ABSTRACT
One of the most curious changes in manners during the last two hundred years is the decay of splendour in men's attire. From the beginning of civilisation until toward the end of the eighteenth century rich men displayed their wealth in rich garments, as their wives still do. Pepys, in the time of Charles II, spent far more on his own clothes than on those of his wife. It is an entirely modern custom that only women should dress expensively.
