This little Wiggy...

In the 18th Century the choice of wig for chaps was between the perruke (left), the tie-wig (middle) and the bob-wig (right), all of which could be made in any colour of hair from black to grey.

As the century progressed shorter, more natural-looking wigs predominated, but earlier in the 1700s the wigs were large, curly and grand, as the portrait of Voltaire below amply demonstrates.

Bob-wigs were worn by professional men, citizens, and even apprentices; lawyers sported a high frontlet and a long bag at the back tied in the middle, undergraduates a wig with a flat top to allow for the academic cap.

Below Denis Diderot (aka, Mr. Encyclopedia) is modelling a subtle little number:

Where Hogarth and Chardin (see yesterday's post) bravely flaunted convention by depicting themselves unwigged, their stubbly skulls draped intimately in soft furnishings (not, Mr. Coombes, lady-bedcaps, as you suggested), tonight we go a step further in the strip-tease.

I give you the naked cranium of Denis Diderot, flaunting the protrusion of his frontal lobes for all to see:

What a man!