Tuesday, May 15, 2018

Tradiditions? Are they worth following.

With the royal wedding just around the corner, there is much talk about royal wedding traditions – some of which apparently have already been broken, and some that might be broken. One that no bride seems to want to break is to dress like Queen Victoria did on her wedding day more than one hundred years ago.

But strange as it is that brides still choose long dresses and veils which was normal every day wear in Queen Victoria's time, there are even stranger traditions being followed hundreds of years after they were introduced.

For example, ever wondered why the legal profession still wears those weird wigs for their court appearances?

Throughout the human history, wigs were worn for all sorts of reason, sometimes as a fashion fetish, but  most often for very practical reasons.

For example, it's been suggested that the popularity of wigs in England started as a disguise for baldness, often caused by syphilis. And hygiene not being all it could be, many suffered with lice and found it was easier to shave their hair, don a wig which they could throw at their washer woman, instead of trying to keep the lice at bay by continuous washing of the hair.

Time marches on, wigs mainly disappear, but the legal profession still adheres to its wigs. 'English judges and barristers began wearing wigs and robes because everybody in polite society was wearing wigs and robes in those days. They continue to wear them because nobody has ever told them to stop'.'

Any tradition you think we could do without?


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