Hair & Dress in Imperial Russia

Thu Oct 16 19:52:36 UTC 2008

In an historical context, using the term 'sexism' is not necessarily  
indicative of a value judgement, but could simply be descriptive,  
although the qualifier 'thoroughly' smells of the former.  
Additionally, I do not grasp how founding an organised religion  
necessarily qualifies one as being 'progressive' and 'enlightened'.

Andrew Swearingen

On 16.10.2008, at 20:04, Moshe Taube wrote:

> Paul a sexist? As opposed to whom? You must be joking. We're talking  
> about a Jew who 2000 years ago founded Christianity as an organized  
> religion in the Eastern Mediterranean. Surely he was as progressive  
> and enlightened as any other guy at that time and in that area.
> Just a small remark on "doksa andros". Let's not forget that if  
> we're looking for sources of inspiration for Paul's phraseology, we  
> have to look at his Scripture, i.e. the Old Testament, and there I  
> would say the closest expression is in Proverbs 12.4, which Paul  
> surely knew in the original (for our evangelical friends: I do not  
> mean KJV) אֵשֶׁת־חַיִל עֲטֶרֶת בַּעְלָהּ  
> - 'A virtuous woman is a crown to her husband.' , LXX: γυνὴ  
> ἀνδρεία στέφανος τῷ ἀνδρὶ αὐτῆς. Now  
> 'atereth lit. 'crown', but figuratively also 'ornament, honour,  
> glory'  appears several times in the OT in conjunction with and  
> sometimes as synonym of תִּפְאָרֶת tif'ereth, which is  
> glossed  as 'ornamentum, decus, gloria', and is very readily  
> rendered by doksa. Cf,  Exodus 28:2 לְכָבֹוד  
> וּלְתִפְאָרֶת εἰς τιμὴν καὶ δόξαν.  
> Could this have been the source of inspiration?
>
> Moshe Taube
>
> On Oct 16, 2008, at 8:26 AM, Daniel Rancour-Laferriere wrote:
>
>> Dear colleagues,
>> Slavianskie drevnosti is indeed an important and rich source, and  
>> does have the limitations mentioned by Will Ryan.  The reference to  
>> Corinthians is quite interesting, and adds some historical and  
>> cross-cultural perspective.  Paul is thoroughly sexist: a man is  
>> but the image and glory of God ("obraz i slava Bozhiia" in the  
>> Synodal trans of texts going back to "eikon kai doksa Theou"),  
>> while a woman is but the glory of a man ("slava muzha" rendering  
>> "doksa andros").  Probably "doksa" is better rendered  
>> "reflection" (Oxford NRSV).  So a woman is but the reflection of a  
>> reflection.  What a woman has, however, in addition to her  
>> "glory"/"reflection" is her "authority on her head" ("znak vlasti  
>> nad neiu," rendering the "eksousian" she should have on her head) -  
>> i.e., her hair.  NRSV gives "a woman ought to have a symbol of  
>> authority on her head" (I Cor. 11:10), meaning roughly, she ought  
>> to have the freedom of choice regarding her head.  So Paul seems to  
>> want to have it both ways: women should be subordinate to men, but  
>> they are equal too.  The passage is obscure, and fascinating.  The  
>> OXFORD BIBLE COMMENTARY (2001, pp. 1125-1126) provides some  
>> insights, as well as the relevant historical literature on head- 
>> covering in the Graeco-Roman world.  Apparently worship in Corinth  
>> was, shall we say, pretty free and easy, and this provoked Paul.   
>> Later Tertullian chimed in with a piece on the veiling of virgins.
>>
>> The reason for going into this is that the biblical text has (for  
>> me) the same ambivalent feel about the hair on a woman's head which  
>> is expressed in those sad Russian peasant prenuptial bath songs.   
>> In the "bania" the bride-to-be laments the loss of her  
>> "krasota" (stress on first syllable) and her "volia."  These are  
>> not merely "beauty" and "freedom," but items of headgear which will  
>> be lost when the girl effectively enters into a relationship of  
>> "nevolia" with the husband who will have the right to abuse her for  
>> the rest of her life.  See my SLAVE SOUL OF RUSSIA (1995, 193-201).
>>
>> Regards to the list,
>>
>> Daniel Rancour-Laferriere
>> UC Davis
>>
>> http://Rancour-Laferriere.com
>>
>>
>>
>> On Oct 15, 2008, at 1:02 PM, William Ryan wrote:
>>
>>> I have only just seen this, but since I have been cited I would  
>>> recommend looking first at the 4-page entry 'volosy' in  
>>> Slavianskie drevnosti, vol. 1, Moscow, 1995. The only problem with  
>>> it is that it is anthropological and not historical in emphasis -  
>>> but there is a great deal about hair and magic, and short sections  
>>> on unbound and uncovered hair. You will find some references to  
>>> hair and magic in my own history of Russian  magic, The Bathhouse  
>>> at Midnight, PSUP, 1999, see index under 'hair' (or the rather  
>>> better index in the Russian version: Bania v polnoch', NLO,  
>>> Moscow, 2006). The trouble with folk beliefs is that most are  
>>> recorded in the nineteenth century and later and it is usually  
>>> difficult to say much about their history. Even so, many beliefs  
>>> and practices recorded in the nineteenth century are likely to  
>>> have been prevalent in the eighteenth century also, or even earlier.
>>> The Pauline injunctions (1 Corinthians 11:4-16) on covering hair,  
>>> and the Russian custom of cutting off the long hair of brides at  
>>> their wedding, would have been significant, and indeed affect the  
>>> kind of head covering which women wore.
>>> Will Ryan
>>>
>>>
>>> Allison Leigh-Perlman wrote:
>>>> Can anyone recommend some good source material regarding the  
>>>> covering of female hair and its 'magical' qualities in 18th- 
>>>> century Russia or earlier?  I'm also interested in histories of  
>>>> costume/dress of the same time period.  Any recommendations would  
>>>> be greatly appreciated.
>>>>
>>>> Allison Leigh-Perlman
>>>>
>>>> Graduate Assistant Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum
>>>> Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
>>>>
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