Napoleon Cap for an Infant in Star Stitch and Double Crochet (1912): vintage crochet pattern

Materials

• Light (CYC #3) soft wool yarn in white — approximate; the original was 5 skeins of zephyr (ply, skein weight and length not printed)
• Crochet hook (no hook size printed)
• 10 yd (9.1 m) baby ribbon, as printed (presumably for the rosettes)
• 1 yd (0.9 m) wide ribbon for ties, as printed
• Tapestry needle
• Hook: Start with 4 mm (US G-6) — approximate; no hook or measurement is printed, so keep the star loops loose and even and check that the crown lies flat

Abbreviations (US terms)

ch

chain

sc

single crochet

dc

double crochet

sl st

slip stitch

st

stitch

sts

stitches

lp

loop

yo

yarn over

rep

repeat

row

row

sk

skip

inc

increase

dec

decrease

Notes before you start

• Source: "Napoleon Cap", Priscilla Wool Crochet Book (ed. Lola Burks Hettich), The Priscilla Publishing Company, Boston, 1912. Public domain in the USA.
• As printed — materials: Five skeins zephyr, 10 yards baby ribbon, and 1 yard of wide ribbon for ties.. Gauge: Not given.
• Modernisation note: Stitches converted by the book's own “Explanation of Stitches”, not by name: chain stitch (ch st, “make a series of loops, drawing each loop through the preceding one”) = ch; slip stitch (sl st, “insert the hook into the stitch, draw the wool through that stitch and through the wool on hook at the same time”) = sl st; single crochet (s c, “insert the hook, draw wool through, pass wool around hook (wool over), and draw it through both loops on the hook”) = sc; double crochet (d c, wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then through 2 loops twice) = dc; half double crochet (h d c, wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then “through all 3 loops at once”) = hdc; treble crochet (t c or tr c, wool around the hook twice, insert, draw through, then through 2 loops three times) = tr. For these stitches the 1912 American names already match modern US usage, so no stitch changes height. The book's long crochet (l c: wool around the hook, insert, draw through, then through 1 loop, then through 2 loops twice) is the modern extended double crochet; where used it is written “long crochet” with that definition.
• Modernisation note: The book's abbreviations are written in modern US form: ch st = ch, s c = sc, d c = dc, h d c = hdc, t c / tr c = tr, st(s) = st(s), “wool over” / “thread over” / “pass the wool around the hook” = yo; “miss” = sk; loop = lp; “repeat” = rep; “beginning” = beg. “Widen” is written as increase and “narrow” as decrease, as defined in each design. Ordinal row names (“1st row”, “2d row”) are written Row 1, Row 2; where the book calls a circuit of a round piece a “row” the book's word is kept. “Plain” (a row or round with no increases or decreases) is kept as printed.
• Modernisation note: Star stitch is the book's own stitch, defined on its “Star Stitch” page (quoted as the first steps of each design that uses it): loops are drawn up in the chain or in the long and short strands of the star below, all taken off together with 1 yo and closed with 1 ch. It has no single modern abbreviation, so it is written “star”. The book's widening terms are kept and explained: “wi 1” (one extra star in the same stitch), “wi 2” (two extra stars in that stitch) and “wi by 2 over 1” (two stars over one star of the row below).
• Modernisation note: Long printed paragraphs are split into one row, round or step per line; stitch order and counts unchanged. Section headings added for navigation.
• Modernisation note: Hooks are printed as bone hooks described only as fine, medium-sized or coarse, or by an unstated numbering system, with no diameters, so no exact metric size can be read from the book. The suggested modern hook is an approximate starting point chosen for the yarn weight and tied to any printed measurement.
• Modernisation note: No stitch gauge is printed for this design; work a swatch and match any printed measurement (given in the modern gauge line) before starting.
• Modernisation note: The yarns are 1912 trade descriptions with no exact modern equivalent, and the book prints no yardage or skein/ball weights except where quoted in the materials. The CYC weights given are approximations only: Saxony (a fine, firm yarn) and 2-ply (single) zephyr as super fine (CYC #1); ice wool (a very fine, lustrous yarn) as super fine (CYC #1); Shetland floss (a soft, lofty yarn) and eiderdown wool as fine (CYC #2) — lofty yarns and to be matched by gauge or measurement rather than by weight; 4-ply (split) zephyr, 4-fold Germantown and Spanish yarn as light (CYC #3); 8-fold Germantown and knitting worsted as medium (CYC #4).
• Modernisation note: The book calls the circuits of the crown and brim “rows”; the book's word is kept. “Clip wool” is written fasten off. “Take up the 3d and 4th sts” (of the chain) is written as the 3rd and 4th ch, and the loops on the hook are written lps.
• Modernisation note: The cap's own 4-loop star-in-a-circle directions are transcribed in full after the book's general star stitch definition.
• Modernisation note: “Zephyr” is printed without a ply; it is given as light (CYC #3) as an approximation only.
• Modernisation note: Check: the book prints “3d row.—Widen every 2 stars, and so on, increasing 1 star between widenings until you widen every 7 stars, which is 8 rows”. The count to 56 stars does not work out exactly by simple arithmetic; stop widening when the crown lies flat and has 56 stars (for the infant size).
• Modernisation note: Check: “widen 2 d c at two opposite points … for 2 rows, then widen 4 at same points until you have 9 rows” — the book does not say whether the widening is split on each side of the point or how the stitches are placed; the row numbers are ours (Row 1 = the first dc row around the crown).
• Modernisation note: Check: the picot edge is printed “Single crochet into top of first d c, ch 3, s c into top of same d c; s c into top of next d c, ch 3, s c into top of same d c”, i.e. a picot on every dc. How the brim edge is worked across the row ends is not printed.
• Modernisation note: Check: the rosettes are not described; the 10 yards of baby ribbon in the materials are presumably for them.
• Modernisation note: Row numbers for the brim added. Metric conversions added. “Weave in the ends. Attach the wide ribbon ties.” added.