Stola This created the illusion of layers, a symbol of wealth and status. Stolas were made in a variety of colors including red, yellow, and blue. Decorations were also added to the neckline and hem. For common women, these would be a simple band of color or pattern. For wealthier women, more details and embellishments were used. A wide ornamental border called an instita was often used around the neckline and hem as a display of wealth. Stola The stola was the traditional garment of Roman women, corresponding to the toga, that was worn by men. The stola was usually woollen.
The Man of the Crowd dress, too, is contradictory: his linen is dirty but ‘of beautiful texture’, and through a tear in his cloak the narrator glimpses a diamond and a dagger.” “The Man of the Crowd” stands as a transitional work between the haunting Gothic tales of the late 1830s and the ratiocinative fiction of the early forties, possessing obvious qualities of both. This story is also the beginnings of Poe's detective stories. Walter Benjamin writes that "[The Man of the Crowd] is something like an X-ray of a detective story. It does away with all the drapery that a crime represents. Only the