A strip of coarse cloth rolled around what a labouring household can manage: a double-sided comb whittled from boxwood or beech, a small brush of boar bristle set in a turned handle, a cake of plain soap wrapped in waxed cloth, and a linen handkerchief that doubles as a hand-towel. There is no mirror and no razor — a man who needs shaving goes to the barber on market day, and a woman judges her hair by touch or by the water-butt.
Reckoned as its parts: comb 3d, brush 4d, soap 2d, handkerchief 2d, and a penny for the roll. It is the kit a yeoman or a guildsman’s apprentice carries, and it marks its owner as neither slovenly nor grand.