Overview
A doublet is a snug jacket that ends at the waist, shaped by seams and often stiffened or padded, and fastened down the front with buttons or hooks. Hose or breeches were tied to it at the waist, so it held up the lower garments as well as clothing the torso.
How it is worn
It is buttoned closely over the shirt and worn under a cloak or jerkin; points (laces) once joined it to the hose, later replaced by hooks. Elizabethan doublets were stiffened into a pointed peascod belly, while the Cavalier doublet of the Stuart era hung softer and slashed to show the shirt.
History
The doublet ran through Tudor and Stuart fashion as the essential male upper garment, its shape shifting from padded and rigid to loose and beribboned. By the late seventeenth century it gave way to the coat, waistcoat, and breeches that became the three-piece suit.