Note 317 — Chapter V · SURNAMES OF OCCUPATION. (TOWN).
Reading edition
It is not impossible that this species of cloth was in use by the lower classes for articles of apparel. Chaucer, in his Romance, refers to such a habit when he says:—
‘She ne had on but a straite old sacke,
And many a cloute on it there stacke,
This was her cote, and her mantele.’