From Head to Toe Bound Feet, Bathing Suits, and Other Bizarre and Beautiful Things

TOPPING IT ALL OFF Samson was a man whose strength was legendary. The Bible tells us that he could fight off whole armies single-handedly, and that he once killed a thousand of his enemies, the Philistines, with the jawbone of an ass. Even today, people associate him with superhuman power. Because of a vow sworn by his parents before his birth, Samson was never to drink wine or eat the grapes it was made from, touch a dead body, or most famously, cut a hair on his head. He didn't take those vows too seriously, however, and in time he broke all but the last one. This he kept because he knew his hair was the source of his great strength. Unfortunately, Samson wasn't much better at choosing women than he was at keeping promises. When he fell in love with Delilah, a Philistine beauty, she tricked him into revealing the secret of his strength and then cut off all his hair while he slept. When he woke up, he was set upon by Philistine soldiers, who easily captured the newly shorn Samson, blinded him, and put him to work as a slave. He was often placed on display, to be mocked and taunted by the Philistine people. It was a terrible life of daily humiliation and torture that offered Samson no hope of escape until his hair eventually grew back. At last reinvested with the might of several men, he was able to topple the walls of a great temple full of Philistines. His strength had returned, but at a terrible price. Three thousand people including Samson himself were killed. *** Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow Samson's story reminds us of the great power we attach to our hair. In his case, the power was physical. For the rest of us, it might be power of a subtler kind: an ability to attract mates, a sign that we are young and healthy, evidence of our wealth and position in society. We have, for centuries, spent fortunes in both money and time on our hair cutting it, styling it, shaving it off and letting it grow, curling it and coloring it, even hiding it away beneath hats, scarves, and wigs. Our obsession with our hair goes back to prehistoric times. Primitive men liked to smear their locks with mud or clay and tie on small trophies for added effect. For many ancient people, whose style of dress tended to be simple and unadorned, hair provided an important opportunity to display status and individuality. Hairpins, wigs, extensions, bleaches, waxes, and oils were all used to accentuate the positive and mask the negative. The Egyptians even experimented with treatments for that fear of men both ancient and modern: baldness. One "cure" advised sufferers to coat their heads with chopped lettuce leaves to stimulate growth. Bald men were also encouraged to rub their pates with the fats of lions, hippopotamuses, crocodiles, cats, serpents, and goats. There was no advice on how they were to acquire these fats or how long they had to wear what must surely have been a pretty unpleasant concoction. The Egyptians were a vain lot all around. If baldness wasn't an issue, they found other hair-related worries to occupy their minds. We know, for example, that they were among the first to use dye to cover tell-tale gray. As early as 3400 B.C., they were apparently using henna, a dye extracted from a small shrub, to give their hair a reddish hue. Indigo, another dye derived from plant material, was applied to produce that blue-black color we often associate with these ancient people. But the Egyptians were not the only ones to understand the value of an attractive head of hair. The Babylonians spared no expense in their quest to look good, powdering their locks with real gold dust. Ancient Saxons dyed their hair blue using woad, yet another dye made from a plant; Saxon women also used an ointment of burnt bear claws and swallow droppings to give their hair a glossy sheen. The RoWeaver, Janice is the author of 'From Head to Toe Bound Feet, Bathing Suits, and Other Bizarre and Beautiful Things' with ISBN 9780887766541 and ISBN 0887766544.