Circlets and frilled headwear

Fig. 1 - ca. 1380, Koolskamp.

Fig. 2 - ca. 1360-1400, Gent.

In the Southern Low Countries (the current region of Flanders) it appears that frilled veils were often worn together with a circlet during the late 14th century. This style appears namely on stone sculptures such as funerary monuments and decorative achitectural elements. Presumably this style was worn mainly by the noble elites and possibly also the urban upper echelons, as the coronets were made of (precious) metal and thus would have been quite costly. The circlet was worn underneath the veil, so that is was visible only accross the forehead. The circlets were decorated with ornate floral elements in varying sizes.You can find some more examples here.

Fig. 3 - Male head, ca. 1300 (?), Gent.

I've been wanting to have exactly such a circlet for quite some time now, to wear with my own frilled veil. Because the circlets in the images with frilled veils are largely obscured, I collected some photos where they are more clearly visible.

Fig. 4 - Naked woman, 1301-1315, Freiburg im Breisgau.

Fig. 5 - Console, female head, 1401-1500, Schweinfurt.

Fig. 6 - Fountain mask in bronze, ca. 1400, Nuerenberg.

The next step will be to find extant examples of similar flower shaped rozettes or completely preserved circlets to base a replica on. And save mony to pay for it, not quite unimportant!

Many thanks goes to Ewa for sending me Fig. 4-6.

More from Visby: frilled veils

Wile I was sorting through our old posts on the blog, I found a post I started about my lecture on frilled headwear I did in Visby, Sweden, back in August. I then totally forgot about it, and never got round to actually posting it. Here are just a few pictures of the lecture in the Kapittelhusgarden, a medieval restaurant/tavern in Visby, situated in one of the oldest buildings of the town. I also included some screenshots of the slides of the powerpoint.

The presentation's scope was frilled headwear in North-Western Europe, with some small exursions to Northern Italy.

The setting of the scene in the Kapittelhusgarden.

I talked about the terminology that was used to name frilled veils during the late Middle Ages in different European languages. I am currently writing an article specifically on this subject, so I won't be giving away too much about the subject yet!

Besides the subject of terminology and general background of the fashion of frilled veils, a large part of the lecture was dedicated to the construction of frilled veils and reconstructing them. I tried to include as much images of original frilled veil finds, and also brought reconstruction samples for the audience to study.

The lecture was a lot of fun to do! I want to thank everybody who attended and hope to meet all of you again!

Maria's frilled veils

I promised photos of Maria wearing her frilled veils in Visby. Sadly we didn't have time to make them, as she was organizing and running around all the event solving problems and making everything go smoothly. So she sent me some pictures yesterday taken in her home in Stockholm.
To see the making of of the veils click here and here.