17th Century Coifs
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Glasgow Museums has a collection of seven seventeeth-century coifs dating from 1600 to 1620. All were collected by Sir William Burrell (1861–1958), although three were not identified as coifs at the time. One was acquired by Burrell as a small cushion, the top of which was made from a coif, and two as rectangular panels of emboridery that had been cut down from coifs, possibly to make them easier for collectors to frame and display.
Coifs, a kind of close-fitting cap, were worn informally at home by women in all levels of society during the 1500s and early-to-mid 1600s. For the majority of the 1500s white linen coifs were favoured, either worn by themselves or under hoods and bonnets. However, in the 1590s to 1620s embroidered linen coifs became fashionable for aristocratic, gentry and wealthy middle-class women to wear at home. Some coifs were embroidered by the wearers or members of their household at home using a pre-drawn design. The Howard Accounts from the 1620s include a payment for ‘drawing 2 coifs for my lady’s and for the cloth 12d’.
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