Figure 1.-- These four Edinburgh boys were pictured with their mother in cabinet card portrait. Itb is a good view of boys' headwear, although unfortunately the image quality is poor. We think the children are all boys. The boy look to be about 1-10 years old. The two older boys wear glengaries with srandard suit. Theur younger brothers wear a school cap and broad-brimmed sailor hat. The portrait is undated, but looks like the 1890s to us. The studio was R. Brown in Edinburgh,

We see Scottish boys wearing a range of headwear, both Scottish and the styles common in England. Headwear until after World War II was fairly common, much more common than than is the case tody. We see younger boys wearing broad-brimmed sailor hats. Other kinds of hats seem less common. Caps are another matter. And various types are caps are even identifid with Scotland, known as bonnets. The Glengary has fairly modern origins, the Balmoral is a modern name for style which may have earlier origins. In addtion we see the same type of caps worn in England such as peaked caps and flat caps. Boys wearing these styles look virtually identical in Scotland and England. These are actually more common thnt the Scottish styles. And their are other types of headwear such as tams which have Scottish origins.

Hats

Hats were not very common for Scottish boys. Headwear was common, but not hats. One exception was sailor hats. We do see younger boys wearing wide-brimmed sailor hats ith streamers. These were worn by pre-school boys or boys in theyounger primary forms. They wee worn with sailor suits as well as non-sailor outfits. Older boys tended to wear variuous types of caps, including of course Scottih styls. Older teenagers might begin to wear adult styled hats s worn in England, but we see few boys wearing them. Our Scottish archove is still limite, but as far as can yell from the photogrhic record, this was the general trend.

Caps

There are several types of caps that are destinctive to Scotland. They are commonly refrred to as bonnets. They appeared to have been created as military styles. These Scottish caps were associated with and commonly worn with the Higland outfits like kilts, but not exclusively. We also see boys wearing Scottish bonnets, especially the Glengary, with regular suits. The Glengary has fairly modern origins, the Balmoral is a modern name for style which may have earlier origins. The most common were balmorals and glengarys. Boys wearing kilts commonly wear one of those two cap styles. There were also various styles of other caps worn by Scottish boys. One style was the flat cap and may actually have been very common.

Scottish Headwear

The two decidedly Scottish boys headwear (balmorals and glengaries are often called caps, but neither are really caps as they do not have brims. Girls and some younger boys wore tams.

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Created: February 1, 2003
Last updated: 9:50 AM 2/17/2024