Back in the fifteenth century the jester or fool attached to the retinue of prominent persons was sometimes referred to as a patch, probably because his costume was often “a thing of shreds and patches.”
And whether or not this term was applied to him only when he was ill tempered is not now known, but such was the case by the end of the sixteenth century, and so it remained for another hundred years, though other than court fools were included.
It was then, for additional force, that some genius made assurance doubly sure and labeled a person of ill-nature a crosspatch.
