The Coleorton Tunic and Coat

The other day I happened upon the website of the Leicestershire Museums Collections, and encountered there the Coleorton Tunic and the Coleorton Coat.

Coleorton is a small village in north-west Leicestershire. Originally just known as Orton it had, according to Wikipedia in Coleorton acquired the Cole prefix by at least 1443  due to it being a local centre for the digging and then mining of coal. In a somewhat similar process the nearby new town, as it then was, of Coalville acquired its name from the same industry in 1833.

Study of surviving early coal workings in 1985-93 revealed some remarkable survivals in the form of tools and clothing from past generations of miners. Most notable were the sodden, but retrievable, remains of a mid-sixteenth century tunic and a mid-seventeenth century coat, left, for whatever reasons in the coal workings. Sufficient survived to be preserved and displayed. There was evidence of the original dye to indicate the original colour of the tunic so as to enable a replica to be made. Both the original remains and the tunic replica can be seen, together with other finds, at Medieval Coal Mining