Excerpts from "Chats on Costume" by G. Woolliscroft Rhead, 1906
There was nothing new, even in the days of Solomon; wigs, curling irons, hair powder, and turned-up moustachios being no exception to
the rule.
We have abundant evidence, both from the concurring testimony of authors and from the
actual works which have come down to us, that heated irons were employed from a very early period for the purpose of curling the hair
and beard. Both with the Assyrians, and the Greeks of the earlier period, the hair and beard were plaited in a series of symmetrical
curls and ringlets, displaying the utmost degree of formality in their arrangement.
The hair and beard of Bélshazzar when he "made a great feast to a thousand of his lords,"
and received an intimation of an unpleasant character, conveyed to him in an unusual manner, were certainly curled in such wise, and
probably dyed and powdered, as was the custom, the powder, however, being gold instead of flour, as in more recent days. As a matter of
fact, gold was employed in various ways as an enrichment to the hair. The Kings of Egypt had their beards interwoven with gold thread.
Herodotus assures us that the skulls of the Egyptians were much harder than those of the
Persians, owing to the national custom of shaving the heads of their children at a very early age. He adds, " In other countries the
priests of the gods wear long hair; in Egypt they have it shaved. With other men it is customary in mourning for the nearest relations
to have their heads shorn; the Egyptians, on occasions of death, let the hair grow both on the head and face, though till then they
used to shave."
The ceremonies and customs relating to the beard are innumerable. The management of the beard
formed a considerable part of the religion of the Tartars, who waged a long and bloody war with the Persians, declaring them infidels,
though in other respects of the same faith as themselves, because they refused to cast their whiskers after the mode or rite of the
Tartars.
It has been recorded that the Greeks wore their beards until the time of Alexander, who,
fearful lest the length of their beards should prove a handle to their enemies, comrnanded the Macedonians to be shaven, and the first
who shaved at Athens ever after bore the addition of xopone (shaven) on medals. Notwithstanding this statement, however, Philip,
the father of Alexander, as well as Amyras and Archelous, his predecessors, are represented without beards.
According to Pliny, the Romans did not begin to shave until the year of Rome 454, when
P. Titinius brought over a stock of barbers from Sicily. Pliny adds that Scipio Africanus was the first to introduce the fashion of
shaving daily. It became the custom to have visits of ceremony at the cutting of the beard for the first time. The first fourteen Roman
Emperors shaved until the time of the Emperor Adrian, who discontinued the practice and wore a beard, for the purpose, however, of
hiding the scars on his face.
From Gregory of Tours we learn that in the Royal family of France it was for a long time the
peculiar privilege of Kings and Princes of the blood to wear long hair, artfully dressed and curled; everybody else was polled, as a
sign of inferiority and obedience. To cut off the hair of a son of France under the first race of Kings was to exclude him from the
right of succession to the crown, and to reduce him to the condition of a subject.
French historians, however, tell us that Charlemagne wore his hair short, his son much
shorter, and Charles the Bald, as his surname indicates, none at all.
Good Luitprand furiously declaimed against the Emperor Phocyas for wearing long hair, after
the manner of all the other Emperors of the East, with the exception of Theophilus, who, being bald, enjoined all his subjects to shave
their heads, like the fox of Aesop, who, having survived the experience of a trap by the sacrifice of his tail, harangued the other
foxes on the inconvenience of tails in general, and endeavoured to persuade them to cut off theirs also.
In the Church, too, in spite of the beard of Aaron, "that went down to the skirts of his
garments," the Nazarite law, and the reputed long hair of the founder of Christianity, the priesthood habitually condemned long hair as
being inconsistent with the sacred character of the priest's office. Pope Anictus is supposed to have been the first to forbid the
clergy to wear long hair. " The Holy Prelate, Wulstan, reproved the wicked of all ranks with great boldness but he rebuked those with
the greatest severity who were proud of their long hair." The Nazarite vow is an act of sacrifice in accordance with the terms of the
law laid down in Num. vi. 1-21 : " All the days of the vow of his separation shall no razor come upon his head " ; "He shall be holy,
and shall let the locks of his hair grow."
