Chaperon (headgear)

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A chaperon was a type of hood or cap worn by both men and women, nobles and the populace, and afterwards particularly by doctors and licentiates in colleges, etc.

Hence, the name passed to certain little shields, or escutcheons, and other funeral devices, places on the foreheads of horses that drew the hearses to processional funerals. These were later called chaperoons or shafferoons, by reason that such devices were originally fastened to the chaperonnes, or hoods, worn by those horses with their other coverings of state.

This article incorporates content from the 1728 Cyclopaedia, a publication in the public domain.