The Armour Archive

Okay....my search fu is seriously weak today.....looking for info and perhaps patterns on how to make the linen head coverings commonly worn circa 1360ish.

What, specifically, are you looking for? You could do with "dressing" your hair, as in doing it up in braids. Or you could go with a veil and wimple. Do you have a picture?

If you're looking for veil and wimple, I usually just use my standard napkin size (because I have tons of them kicking around the house and they look fine). They're both 24"x42".

First, I tie a kerchief to my head, Aunt Jemima style. Then I pin the wimple on to it, under my chin, tucked into the dress. Then the veil pins on over it.

But don't stop there, there are lots of possibilities, if you can describe more of what you're looking for!

RH020 - 14th century Women's Accessories - including hood with and without liripipe, shift or smock, hose (cloth stockings), veil, wimple, and instructions for arranging your hair in braids 14th century style.



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I'd also recommend <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0896762394?ie=UTF8&tag=suggestion-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0896762394">Medieval Tailor's Assistant: Making Common Garments 1200-1500</a> for patterns and arrangement techniques -- mostly it's a bunch of flat pieces of fabric (my wimples tend to be big rectangles, and my veils are somewhat elongated half-circles).

There's also a really good series of photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/racaire/se ... 406367893/ that may help you figure out how to assemble a 14th century set of linen head-coverings. http://www.virtue.to/articles/veils.html is pretty useful, too.

I'd point you to a good clear photo of how I typically set up my veil & wimple for when I'm doing the 14th century thing, but there aren't a whole lot of photos of me to pick from (more by design than by accident, I'm not terribly photogenic and prefer to be in the background at events, anyway -- that, and I like the anonymity of not being recognized in-person everywhere I go).

Anyway, I am in this photo; I'm the woman standing up, arms folded (to better conceal the digital camera I'm carrying, hee!) Char, do you mind if borrow this photo as an illustration?

It's kind of a later-in-the-day sort of image, and I hadn't done anything to fine-tune or touch-up the setup since that morning -- so the veil is slightly askew, but the wimple looks relatively even.

Here's how I construct it ...

I use one of my husband's linen coifs as the first layer. (The bands -- like the filet that the lady at the far right in this photo is wearing under her silk veil -- tend to give me a headache if I wear them all day, and the coif just seems to do a better job of holding things together in the long run. Some women use a square piece of fabric and tie it behind their heads, like a modern head-kerchief; I like having the extra support tied under my chin, rather than at the back of my head where it's more inclined to slip off. Your mileage may vary.)

For the wimple, I take a long rectangular piece of cloth, set the middle right under my chin, and pin it to the top of the coif, kind of far back on my head.

Then, the veil, and pin it to the coif more towards the front edge -- one above each temple, one above my forehead; the veil conceals the top of the wimple, and (I believe) all of the coif.

The whole headdress only uses about five pins, but it's quite solid, and if I want to take it off quickly (or if it falls off on its own), it goes off all at once -- I don't have to fuss around in front of a mirror to take apart every last bit. It'd cover a modern haircut quite capably, too.

On the use of coifs by women:

http://m-silkwork.blogspot.com/2008/11/womens-caps.html

and there´s an extant one, you can read all about it in:

Dahl, C.L. & I. Sturtewagen, 2008, The Cap of St. Birgitta, Medieval Clothing and Textiles vol. IV, pp. 99-129.

The style I wear for SCA events would be exceedingly appropriate for the 1360s. This was take a couple of weeks ago at Pennsic:



There's a lot going on there, but the upshot is that I have a rectangle of hemmed linen, a tablet-woven fillet (woven so beautifully by Charlotte J), and some fake braids that I sewed into submission and attached to the inside of the fillet (I encased them in same-colored silk as the fillet and sewed them in as a semi-permanent solution). I used research by Maitresse Muriel de Chimay for this effort. I then use straight pins to attach the veil to the fillet and plop it down on my head. Voila, instant appropriate headwear. And documentable!

It takes some time and effort to get this sort of getup together, but I find it super-worth it because my real hair is way too short to braid like that. The effect is completed with good headgear.

-Tasha

This was just such the information I was hoping for! I have "very" short hair that I will be needing to conceal. Thank you all sooooo much.

You could also wear the white turban thingy that is always showing up.

http://www.larsdatter.com/baths.htm

but someone else will have to tell you how to fold and tie it on, I always end up looking like I should be on a syrup bottle.

LadyRed wrote:You could also wear the white turban thingy that is always showing up.

http://www.larsdatter.com/baths.htm

but someone else will have to tell you how to fold and tie it on, I always end up looking like I should be on a syrup bottle.

Bwahahaha! I always end up looking more Middle Eastern than anything. I'd like to get that look down, though. Then...garb to go with the head wrap!

(Yes, I bought several 14th C head coverings without even owning the dresses to go with them! What can I say, I like head gear. At least I promise not to wear them with Viking or ME garb, lol!)