sollers

I forget which writer it was who commented on the tendency of wild, unconventional young men of artistic leanings in the 19th century to wear very broad-brimmed hats to show their wildness and unconventinality - and drew attention to the fact that they were never wild and unconventional enough not to wear a hat at all.

It's hard in the 21st century for some people to realise how universal it was to cover one's head until well into the 20th century. Men, who couldn't use hatpins to anchor their hats, had particular problems, and the accidental loss of one's hat was a source of humour. There's a Punch cartoon concerning a bishop who has lost his hat overboard while crossing the Channel and is trying to find a replacement for his very distinctive headgear; communication with the French shopkeeper doesn't really happen, and he ends up with something like a Pierrot's conical construction on his head. There's a Dornford Yates story that centres on a hat being blown off in the wind and landing on top of a vehicle; the protagonist has to start by buying a replacement, right away.; going around bareheaded was only marginally better than going around without his trousers.

What headgear a man wore could send all sorts of messages, including the situation he was in and his social class; "cloth cap" was synonymous with "working class" (a man of higher status might wear a soft cap in some circumstances but it was often tweed, which didn't count as "cloth). Bowlers, being so hard, were often associated with situations where one might get hit on the head; and were also the symbol of the foreman. Top hats marked status, but posed an obvious problem in theatres, hence the invention of the collapsible "opera hat". For cycling, and for travelling generally, in the late 19th/early 20th century the favoured headgear was the "travelling cap" with earflaps; worn, when cycling, with a Norfolk suit and when travelling often with an Inverness cape - this is what Sherlock Holmes is shown wearing in one Sidney Paget illustration; it was only later that the travelling cap was referred to as a "deerstalker", which is why ACD fans can't find any textual references. These costumes were so normal that they weren't worth mentioning.

The universality of a man covering his head is relevant to a passage I came across the other day (and which prompted these musings) in "Seven Pillars of Wisdom" where T.E. Lawrence expounds on the wearing of Arab clothes:

"..I failed to make a good impression. I was travel-stained and had no baggage with me. Worst of all I wore a native head-cloth, put on as a compliment to the Arabs. Boyle disapproved...

"...The skirts were a nuisance in running up stairs, but the head-cloth was even convenient in such a climate. So I had accepted it when I rode inland and must now cling to it under fire of naval disapproval, till some shop should sell me a cap."

In other words, even strongly disapproved-of headwear was better than none.

The situation was just as strict for women. I remember that even in the 1950s my mother would not go out of the house, even to the corner shop next door but one, without a hat or a headscarf. At the time I dreaded growing up and having to wear a hat as I was under the impression that hatpins worked by nailing the hat to the head (this was based on my experience of hairgrips which felt as if they were attaching my hair to the scalp). How one tied the headscarf sent out signals. Tied under the chin was fairly posh. Working class women used a form that had been widespread during WWII to keep dirt out of the hair and hair out of machinery: fold the scarf diagonally, place the corner over the forehead, bring the ends round and over the corner, tie ends and tuck the corner over them.

Fortunately by the 1960s the rules were changing and the whole thing became optional. I wear hats now, as I did then, for special occasions, to keep my head (and particularly my ears) warm in winter and to keep the sun out of my eyes in the summer. "Special occasions" include Morris dancing: a straw hat with white artificial flowers for North West Clog, and a glorious confection based on a topper bought from a wedding hire firm with a tall mini-garden of artificial flowers, so high that I often have to duck when going through doorways, for Border. When it comes to Morris, exactly the same applies to men, though some sides are more liable to decorate their hats with real flowers. A tall man with really tall decorations (especially if they include pheasant tail feathers) may need to approach the bar in some pubs in a bent-kneed crouch.

But if anybody is writing about any period up to that time, they really need to bear in mind what their characters have on their heads.