THE HISTORY OF BUTTONS

History has not preserved the name of the genius who first invented buttons and buttonholes, especially since there were probably several such geniuses in different parts of the world. The first objects resembling buttons—small round pieces with two holes for fastening to clothing—were found in India in the Indus Valley and date back to the third millennium BCE (approximately 2800–2600 BCE). Similar objects from the Bronze Age were found in China (around 2000–1500 BCE) as well as in ancient Rome and Greece. However, these were most likely merely decorations, serving no functional purpose. The earliest decorative plaques, made from shells, were discovered in Mohenjo-Daro in the Indus Valley. They have a curved shape and were crafted about 5,000 years ago.

The transition from purely decorative item to functional hardware in clothing was just one step away. It's easy to imagine an ancient Chinese or Greek person dealing with a torn garment and, in a pinch, perhaps fastening it by threading a decorative plaque through a nearby hole. The impromptu creation was both attractive and convenient, and wouldn't irritate the skin either. Yet, costume historians unanimously assert that the earliest buttons were not used for fastening in this way.

By late antiquity, people had already figured out what could be done with buttons. Although we usually imagine an ancient Greek tunic fastened with a brooch, by the fourth century BCE, the Greeks preferred to attach them on the shoulder using a button and loop. The Scythians and Romans sewed buttons onto the straps that secured their armor as buttons held up much better in battle than ties and ribbons, a fact confirmed by numerous archeological finds.

Armor makers especially appreciated the button-loop combination as it allowed them to securely fasten the flaps of a knight's armor. The order in which these flaps overlapped was important. A warrior approached the enemy with his left shoulder forward, protected by a shield. It was crucial that the left flap overlapped the right so the enemy's sword wouldn't slide into the gap between them. Thus, the male style of fastening buttons was born, a style that persists to this day.

However, by the early Middle Ages, many of the achievements of antiquity were unfortunately forgotten and lost, including the use of buttons. For several centuries, clothing was fastened with ties and hooks, much as it had in ancient times as well. It wasn’t until the thirteenth century that buttons with loops for fastening clothes reappeared in Germany. Around the same time, form-fitting men's suits came into fashion. From the collar to the waist and on the sleeves from wrist to elbow, these suits were literally covered in buttons, sometimes numbering in the hundreds. A fifteenth-century chronicle mentions four tunics given to the widow of a nobleman executed by the Duke of Milan. Each tunic had between 40 and 126 gold buttons. But that was, by no means, the maximum number ever sewn on clothing at that time! It is known that the French ‘knight-king’ Francis I, who reigned from 1515 to 1547, ordered 13,600 gold buttons to adorn a velvet suit.

By then, the history of buttons had come full circle, and they were once again considered decorative items. Crafted from gold, silver, precious stones, and ivory, they symbolized wealth and high social status, and thus, buttons quickly became one of the most popular men’s accessories. This trend, though, was largely exclusive to men—women still preferred pins and clasps at that time. It wasn’t until much later that buttons appeared on women’s dresses and skirts. In fact, up until the nineteenth century, around 70 per cent of the buttons used in garments were used on men’s clothing. Buttons were sewn on the left side to make it easier for the servants assisting their mistresses to manage them. Although women, like men, have long dressed themselves, fastenings on the ‘women's side’ have remained to this day.

Among the Slavs, buttons initially served as a kind of magical amulet, a charm to ward off evil. They often placed a small stone or pellet inside a hollow protective button that softly jingled as the wearer walked. Usually, this button was sewn onto clothing purely for decorative purposes, without fastening anything, and it had no practical function.

Belief in the mystical powers of buttons persisted among the people even in relatively recent times. In 1931, the London newspaper the Sunday Times published an article titled ‘The Button of the Murdered Tsar’, reporting that in Ufa Province, a peasant was arrested by the Cheka for possessing a ‘magic button’ allegedly belonging to Nicholas II. The peasant was treating all the sick in Ufa with the tsar's button and was eventually accused of counter-revolutionary activities.

On the other hand, the tin buttons that Peter the Great ordered to be sewn onto the cuffs of soldiers' uniforms had a dual purpose: they not only fastened the cuffs to the sleeves, preventing them from hanging loosely, but they also discouraged soldiers from wiping their mouths on their sleeves after meals, keeping the fabric cleaner and reducing wear and tear. However, using tin buttons in Russia was difficult because of the low durability of tin in prolonged cold weather.

According to legend, tin buttons even played a significant role in Napoleon's defeat during the War of 1812. Tin does not withstand freezing temperatures: below minus 13–15°C, tin pestiTin pest is the formation of tin in the phase of α‑tin, which specifically happens in pure tin that transforms from white β‑tin to gray α‑tin at temperatures below 13.2°C. In this phase, tin is a structurally weak and easily crumbly powder. occurs, where tin changes its structure, turning gray and crumbling into powder. As a result, the buttons on French uniforms disintegrated. Napoleon's soldiers, unaware of this property, literally had their pants falling down during the Russian winter!

In the sixteenth century, buttons made from Venetian glass, crafted using a special technique, became fashionable, and even the famous Russian scientist Mikhail Lomonosov opened a factory to produce such buttons. However, his product was not very popular because at that time most wealthy Russians preferred buttons made of gold or silver.

The fashion trends in buttons depended not only on their beauty but also on the rarity and cost of the materials used to make them. Today, aluminum buttons seem cheap and ordinary to us, but in the mid-nineteenth century, aluminum was extremely rare and highly valued. In fact, French Emperor Napoleon III (emperor of France from 1852 to 1870) ordered a ceremonial coat with incredibly expensive aluminum buttons.

An unexpected boost to button production came from Queen Victoria of England. After being widowed in 1861, she issued a special decree regarding funeral procedures, which included a requirement for the mourning attire of widows to feature opaque black buttons. In the queen's own mourning clothes, natural agate served this purpose, but millions of widows needed strict buttons covered with black fabric or made of dark glass. A factory in Gablonz (Bohemia) specialized in producing the latter, finding a surprising use for its glass products.

Buttons were (and in some ways still are) not just decorative items—they also serve as emblems of occupational affiliation. Departmental buttons were used for uniforms of various ministries, provincial and city administrations, military and naval units, educational institutions, and so on. By looking at a button on a uniform, one could determine which department the official wearing it belonged to, the years they had served, and roughly what rank they held. Under Nicholas I (emperor of Russia from 1825 to 1855), who introduced departmental buttons, almost all officials of the empire—from watchmen to the state chancellor—wore uniforms with specific buttons.

Uniform buttons with crests became a popular ‘currency’ for children, who played with buttons, using them with flattened loops as game pieces, much like knucklebones. The higher the ‘rank’ of the button, the more valuable it was. For example, one gilded general's button with an eagle could be traded for a bag of simple brass soldier’s buttons. Buttons modified for these games were called loops.

In the novel Sylvia’s Lovers by the English writer Elizabeth Gaskell, set in the late eighteenth century, one of the characters laments: ‘Silk weavers has been petitioning Ministers t' make a law to favour silk buttons; and I did hear tell as there were informers goin' about spyin' after metal buttons, and as how they could haul yo' before a justice for wearing on 'em.' 'A were wed in 'em, and a'll wear 'em to my dyin' day, or a'll wear noane at a'. They're for making such a pack o' laws, they'll be for meddling wi' my fashion o' sleeping next, and taxing me for ivery snore a give. They've been after t' winders, and after t' vittle, and after t' very saut to 't; it's dearer by hauf an' more nor it were when a were a boy: they're a meddlesome set o' folks, law-makers is, an' a'll niver believe King George has ought t' do wi' 't. But mark my words; I were wed wi' brass buttons, and brass buttons a'll wear to my death, an' if they moither me about it, a'll wear brass buttons i' my coffin!’

Button laws weren’t only passed in England. As we’ve already mentioned, buttons were often seen not as a functional element of clothing but as a form of decoration. For example, in the Protestant Netherlands, Germany, and Switzerland during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, buttons often came under strict Protestant bans on ‘luxury’. To this day, the Amish, who are the descendants of settlers from those regions who strictly follow the religious rules of their ancestors in the modern day in the US, do not use buttons. They fasten their handwoven clothing with hooks and loops because they firmly believe that buttons lead to immorality and depravity, as written in the treatises of Reformation-era preachers.

Silk buttons became quite fashionable during the Victorian era as they were transformed into sachets infused with different fragrances. These buttons were made from dense fabric soaked in essential oils. Worn by wealthy individuals, they were often passed down as valuable heirlooms.

Elsa Schiaparelli, a trendsetter in Parisian women's fashion in the 1930s, pioneered the trend of plastic buttons. In collaboration with Jean Clément, a graduate of an art school with a solid background in chemistry, they created an extraordinary variety of buttons in previously unseen shapes and colors, including phosphorescent ones. They made buttons shaped like fruits (lemons, oranges, grapefruits) as well as ballerina figurines, spoons, Christmas bells, horses, shoelaces, and paper clips. These designs had a surreal touch and were meant to adorn any part of an outfit where a button could fit—even hats! Elsa's ‘Madame Schiap’ boutique on Place Vendôme became hugely popular. It was said that fashionistas took as much pleasure in wearing the buttons purchased there as the designers did in creating them.

Let us return for a moment to the informative role of buttons, and a good example to illustrate their use is the poem ‘The Brown Button’ by E. Dolmatovsky, which became a song during Stalin-era spy paranoia. It tells the story of a young pioneer who finds a foreign-made button on the road and uncovers a foreign spy. While this story may seem humorous now, finding a foreign button in the Soviet Union was truly rare. Even in underground workshops of the 1970s and 1980s, where counterfeit ‘branded’ jeans were produced, buttons were often removed from old, unusable Levi’s and Wrangler jeans. There was simply no other way to obtain American fasteners in the Soviet Union.

There have also been some unusual customs associated with buttons. For example, in England, wealthy families traditionally gave buttons to girls as gifts from a very young age. The most unique and beautiful buttons were strung together on what was called a ‘love string’. It was believed that a girl who collected 999 buttons on her string would soon meet her true love.

Additionally, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, ‘hair buttons’ woven from human hair were made. More rarely, a small lock of hair was placed inside a glass button. These buttons became associated with mourning as they were often made from the hair of a loved one—a parent, spouse, or child—before their burial.

There are also several superstitions also tied to buttons. Losing a button is said to bring bad luck, while finding one brings good fortune. In the past, when chimney sweeps were a familiar sight on the streets, people would try to touch their buttons to make a wish. Even today, street sculptures of chimney sweeps often have polished shiny buttons, worn down from countless hopeful touches. However, sewing a missing button onto your clothes while still wearing them is thought to invite trouble as it is said you will likely forget something important.

And if after reading this article, you dream of many bright and beautiful buttons, rejoice—according to many dream interpretations, it's a sure sign of wealth in your future!

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