Basin. Cotton warp faced Sateen fabric used for summer small clothes, stocks and so on.
Estamette / Etamette: A plain weave worsted fabric, close sett, mostly produced in solid colours. Among other things it was used to line Officers’ coat bodies.
Cadis: Regarded as a type of Serge of Worsted Warp and Woollen Weft, they were produced in different qualities in different regions. Some were scoured and left fairly loose and were used as linings for Soldiers’ coats, others were more heavily fulled to make a denser fabric.
Calamande: Fabric woven in a warp faced twill to give a smooth face, produced in plain colours, stripes or figured, and with the smooth face usually enhanced with a glazed finish.
Cordillat: Twill woven woollen fabric, fairly coarse and heavily milled, used for Soldiers’ gaiters among others.
Drap: Synonym of English ‘Broadcloth‘, a plain weave, heavily milled woollen fabric used for outer garments. Came in various different qualities, described by the place of manufacture, or the number of threads in the full width of the piece; the higher the number, the greater the number of threads, the higher the quality.
– Drap de Louviers: Regarded as the highest quality Superfine Broadcloth made from Spanish Merino Wool.
– Drap de Sedan: Superfine Cloth of comparable quality to Louviers, made from Merino wool. Particluarly famous for it’s high quality black cloths.
– Drap d’Ebeuf: High quality cloth made from Merino wool. – Drab de Berry: Cloth made from high quality French grown wool from the Berry region, so not as fine as those of the three regions above. Often (but not always) made in one of the Berry manufacturing towns Romorantin, Chateauroux and Issoudun.
– Drap de Lodeve: Ordinary quality cloth accepted as the standard for private soldiers, although other factories and regions produced cloth for the same use.
– Drap Gris-Blanc: A cloth used for French soldiers’ coats in the 18th C made from selected naturally white wool, without the need for bleaching. The term ‘Grey-White’ means white without bleaching, and period samples are a natural white and don’t contain visible black or grey fibres.
Droguet: Fabric usually with a worsted warp and woollen weft woven plain weave, then milled to give a stout, dense cloth. Again produced in different qualities in different towns, some types were twill and some with a cotton or linen warp.
Moleton: Twill woven woollen cloth, heavily milled of medium quality.
Serge: A twill fabric with either a woollen warp and weft, (Synonym of the English ‘Kersey‘) a worsted warp and woollen weft (synonym of the English ‘Serge‘, called serge a un éstaim), or Worsted Warp and Weft (called serge de deux éstaims). Made in a range of qualities, widths and weights in different regions, often under their local names. They fall into 4 basic categories:
– Serge Drapee: Twill woven fabric with worsted warp and woollen weft, fulled so that the weft felts over the warp giving a thicker, denser appearance more like a true woollen ‘Drap’.
– Serge en Poil: Serge a un éstaim,lightly fulled to give a little more body, with a long nap raised on the surface to cover the weave which remains fairly open.
– Serge Commun: Serge a un éstaim, lightly scured rather than fulled so still fairly open weave, used for linings etc.
– Serge Rasée: Serges de deux éstaims, had a smooth surface sometimes enhanced by a glazing process.
Particular Types:
– Serge d’Aumale, de Blicourt. Two types of ‘Serge Commun’, made to the same specification as to yarn density, but in different widths. They were Ordinary Serges of the quality used for lining Soldiers’ coats.
Tirtaine: Cheaper fabric with cotton or linen warp and woollen weft, quite heavily milled or fulled to provide a fairly stout cloth where the warp is mostly covered by the weft.
Tricot: Dependent on context can mean knitting (in the case of caps, stockings and gloves), but also a woven fabric. The latter was produced with a worsted warp and woollen weft Serge de Tricot (Chaîne Peignée) and also with a woollen warp and weft (Chaîne Combée). The woollen version was more heavily fulled and used for Soldiers’ Vestes and Pantalons from at least 1793.