Greek national costume runs from the pleated fustanella to the Amalia dress of the royal court. Outings with a host cross mainland Greece and the islands. The sections trace the fustanella, Queen Amalia, the Evzones uniform, Pontic dress and the Lykeion wardrobe in Athens. Four short answers follow. Related reading covers Greek traditions, Greek folk art and Traditional Greek dances. Wider trip planning starts on the page about Greece tours.
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What is the Greek national costume?
The Greek national costume takes two famous forms from the 19th century. For men it is the fustanella, a kilt-like garment. For women it is the Amalia dress. Traditional clothing in Greece also counts the breeches called vraka among its garments.
The Greek national costume belongs to the wider family of folk dress. Such dress signals the cultural, religious or national identity of a people. Clothing linked to one place earns the label of national or regional costume. Those labels sometimes carry official status. Folk dress covers both daily clothes and formal wear.
Under Ottoman rule, every area of the Greek world kept a clothing style of its own. Strict rules on dress covered Christians, Muslims, Jewish communities, clergy and officials under Suleiman the Magnificent. Rural people favoured the fustanella, a traditional garment shaped like a skirt. Klephts, the armed irregulars of that age, wore it as well.
After independence, the new Greek army took up the fustanella with its embroidered waistcoats and jackets. In time that outfit grew into the Greek national costume. Under King Otto, Greeks turned in growing numbers to European garments, while villages held on to older clothing. Ceremonies, feasts and army units kept the pleated uniform in use.
- Mourning: Greeks wear completely black clothing for one full year of mourning.
- Fisherman’s cap: People in Aegean coastal villages commonly wear a cap known as the Greek fisherman’s cap.
- Modern clothes: Since the days of Otto and Amalia, Greek fashion has followed European standards.
Fustanella popularity began to fall by the late 19th century, when Western-style clothing arrived in Greece. Long before that, King Otto had chosen the garment for his personal guard. Evzones, the soldiers of the Presidential Guard, still wear this part of the Greek national costume.
How did the fustanella enter the Greek national costume?
The Greek national costume took its pleated fustanella from a long line of fighters. Byzantine art shows Akritai warriors wearing it, and early 14th-century frescoes in Thessaloniki picture it too. Revolutionary fighters carried it into the Greek War of Independence.
Byzantine fighters wore the full pleated version as a military outfit, seemingly reserved for people of importance. Bows, swords and battle-axes went with it, and a jointed corselet, a fitted body armour, sometimes covered it. A second early fresco of the garment appears in the church of Holy Cross of Agiasmati in Cyprus.
Southern Albanians also fed the Greek national costume. They brought a dress with the fustanella when they migrated into lands of present-day Greece. Klephts and other armed irregulars spread it before the revolution. Its first standardised military use on present-day Greek soil came in 1810, with the British regiment of Zakynthos.
After independence, townspeople traded Turkish-style clothing for this piece of the Greek national costume. It stood for solidarity with the new democracy. In the Crimean War, volunteers of the Greek Volunteer Legion wore it. A demand came in 1855 to swap it for uniforms like the Russian ones. Commander Aristidis Chrisovergis objected and kept his fustanella on.
- Mani: Greeks of Mani wore voluminous trousers by tradition, not the fustanella.
- Hydra: Hydriotes wore costumes like those of other islanders rather than the fustanella.
- Crete: Local theatre productions on Crete tied the fustanella to the heroes of the 1821 war.
The hem of the Greek national costume changed with time. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, skirts fell below the knee and met the boots. Later, during the Bavarian regency, skirts rose above the knee and went with hose and decorative clogs.
Which queen gave the Greek national costume its Amalia dress?
The Greek national costume owes its female form to the duchess Amalia of Oldenburg. She was the Queen of Greece from 1836 to 1862. Arriving as queen in 1837, she soon shaped social life and fashion in her new country.
Amalia was born on 21 December 1818 in Oldenburg, the first child of Duke Paul Frederick Augustus. She lost her mother before she was two years old. On 22 December 1836 she married King Otto in Oldenburg, in both a Lutheran and a Catholic ceremony. She arrived in Athens on 14 February 1837.
She saw that her clothes ought to match those of her new people. From that idea came a romantic court dress with a folk look. It grew into the Greek national costume for women and still carries her name. During those years the royal couple lived in a small house.
Queen Amalia arranged balls at court and rode in and around Athens. Those pastimes were common among upper-class women of Western Europe but new in Greece. She also worked for social improvement and the creation of gardens in Athens. Alongside the Greek national costume, she brought the Christmas tree to Greece.
- Regent: She governed as regent in 1850-1851 and again in 1861-1862 while Otto was away.
- Faith: She kept her Protestant faith throughout Otto’s reign, though nearly all Greeks were Orthodox.
- Exile: An uprising drove the couple out of Greece in 1862, and she lived on in Bavaria.
The court that saw the birth of the Greek national costume was mostly German. The diarist Christiane Lüth, who saw Amalia in 1839-40, called her small and lively. Her chamberlain and chief lady-in-waiting were a German couple. Her sister Frederike stayed with her until 1843.
What does the Evzones uniform keep of the Greek national costume?
The Greek national costume lives on in the Evzones uniform, worn by the Presidential Guard in Athens. This ceremonial infantry unit is the final Evzone force left in the Hellenic Army. Civilian staff sew every uniform by hand in workshops at its camp.
The fermeli, the waistcoat of this Greek national costume, carries traditional designs in white or gilt thread. Yellow stripes on its lower sleeves mark rank, with two for sergeants and one for corporals. Blue and white fringes, called krossia, repeat the colours of the Greek flag. Black silk garters and white woollen stockings complete the lower leg.
Officers of the Presidential Guard wear a version closer to the original dress of the klephts. Their fustanella hangs longer. Their Tyrian purple fermeli carries gold embroidery, and red-and-gold gaiters cover the lower leg. This officer form of the Greek national costume ends in red boots called stavalia.
In 1833 Evzones wore an unpopular Bavarian style of blue trousers, tailcoats and a shako hat. King Otto, first ruler of modern Greece, wore the fustanella uniform in public. A khaki field uniform replaced the red cap and dark blue jacket in 1910. Greek boys still dress up as tsoliades, or Evzones, on Greek Independence Day.
- Doulamas: This long everyday tunic comes in a navy blue winter version and a light khaki summer one.
- Formal days: Full formal dress appears on Sundays, important national holidays and visits by foreign dignitaries.
- Cold weather: A dark blue cape goes over the uniform when the weather turns very cold.
Recruits for this Greek national costume are all volunteers from the Hellenic Army’s Infantry Corps. A height of at least 1.87 metres is required. In 2018 Saint George of Ioannina, nicknamed Fustanellas after the garment, became the patron saint of the Guard.
How does Pontic dress widen the Greek national costume?
The Greek national costume has a separate branch in Pontic clothing, the dress of the Pontic Greeks. Its forms changed from region to region across the Pontos. Matzouka and Santa, two such areas, kept clothing traditions that stood apart from the rest.
A woman’s Greek national costume in the Pontos centred on her zoupouna. This garment resembled a dress and used wool or cotton for everyday wear. It buttoned at the front and stayed open there and at the sides. Girls began wearing it at around 15. The shape recalls the dalmatica, a garment of Byzantine dress.
Hats marked age in this branch of the Greek national costume. From 16, young women wore small disc-shaped hats. The tapla carried gold coins, and the tepelik an embossed gold or silver plate. The koursin had golden thread and a matching tassel. A light kerchief also covered their heads. Older women chose dark headscarves.
Pontian men began adopting the zipka, the traditional Laz costume, in the 1800s. It paired dark wool trousers with a white shirt, a vest and an overcoat. A black head covering called a pashlik tied around the head. The zipka went with warfare, with an ammo belt and sheaths for daggers.
- Home sewing: Families made the bulk of their clothing at home, weaving, dyeing and sewing the fabric themselves.
- Hatmakers: Milliners, known as kalpakzides, made the headwear of Pontian communities.
- Jewellery: A gerdanluk combined chains, beads and coins, fixed around the neck like a collar.
Today this branch of the Greek national costume appears mainly at dances and cultural festivals. Its modern form blends local clothing traditions, rebuilt from photographs and surviving garments. City merchants were among the Pontian men who took up European clothes, known as stana.
Which women’s society keeps a wardrobe of Greek national costume?
The Greek national costume has a home in the Central Lykeion ton Ellinidon in Athens. Its rich, historic wardrobe holds men’s and women’s national dress. This Hellenic women’s organisation exists mainly to keep and promote Greek cultural heritage.
Callirhoe Siganou-Parren, a pioneer of Greek feminism, founded this keeper of Greek national costume in 1911. She focused on the right to education and employment. Born in Rethymno on Crete, she trained as a teacher at the Arsakeion School, graduating in 1878. In 1887 she started the Ladies’ Journal, a newspaper run entirely by women.
The Lykeion runs 56 annexes across Greece, 14 bureaus abroad and 4 bureaus in Cyprus. Volunteering, social action and research-based care of heritage drive its work. Beside that wardrobe of Greek national costume, its Folk Dance Group performs in Greece and abroad. It also publishes and organises events and traditional dancing classes.
During the Balkan Wars, it supported the families of deployed men and arranged hospital equipment and nurse training. In the Greco-Italian War, it wrote to soldiers and sent supplies. During the Axis Occupation, it ran soup kitchens and gave supplies to children and mothers. The International Association of Lyceum Clubs helped with that work.
- Feminist press: Her Ladies’ Journal appeared as an eight-page weekly until 1908, then turned bi-monthly.
- University: She lobbied successfully for the admission of women to the University of Athens.
- Welfare: She founded welfare bodies for women between 1890 and 1896, including a Sunday School.
Parren also wrote a history of Greek women between 1650 and 1860. Her Union of Greek Women, founded in 1896, sewed uniforms for soldiers in the war of 1897. The Lykeion, home of this Greek national costume wardrobe, has its headquarters on Dimokritou Street in Kolonaki.
What do travellers ask about the Greek national costume, and what are the answers?
The Greek national costume reaches past the fustanella and the Amalia dress. Nomadic Sarakatsani herders and the Island uniform of the Presidential Guard add other styles. The fieldwork of Ioanna Papantoniou and folklore museums in Drama and Serres keep its record.
Who studied the Greek national costume in the field?
Ioanna Papantoniou, a Greek folklorist and costume designer, did extensive fieldwork from 1956 until the 1980s. She worked across Greece, Cyprus and communities in Italy. She also wrote publications on Greek local costumes and fashion. She gave nearly all her property, with her folklore collection, to her Nafplion foundation.
Which shepherd people wore a Greek national costume of their own?
The Sarakatsani, Greek-speaking nomadic herders, stand apart through their settlements, dress and costumes. The leading theory ties their name to the Turkish word karakaçan, used for people who dressed in black. Embroidery on their costumes echoes geometric art from Greece before the classical age. Men wore either trousers or the fustanella, following local tradition.
What is the Island uniform in the Greek national costume?
The Presidential Guard sometimes wears a royal blue and red uniform. It draws on the male dress of the Aegean Islands. It has blue breeches called vraka, a Cretan knife and white thigh-high boots. Its wearer is called a Vrakoforos, meaning a wearer of breeches.
Which northern museums hold Greek national costume?
The Folklore Museum of Drama was launched by the Lyceum Club of Greek Women. It holds authentic folk costumes from the area and the rest of Greece. In Serres, the Sarakatsani Folklore Museum shows costume varieties for women and men. The private Hadzilia museum there, opened in 1998, has a section on traditional dress.
Featured photo: Joanbanjo, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.