Shakespeare wrote several plays set in classical Rome. How would his theater company have costumed Roman Legionaires and Senators? Did they know soldiers of antiquity were outfitted any differently than the contemporary english Army? Did they try to make sure, e.g., Brutus had an accurate toga?

by DisgruntledNumidian
ladameauxcamelias

Interestingly, one of the most useful documents giving us insight into the original staging of Shakespeare’s plays depicts characters from one of his Roman-set plays: the so-called Peacham drawing (c.1595). This contemporary image (https://shakespearestaging.berkeley.edu/system/files/images/1595TAScene.jpg) shows a moment from ‘Titus Andronicus’, Shakespeare’s early Senecan-style Roman tragedy (the one where Titus feeds Tamora her own rapist sons cooked into a pie...). It suggests that costumes of the time combined early modern elements (the Elizabethan-clothed attendant soldiers on the left) and an attempt to evoke Roman dress (Titus in a toga-like robe in the centre). Aaron the Moor on the right would have been a white actor (like Richard Burbage, the first performer to play Othello) in a dyed lambs-wool wig and black make-up (possibly charcoal).

TLDR: Sartorial accuracy was not a priority, it appears, but Shakespeare’s company would have made some effort to convey a sense of historical era and location through costume.