City Flat-cap worn by “Bilious” Bale.
Belgic Britons, Welshmen, Irish, Anglo-Saxons, Danes, and Normans all had worn caps, as well as ancient Greeks and Romans. These English caps had been of divers colors and manifold forms, some being grotesque indeed. When we reach the reign of Henry VIII we are made familiar in the paintings of Holbein with a certain flat-cap which sometimes had a small jewel or leather or a double fold, but never varied greatly. This was known as the city flat-cap.
It is shown also in the Holbein portrait of Adam Winthrop, grandfather of Governor John Winthrop; he was a man of dignity, Master of the Cloth Workers’ Guild.
The muffin-cap of the boys of Christ’s Hospital is a form of this cap.
This was at first and ever a Londoner’s cap. A poet wrote in 1630:—
“Flat caps as proper are to city gowns
As to armour, helmets, or to kings, their crowns.”
Winthrop also wears the city gown.
This flat-cap was often of gay colors, scarlet being a favorite hue.
“Behold the bonnet upon my head
A staryng colour of scarlet red
I promise you a fyne thred
And a soft wool
It cost a noble.”