Situated as it is close to North Africa at the western end of the Mediterranean, the Iberian Peninsula provided the most natural route into Europe for influences from the east during the prehistoric period.
Of the costume worn by the original Neolithic inhabitants we have only shell ornaments and stone buttons, some with stems, others conical and prismatic.
The civilizations of Phoenicia, Crete, the Middle East, and those of Greece, Carthage, Etruria must definitely, making allowance for the hazards of primitive trade, have brought certain characteristics of the clothing indicated by Iberian bronzes after the tenth century bc.
Costume
Particularly towards the sixth and fifth centuries, men wore a type of tight shorts, a short tunic like a singlet belted at the waist, and a short cape. Women wore long gowns, sometimes high-cut and fitted, at other times leaving the left shoulder bare, decorated at the arm-holes and above the waist.
Some wore capes with very pointed hoods, while others were enveloped from head to foot in a veil draped over the hair and edged with braid, and yet others wore cylindrical caps from which short veils hung down. Finally, an astonishing statue of a woman making an offering (plate 196) shows a very tall head-dress in the form of a pointed tiara, covered with a sort of cowl (like a caracalld) swathing her shoulders and open from the waist, lying in oblique folds over the chest: this arrangement shows only the oval of her face.
This type of clothing presents striking similarities of detail with costumes worn in other Mediterranean countries. The shorts worn by men recall those of Etruscan military costume, the perizoma, and also those of the Hittite heavy infantry. The short male cape is echoed in Etruria, and the hooded cape is also to be seen among the Scythians and on Gallo-Roman bronzes.
The tall, tiara-shaped head-dress can be related to numerous conical caps of varying heights, examples of which are seen in Etruscan bronzes of the sixth century bc, in figures of Cretan goddesses from the second millennium, and in bronze statuettes of the Syrio-Hittite style from the second half of the second millennium bc. The tall cylindrical cap can be related to that worn by the Hittites during the first millennium.
Reciprocal Influences
These analogies permit us to suppose, until fuller research has been carried out, that the various streams of Mediterranean trade and civilization gave Iberia styles borrowed from Eastern and Central Mediterranean costume, perhaps as early as the second millennium, but more probably in the course of the first. The fragmentary nature of the evidence so far discovered suggests that they were introduced by small groups reaching Iberia either over land or by sea. This hypothesis fits in with what we know of Iberian trade relations during prehistoric times.
Several of the Visigothic kings and queens of Leon depicted in the Codex Aemilianensis in the Escurial, Madrid , are represented with a garment (long tunic or gown) with several flounces, recalling the style of Cretan gowns; however, it is difficult to conclude that Minoan styles had been introduced into Iberia and maintained there under Arab domination, and had then been driven into the northern region with the Visigothic kings of the tenth century. But we may suppose that these tiered garments were introduced into Spain during the Moslem occupation by merchants from Syria, where we know that the women wore skirts of this type, inspired by Cretan elegance.
Written by François Bboucher in "20,000 Years of Fashion - The History of Costume and Personal Adornment", Harry N. Abrams, New York, USA, excerpts pp.131-132. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.