the two plaits were laid across the hair from the parting to the
forehead in the form of a fillet holding the hair fast, as in the marble
head (Fig. 47); but sometimes the front hair is laid across the ends of
the plait fastened together in front, as in the head from a vase
painting represented in Fig. 48. The head in Fig. 47 also shows a
peculiar mode of treating the back hair. The lower part of this is
plaited, and the plait turned up again and fastened where the other two
braids cross each other. Other plaits also fall from behind the ears in
regular arrangement over the shoulders in front, often reaching as far
as the breast. The hair on the forehead is dressed with equal care. With
this fashion also the regular little curls, arranged in one or more rows
round the forehead, are very common. Sometimes they are in spiral form,
sometimes in that of “corkscrew” curls, as on the archaic bronze head
from Pompeii represented in Fig. 49 and in Fig. 48.
[Illustration: FIG. 47.]
These are the principal archaic modes of wearing the hair found on the
monuments, but they by no means exhaust the varieties which might be
observed. The writers, however, only mention one ancient head-dress.
Thucydides, in the passage already quoted, which describes the long
chitons formerly worn by the Athenians, also tells us that at the same
time that this old-fashioned dress was abandoned, the Athenians gave up
the old way of dressing their hair in the _crobylus_ (κρωβύλος), into
which they fastened golden grasshoppers. It has not yet, however, been
possible to determine with any certainty which of the head-dresses found
on the statues corresponded to this crobylus, which seems to be
identical with the _corymbus_ (κόρυμβος) mentioned in other places; nor
has it been possible to find any traces of the grasshoppers.
Consequently almost all the head-dresses above described have been
claimed for the crobylus, even the double plaits behind the ears; and
the grasshoppers have been explained sometimes as the above-mentioned
spirals, sometimes as hair-pins or fibulae. Perhaps some day a fortunate
discovery may throw light on this difficult question.
[Illustration: FIG. 48.]
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