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Bib (bavoire)

Bib (bavoire)

  • Place of origin:

    France (made)

  • Date:

    ca.1963 (made)

  • Artist/Maker:

    Unknown (production)

  • Materials and Techniques:

    [Bib] embroidered lace-edged linen
    [Box] paper-covered card

  • Credit Line:

    Given by Mrs Marie-Claude Willis

  • Museum number:

    B.936:1 to 3-1993

  • Gallery location:

    In Storage

  • Image in copyright

A bib is a piece of fabric tied under a baby's chin to protect its clothes from the child spilling food or dribbling. The word is derived from the verb to bib (to drink), but it is not known whether this is because it is worn when a child feeds by drinking (whereas as a feeder is worn by a child who is eating) or because the bib 'imbibes' (drinks) the moisture.

The earliest printed reference to a bib in English is 1580, but the item was in use with other names, e g slavering clout (dribbling cloth or garment) much earlier; still current. The 1494 portrait by the Maitre de Moulins of the 2 year old Dauphin Charles Orland of France shows him wearing a button-on bib to match his dress (the painting is in the Musée du Louvre).

Many bibs were decorative rather than absorbent, and there was sometimes an additional pad underneath, as with this example, called a dribble catcher.

Physical description

Baby's bib in original box and lid
[Bib] Baby's bib (bavoire) of fine white linen edged with white machine-made lace, and embroidered in white with fern leaf and six-petalled flower motifs using chain-stitch. The bib is round-necked, and takes the continental form (popular from the 1920s): circular but extending into a waistband threaded with a ribbon (in this instance of pink sateen) which ties at the back. The neck is piped with self fabric, and the bib is finished at the edges with a double row of chain stitch in white as well as the lace, and the bib fastens at the neck back with a button and stitched loop. The bib has a "dribble catcher" pad beneath, made of white linen padded with wadding.
[Box] The original rectangular box is made of cream card covered in pale blue paper.
[Box lid] The original detached lid for the rectangular box is made of cream card covered in pale pink paper.

Place of Origin

France (made)

Date

ca.1963 (made)

Artist/maker

Unknown (production)

Materials and Techniques

[Bib] embroidered lace-edged linen
[Box] paper-covered card

Marks and inscriptions

[Box lid] Trousseau, Blouses, Layettes/ Madame H. Mathieu/ 19, Bould. Malesherbes, Paris. Shop proprietor's label

Dimensions

[Bib] Depth: 12.5 cm centre front
[Box] Height: 2.1 cm, Width: 31.25 cm, Depth: 16.25 cm front to back
[Box lid] Height: 1.9 cm, Width: 31.6 cm, Depth: 16.6 cm front to back

Object history note

Bought for the donor's daughter Victoria Willis (born 1963).

Descriptive line

Baby's embroidered bib (bavoire) in original box; French, c.1963

Production Note

Made for Madame H Mathieu, Paris, France

Materials

Paper; Card; Linen; Lace

Techniques

Embroidering

Subjects depicted

Stylized flowers; Ferns

Categories

Children & Childhood; Children's clothes

Collection code

MoC

Qr_O38172
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