Monmouth Cap
Entry by TJ Harmon (known in the Society as Philippe de Lyon)
Introduction:
I had originally planned for this project to be a complete outfit based on finds from the Mary Rose. It was to include a linen shirt and pants, wool pullover jerkin, knitted flat cap and knitted socks. I have some experience with hand sewing so I decided to start with the knitting as I have never hand knitted before. I went to my lady wife Melisande de Westemere and asked her if she would show me how to knit a pair of socks. She suggested I start with a hat for my first project. I told her that was wonderful; there was a hat that I wanted to do as well. I then showed her a lovely picture of a knitted flat cap from the Mary Rose. She told me that was very nice but suggested we start with a Monmouth cap instead. So we did. And I am working on it still. As of today I have almost 80 hours into this project and it is not completed. I do expect it to be done in time for A&S ( the had was completed in time for the regional and has not been modified).
The Monmouth Cap:
The Monmouth cap is a round woolen cap that is knitted. Monmouth caps are associated with both soldiers and sailors and were quite popular in the 16th and 17th centuries. This point is illustrated by a sixteenth century poem called the Ballad of the caps. It included a verse on the Monmouth cap.
“The soldiers that the Monmouth wear
On Castle tops their Ensigns rear;
The Sea-man with his thrum doth stand
On higher parts than all the land.
For any Cap, what ere it bee,
Is still the sign of some degree.1
“The earliest surviving reference to a "Monmouth cape" dates from 1576, in a letter from Lord Gilbert Talbot of Goodrich Castle to his father, the Earl of Shrewsbury, accompanying a new year's gift of a cap. By that time, the caps were popular enough to have their own name, and considered to be suitable gifts between noblemen.”2
This is a picture of the 16th Century Monmouth Cap in the Monmouth Museum. It is the earliest known surviving Monmouth cap.
Knitting:
The knitted goods aboard the Mary Rose were knitted in the round on 4 double pointed needles3. These needles had a point on both end. By using 4 needles you were able to knit a round tube. In his book “A History of Hand Knitting”, Richard Rutt talks about the use of the 4 needles at length and shows paintings where the Madonna is shown using the 4 needles to knit a shirt4.
Among researchers into historic knitting, there is an ongoing debate about the use of the purl stitch. One group says that purling is post period. Another group claims the purl stitch was not used until the 16th century. Certainly the purl stitch was in use by the 16th century. There is a row of purl stitch showing on the surviving Monmouth cap. The socks on the Mary Rose have several rows of Garter Stitch showing5. There is also extensive use of the purl stitch in the decorations on the Eleanor of Toledo stockings. I think this more than proves the use of the pearl stitch during the 16th century.
My Cap:
I downloaded instructions from the internet for knitting a Monmouth cap. I decided not to use the pattern but to make my own.
The first cap I knitted was intended as a prototype. It was done on a pair of modern circular needles using hand spun brown wool. I had been told the wool would shrink about 20% when it was fullered. I did a test gauge and found that with the #10 needles and using the hand spun yarn I had a gauge of 3 stiches per needle horizontally and almost 4 vertically. I measure my head at 20 inches in circumference. At that gauge I needed 60 stitches and with the expected shrinkage I cast on 80 stitches. I then knitted 10 rows, pearled one row, knitted 10 more rows, and then I rolled the brim up and knitted the top and bottom of the brim together. I then knitted 10 more rows. Now I started turning the cap. I knitted the next row but I knitted two together on every 8th stitch. I then knitted a normal row. I next knitted another row knitting together every seventh stitch and then a normal row of knit. This continued till I was down to 8 stiches remaining. I then took a yarn needle and ran the working yarn through the remaining stiches and tied them off with the knot inside the hat. This little lump formed the button. Finally I used the yarn needle to weave the tail from the starting of the piece through the band. I knotted the tail and then did finger loop braiding on the tail and tied it off on to itself to form the loop.
This all sounds easy and straight forward. And it was the 4th time. The 3 previous attempts were ripped out because I had dropped stitches or I did not have the brim lined up properly and it rolled and puckered very badly.
The finished hat was too short. It would not go down all the way over my ears, and the band was too large.
The next step to this hat was to fuller it. I tried to do it in hot water by itself and could not get it to work. It was suggested to me to use soap with the hot water and that did the trick. I decided to reduce the size of the headband by felting it. I scrubbed the hat in hot soapy water. I would then squeeze out the water and dunk it in cold water. I would squeeze out as much of the cold water as I could and then I would start the process over. After about a half hour of this I had the hat felted down to the size I wanted. I removed as much water as I could and put the hat on my head to dry. I wore the hat all day and it did not dry completely. I took the hat off and laid it on a table. It took two more days to dry completely. The hat fit fine after I fullered it. By the time it dried it had shrunk some more and it is now almost too small.
It was now time to try the actual hat. My wife showed me how to use the double sided needles. I used a set of wooden needles that were size 10. I used another ball of hand spun yarn that was not dyed. I decided to modify my pattern this time. Here is the pattern I am using (the piece is not completed at the time this paper is being written):
Cast on 60 stitches
Knit 10 rows
Pearl one row
Knit 10 rows
Fold the brim on itself using the pearl row as the crease. Knit the two edges of the brim together.
Knit 20 rows
Knit 1 row while combining two stitches together on every 10th stitch
Knit 1 row
Knit 1 row while combining two stitches together on every 9th stitch
Continue this pattern until you have 10 or less stitches left on the needles.
There are approximately 51 rows in my hat (with 21 of them in the brim).
I will then finish off the hat in the same manner of the mockup. It was my intent to fuller this hat as well. I do not know if I will have time to complete the fullering before the A&S competition.
Problems encountered:
I had a lot of trouble with the double pointed needles. My tension was very bad where the two needles connected. This caused uneven stiches through the hat. I also had problems with the double pointed needles staying together. On my first attempt using them, I had lost my tension after doing the purl stitches. One of the needles just fell out of the hat. To resolve that issue my wife suggested I put something on the ends of the needles to stop that from happening. I cut up a couple of old wine bottle corks and used them as caps on the ends of the needles.
I also had problems keeping steady tension while I was decreasing stitches in the crown of the hat. I am assuming it is because of decreasing stitches.
Next Project:
It is my intent to continue with the knitting and to do the rest of the projects I had originally hoped to make. The next project is a flat cap. This is knitted in the round and then heavily fullered so it becomes felted. There is one example in the Victoria and Albert museum so heavily felted the brim was split with a knife and did not unravel. After the flat cap, I will do the knee socks off of the Mary Rose. I am hoping to complete the Mary Rose outfit in time for the A&S 50 project.
Bibligorapy:
Bradberry, Sarah. MonMouth Cap. 2004 published on line at www.knitting-and.com/knitting/patterns/hats/monmouth/htm.
Carlson, Jennifer. A Short History of the Monmouth Cap. published on line at www.personal.utulsa.edu/-Marc-caarlson/jennifer/monmouth.htm
Gardiner, Julie and Michael Allen. Before the Mast, Lie and death aboard the Mary Rose. The archaeology of the Mary Rose, Volueme 4. Published by the Mary Rose Trust 2005.
The curious Frau. Knitted Man’s Hat from the ship “Gagiana”. Published on line at www.curiousfrau.codiaries/94-knitted-mans-hat-from-the-ship-qgagianaq?mpl=component&sprint=1&layout=default&page=
Rutt, Richard. A History of hand Knitting. 2003
Medieval Knitting. 2008. Originally published in Tournaments Illuminated 165.
A special thanks goes to my Lady Wife Melisande de Westemere (Dawn Blaloch) for teaching
me to knit.
1 Gardiner, Julie and Michael Allen. Before the Mast, Lie and death aboard the Mary Rose. The archaeology of the Mary Rose, Volueme 4. Published by the Mary Rose Trust 2005. Page 33.
2 Wikipeidia article on Monmouth Cap.
3 Gardiner, Julie and Michael Allen. Before the Mast, Lie and death aboard the Mary Rose. The archaeology of the Mary Rose, Volueme 4. Published by the Mary Rose Trust 2005. Page 30.
4 Rutt, Richard. A History of hand Knitting. 2003
5 Gardiner, Julie and Michael Allen. Before the Mast, Lie and death aboard the Mary Rose. The archaeology of the Mary Rose, Volueme 4. Published by the Mary Rose Trust 2005. Page 58.
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