Topic Description: Luxury Textiles

"LUXURY TEXTILES" for furnishing and dress constituted one of the principal expenditures of any court or noble house and are among the items most frequently cited in the Medici Granducal Archive.

Descriptions of luxury fabrics and trimmings are always indexed, while less circumstantial references are entered only selectively, when the context renders them potentially informative. It is often difficult to determine whether a particular textile was intended for furnishing or dress, since the same products were often used for both purposes.

References to "LUXURY TEXTILES" are often cross-indexed under "COSTUME AND DRESS", "TAPESTRIES AND HANGINGS" and "STATE GIFTS". References to SUMPTUARY LAWS involving textiles are cross-indexed under "ART LEGISLATION".

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