Head coverings and veils

Men covered their heads against the sun with a cap, a turban or a head scarf. A turban was a strip of thick linen wound around the head with the ends tucked in; the high priest’s turban carried a gold plate engraved “HOLY TO THE LORD” (Exodus 28:36). The head scarf, a square of cloth about 0.8 square meters (a square yard), was folded into a triangle, with the sides over the shoulders and the point down the back, and held by a cord. From about the 2nd century BC Jewish men also wore phylacteries — small leather cases holding passages of Scripture — at prayer (Matthew 23:5).

Women were often veiled in public, though the custom changed over the centuries. Rebekah covered herself with her veil when she first saw Isaac (Genesis 24:65), and Tamar hid who she was behind a veil. Women also wore a scarf like the men’s, of different cloth and color, often over a stiff cap set with ornaments. In Paul’s day Jewish women wore veils in public, and by one view Greek women generally did too; at Corinth a dispute arose over women praying with uncovered heads (1 Corinthians 11:5).