This coat was found during open cast coal mining in Coleorton in 1988. The coat had been left in mine workings dating from the late 15th or early 16th century, around the beginning of the Tudor period. The coat is one of the earliest survivals of working class clothing in Britain. It is made of woven wool that has evidence of yellow and blue dye. The wear patterns show that it was worn by a miner, but the good quality suggests that it began life as the possession of a person of higher standing.
The evidence from documents shows that coal mining in Leicestershire dates back to at least the 13th century, and probably before the Norman Conquest. Important archaeological discoveries have revealed that Tudor miners dug shafts of up to thirty metres deep.
The early workings around Coleorton have produced wooden tools, parts of baskets and small items of clothing such as shoes which were all left behind when the workings were abandoned. Leicestershire's early miners would have been local people, working around Swannington and Coleorton. They supplied coal to most of Leicestershire, using pack horses which travelled to Leicester using established routes which crossed some of the several surviving pack horse bridges, including those at Anstey, Aylestone and Thurcaston.
