tuffet (n.)

1550s, "little tuft," from Old French touffel (with diminutive suffix -et for French -el), diminutive of touffe (see tuft). Obsolete except in the nursery rhyme "Little Miss Muffet" (1843), where it has been felt to mean "hassock, footstool."

LITTLE Miss Muffet

Sat on a tuffet

And made of her knees such display

That the old fashioned spider,

Embarrassed beside her,

Was actually frightened away!

[Life magazine, Oct. 1, 1927]