#elizabethan

Costume designed by Alexandra Byrne for Cate Blanchett in Elizabeth (1998)

This purse measures just 8cm (about 3 inches) long, and it was crafted from silk and metal threads, leather, wire, and glass beads.

Above: frog-shaped purse from England, c.1600-1650 CE, currently housed at the Ashmolean Museum

During the 17th century, purses like these were often created and used as "sweet bags" -- small pouches filled with dried flowers, perfumes, and aromatic powders.

According to the Royal Collection Trust:

Seventeenth century noblemen and women rarely carried money on short day trips, since accounts were settled on a periodic basis. Purses like this one were instead used as 'sweet bags', filled with sweet-smelling powder or dried flowers to perfume the air. Scented travelling accessories were particularly desirable when moving around cities, which often smelt strongly due to open sewers and overcrowded streets. This purse is made in the unusual shape of a frog – a fashionable addition to an expensive outfit.

There are only a few known examples of 17th century purses (or "sweet bags") depicting frogs.

Above: a similar frog purse from England, c.1600-1630 CE, in the Royal Collection Trust

This book also describes how novelty bags were made and used in 17th century England:

Decadent and decorative, novelty bags sprout up in expansive times — when the marketplace is more diverse and playful, and when a wealth of new materials invites design experimentation. Elizabethan novelty bags shaped like animals, grapes, and nuts created drama for their wearers. Like props in a play, they accompanied the exotic feather headdresses and fans to the masque.

Carrying a scented "sweet purse" (a small pouch to perfume your skirts) in the shape of a leaping frog also conveyed a certain learned sophistication, mimicking the natural world with a flourish of fashion.

Above: frog-shaped purse from England, c.1600s, in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Sources & More Info:

Ashmolean Museum: Frog Purse

BBC: The Extraordinary Handbags that are Both Fashion and Art

Royal Collection Trust: Royal Travel: Purse

Royal Collection Trust: Purse

Los Angeles County Museum of Art: Needlecase Frog

Bags and Purses: Seventeenth-Century Sweet Bags and Purses

Isis's Wardrobe: 17th Century Frog Purses

English Embroidery: Frog Purse

Chatsworth House, Derbyshire Dales

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