This curfew would have furnished a wealthy Dutch middle-class home and been used to enclose the embers of a fire at the end of the day. The curfew, from the French couvre-feu (cover the fire) enabled the embers to keep smoldering overnight so that the fire could be easily re-lit the following morning with a puff of the bellows.

To prevent domestic fires from accidentally burning down entire villages, a bell was often rung at a certain hour in the evening indicating that all fires must be covered or put out.