I used to do that- approaching it with a neolithic precision, honing the
end down to an angel-bearing pinnacle- but, while I had two younger
sisters to torment, I was content to play Hephaestus with my weapons. I
especially liked it when the tip had a slight swirl in it, like a
narwhal's tusk.
As far as the origin of the xian reference to the candy cane, it's
probably a confabulation of the xian-biased source that was cited. Candy
has been striped for quite a while, it's easy and decorative to make that
way, (does no-one here ever try to take the methods of manufacture into
consideration?), and the striped barber pole, a true historical oddity,
has this origin- which origin, purely coincidentally?, brings our
Justine's little, uh, prick into focus....
History Of The Striped Barber Pole
In the Middle Ages, hair was not the only thing that barbers cut. They
also
performed surgery, tooth extractions, and bloodletting. French
authorities drew a
fine distinction between academic surgeons (surgeons of the long robe)
and barber
surgeons (surgeons of the short robe), but the latter were sufficiently
accepted
by the fourteenth century to have their own guild, and in 1505 they were
admitted to the faculty of the University of Paris. As an indication of
their medical
importance, Harry Perelman points out that Ambroise Pare, "The father of
modern
surgery and the greatest surgeon of the Renaissance," began as a barber
surgeon.
The barber pole as a symbol of the profession is a legacy of
bloodletting. The
barber surgeon's necessities for that curious custom were a staff for
the patient
to grasp (so the veins on the arm would stand out sharply), a basin to
hold
leeches and catch blood, and a copious supply of linen bandages. After
the
operation was completed, the bandages would be hung on the staff and
sometimes placed outside as advertisement. Twirled by the wind, they
would
form a red & white spiral pattern that was later adopted for painted
poles. The
earliest poles were surmounted by a leech basin, which in time was
transformed
into a ball.
One Interpretation of the colors of the barber pole was that Red
represented the
blood, Blue the veins, and White the bandages. Which has been retained
by the
modern Barber-Stylist.
*****************
Wade T. Smith
morbius@channel1.com | "There ain't nothin' you
wade_smith@harvard.edu | shouldn't do to a god."
******* http://www.channel1.com/users/morbius/ *******