Macaroni (fashion)

Amacaroni(formerly spelledmaccaroni) was a pejorative term used to describe a fashionable fellow of 18th-century Britain. Stereotypically, men in the macaronisubculturedressed, spoke, and behaved in an unusuallyepiceneandandrogynousmanner.
The term "macaroni" pejoratively referred to a man who "exceeded the ordinary bounds of fashion"in terms ofhigh-end clothing, fastidious eating, andgambling. He mixed Continental affectations with his British nature, like a practitioner ofmacaronic verse(which mixed English and Latin to comic effect), laying himself open to satire.
The macaronis became seen instereotypedterms in Britain, being seen as a symbol of inappropriatebourgeoisexcess,effeminacy, and possiblehomosexuality- which was then legally viewed assodomy.At the time, homosexuality was frowned upon, and was even punishable by death. Many modern critics view the macaroni as representing a general change in 18th-century British society such as political change,class consciousness, newnationalisms,commodification, andconsumer capitalism.
The macaroni was theGeorgian eraprecursor to thedandyof theRegencyandVictorian eras.
In the 18th century, wealthy young British men traditionally took a trip around Europe upon theircoming of age, known as theGrand Tour. Italy was a key destination of these tours. During their trip, many developed a taste formaccaroni, a type ofpastalittle known in Britain then, and so they were said to belong to theMacaroni Club,founded in 1764 by those returning from the Grand Tour.They would refer to anything that was fashionable orà la modeas "very maccaroni".
The Italian termmaccherone, when figuratively meaning "blockhead, fool", was apparently not related to this British usage, though both were derived from the name of the pasta shape.
AuthorHorace Walpolewrote to a friend in 1764 of "the Macaroni Club [Almack's], which is composed of all the travelled young men who wear long curls and spying-glasses".The expression was particularly used to characterize "fops" who dressed in high fashion with tall, powderedwigswith achapeau-brason top that could only be removed on the point of a sword.
TheMacaroni suit, made up of a shorter, tighter fitting coat, colourful stockings, and shoes adorned with large buckles, and, fastened in a large bow, theMacaroni cravat, made from lace-edged muslin, were developed and worn in the 1770s.A prominently large nosegay of flowers was often worn (on the left side of the chest or shoulder of the coat), along with a very small tricorne style hat.
The shop of engravers and printsellersMary and Matthew Darlyin the fashionableWest End of Londonsold their sets of satirical "macaroni" caricature prints, published between 1771 and 1773. The new Darly shop became known as "the Macaroni Print-Shop".
Design historian Peter McNeil links macaroni fashion to thecrossdressingof the earliermolly subculture, and says "some macaronis may have utilized aspects of high fashion in order to affect new class identities, but others may have asserted what we would now label aqueeridentity".
In 1773,James Boswellwas on tour in Scotland with the stout and serious-minded essayist andlexicographerDr.Samuel Johnson, the least dandifiedof Londoners. Johnson was awkward in the saddle, and Boswell ribbed him: "You are a delicate Londoner; you are a maccaroni; you can't ride."
InOliver Goldsmith'sShe Stoops to Conquer(1773), a misunderstanding is discovered and young Marlow finds that he has been mistaken; he cries out, "So then, all's out, and I have been damnably imposed on. O, confound my stupid head, I shall be laughed at over the whole town. I shall be stuck up in caricatura in all the print-shops. The Dullissimo Maccaroni. To mistake this house of all others for an inn, and my father's old friend for an innkeeper!"
The song "Yankee Doodle" from the time of theAmerican Revolutionary Warmentions a man who "stuck a feather in his hat and called it macaroni." Dr. Richard Shuckburgh was a British surgeon and also the author of the song's lyrics; the joke which he was making was that theYankeeswere naive and unsophisticated enough to believe that a feather in the hat was a sufficient mark of a macaroni. Whether or not these were alternative lyrics sung in the British army, they were enthusiastically taken up by the Americans themselves.