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| Third time's the charm. |
The coif pattern is a custom-sized version of the Patterns of Fashion 4 16th/17th century coifs that I used before. The forehead cloth is based on two examples in the Met; both forehead cloths from the last quarter of the 16th century. They are triangular pieces of linen, each 14.5" x 16.5", one of which has short ties on the two corners adjacent to the hypotenuse. Zoomed in, the grain of the cloth indicates that these were cut as half-squares, the long edge falling on the bias.
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| Coif and forehead cloth. |
The linen is, yet again, 3.5 oz lightweight from Fabric-store.com, the lace is from The Tudor Tailor Etsy store, and the ties are (bleached) 1/4" linen tapes from Burnley and Trowbridge.
So a coif makes sense to me to wear. Whats with the forehead cloth? Doesnt it make more sense to have the coif fit the head? Or do sometimes you only wear the forehead cloth like at home or something?
ReplyDeleteIt also looks like it would shift all the time. Very confused!
I need to wear it more to gather my own data, but the two schools of thought I am aware of are that the forehead cloth helps keep the coif from slipping off the back of the head (more friction with cloth on cloth than cloth on hair), and that it keeps the coif cleaner (by being in less direct contact with the hair).
Delete... Ok that makes sense. So were coifs MORE decorated at times of forehead scarves?
DeleteThe surviving examples of coifs tend to be very highly decorated (which is probably related to why those specific coifs got saved): all-over blackwork or polychrome embroidery, lace trim, sometimes even metallic lace. So far as I've been able to find, extent forehead cloths are much rarer, though again the ones we do see are covered in embroidery. One proposed explanation I've seen for the dichotomy is that the forehead cloths took more abuse during wear.
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