Árbók Hins íslenzka fornleifafélags - 01.01.1969, Side 75

SKILDAHÚFA
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S U M M A R Y
In the National Museum, Reykjavík, there is a woman’s cap, a so-called skilda-
húfa, of red woollen plush, decorated with eight disks (skildahúfa: „cap with
disks") of gilt silver filigree work (Inv. No. 10934; Figs. 1-3). Another Icelandic
skildahúfa is to be found in the National Museum, Copenhagen (Inv. No.
12013/1964). It is not preserved in its original form, however; the original
black velvet cap, turned upside down, forms the flat crown (Figs. 5 and 6), a band
of black and green silk fabric had been added at some time before the cap
reached the museum, to form a differently shaped, wider lower part or rim (Fig.
7), while the disks were removed at some time after the museum received the
cap, and displayed separately for several decades. These are the only two caps of
this type known to exist today, but a detailed written description from the year
1791 of a black velvet skildahúfa (cf. note 5) proves a valuable addition to the
knowledge of the appearance of these caps. The source also describes the manner
in which the skildahúfa was worn, as is done to some extent as well in an Icelandic
manuscript dictionary from about 1830—1840 (cf. note 26). The skildahúfa, stiffened
with an interlining of cardboard or felt, and the inside of the crown apparently
stuffed with paper, was worn on top of the cylindrical or conical, wound head-
dress called vaf or later(?) faldur (notes 5 and 26). A skildahúfa worn in this
manner may be seen in an illumination in an Icelandic manuscript from
the close of the sixteenth century (Fig. 10.). Besides the above mentioned source
material, a very few references from the seventeenth century have been found
about skildahúfa and, from the end of the sixteenth century, about húfuskildir,
i. e. disks to be placed on caps; these references are for instance testaments and
settlements of inheritance (notes 18, 19, 20, 27, 28, and 29).
From the available data it seems that the skildahúfa was worn only by wealthy
women, most likely exclusively by brides, during the sixteenth, seventeenth, and
perhaps the early eighteenth centuries. It had a flat, circular crown with some-
times a flat lower part, cf. the cap preserved in Copenhagen (Figs. 2 and 9) and
the one described 1791 (note 5), sometimes a slanting lower part, cf. the cap in
Reykjavík (Fig. 1). It would seem that it was generally decorated with eight
ornamental disks of gilt silver, frequently with filigree work, one disk being
placed on the centre of the crown, the other seven arranged, evenly spaced, on
the lower part of the cap. The disk on the crown and the one facing directly
front were apparently larger than the other six, all of which were likely of
equal size. Pointing to a certain uniformity in the size of the skildahúfa and
its ornaments are the measurements available from the three above mentioned
caps. They disclose minor variations only: from 22—25.4 cm in the diameter
of the crown, 9.8—11.5 cm in the diameter of the opening for the vaf, and
from 6—8 cm in the width of the rim or lower part of the cap, while the
disks placed at centre front vary from 10.7—11.4 cm in diameter, the sets of smaller
disks from 6.6—7.3 cm and the disks on the crown are 10 and 12.7 cm in diameter.
There seems little doubt that the Icelandic skildahúfa was derived from the
berets fashionable in Europe at the end of the fiftecnth and especially during
the sixteenth century. Caps very similar in appearance but worn directly on
the head may for instance be seen on a North-German altarpiece executed by Ilinrik
Funhof about 1483 (note 41).