Cloth-ears?

[Loon76]

ok,here goes!

About a week ago my mum challenged me to find the origin of the term Cloth-ears, it is an expression used widely in our house. Anyway since then, I have been searching on the internet (ye olde t'internet!), but all I keep coming up with is what it actually means!

The only exception to this is a Pepys diary entry. I have come up with my own theories, could anyone let me know if I am getting close!

theory 1, relating to the pepys diary entry which mentions horses wearing them, cloth-ears are in fact "audio blinkers", stopping horses from getting spooked in crowd control etc?

theory 2, mill workers, often using large heavy machinery which in effect deafens them, could be said to suffer from cloth-ear?

theory 3, the muffling factor of cloth, eg putting your head under a pillow or blanket to escape noises?

I hope y'all can help as my mum is driving me completely nuts with this one!

Thanks in advance,
Loon

P.S. if you have another theory please paste it on, all ideas are welcome!

[Quizmonster]

The earliest recorded use of the exact phrase 'cloth ears' is in a book by C Mackenzie called Carnival published in 1912. (I'm not sure what exactly the Pepys quote you refer to was, but The Oxford English Dictionary has no mention of it.) It contains the words: "I wish you'd listen. Have you got cloth ears?" In one of P G Wodehouse's books, published in the 1920s, he refers to someone as a 'cloth-head' on the same sort of basis.
Presumably, the idea was created on the basis that cloth is a deadening agent, difficult for sound to �get through'.

[Loon76]

http://www.pepysdiary.com/archive/1663/05/01/i ndex.php

This is the link to the online diary entry on Samuel Pepys, dated 1st of May 1663, it takes a bit of reading but it is in there! some of the commenters (is that a word?) at the bottom of the entry suggest it is to do with disguising a stolen horse!

[Quizmonster]

Thanks for the link, Loon, but it's clear that the words "cloth ears" are literally true in the case of Pepys's diary entry, given that it reads: "found with cloth ears on and a false mayne, having none of his own." That is, the horse was 'done up' to look normal despite its disfigurements.
Clearly, I should in my earlier response have said, "The earliest recorded use of the exact phrase 'cloth ears' - in the sense of being hard of hearing or inattentive - is in a book..."
I apologise for my lack of precision, but I presume your mother refers to the use of the phrase as I have just defined it rather than as Pepys means it. Cheers