SPQR Blues part XXXIV - 1

[spqrblues]

More to come...

Comments

[lignamorren.livejournal.com]

You may find this and this informative.

[pikku-gen.livejournal.com]

Should have remembered... Thanks! =)

[mummpizz.livejournal.com]

I like the folding doors. And btw. I like your avatar, too, pikku_gen.

[meritahut.livejournal.com]

I utterly did not know that huge collars were an impetus for using forks. Fashion strikes again.

Now, to figure out what unusual factors led to huge collars, and then what unexpected results the usage or manufacture of forks led to, until we uncover a chain of events leading from, oh, Hannibal's elephants to ENIAC.

[daftnewt.livejournal.com]

"...a chain of events leading from, oh, Hannibal's elephants to ENIAC."

You've watched James Burke's "Connections"!

...or if you haven't, you should!

[meritahut.livejournal.com]

Oh my yes, I am a total raving fangirl for James Burke's "Connections." There needs to be much, much more of that. I wanted to grow up and do historical reenactments with brainy snarky narrators, too :D

[ndgmtlcd.livejournal.com]

Collars started out at a small size and grew because they were considered as an indicator of wealth and social status. Laws were passed in the 16th century, giving size limits according to social rank. The newly rich bourgeois couldn't help themselves and wore bigger and bigger collars. At times the authorities stationed soldiers with shears, and the order to cut down to size any collar offender.

[meritahut.livejournal.com]

Oh. I was thinking:

1. Wave of stricter Protestantism encourages wider collars as "kissing-chastity belts"

2. Importation of ferrets from New World leads to new European breed with tendency to leap for the jugular

3. Attempt made by wealthy women to convince King of England they have already been beheaded, so he won't try to marry them

4. Anti-whiplash devices for horse-and-carriage hotrodders.

Something like that.

[ndgmtlcd.livejournal.com]

I don't know about collars for number 1, but in France there's a wide and fairly rigid women's hat/coif/hood called Quichenotte. The name is supposed to come from "kiss not", which the local women shouted to the English soldiers stationed in parts of France during the hundred years war.

http://maurelili.chez-alice.fr/coiffes.html

[meritahut.livejournal.com]

I love a good origin story :)

Women will put some remarkable things on their heads.

I love hats.

[pikku-gen.livejournal.com]

Thank you, so do I! Which one, BTW? This?

[mummpizz.livejournal.com]

Xes, this one – I'm a great Miyazake fan, you know.

[pikku-gen.livejournal.com]

I didn't, but now I do. I too am a fan, and the Kodama are my fav creatures!

[mummpizz.livejournal.com]

… mine are the dust puppies (susuwatari).