Wig

Wig, a contracted form of periwig, which is a modification (through the Dutch) of peruke, from Fr. perruque; other Romance forms are peluca and piluca, and all of them are from Lat. pilus, 'a hair.' Wigs were in use from the earliest times, not merely to cover baldness, but, like elaborate coiffures of the natural hair (see HAIR-DRESSING), to add to the dignity or formidableness of savages. Wigs are found on Egyptian mummies, and are indicated in Assyrian sculptures, and passed from Persians, Medcs, Lydians, and Carians to Greeks and Romans. But the wig-making and wig-wearing as known to moderns originated in France, and the palmy days of wigs were in the 17th and early 18th centuries. Originally more or less an attempt to reproduce an exceptionally fine head of hair, wigs became in the allongé perruque huge masses of hair that, falling down on the shoulders, were parted into two groups or bunches of ringlets, one on each breast. Louis XIV. wore a wig till then of unparalleled size. The English full-dress wig of Queen Anne's time was similar; and this cumbrous type survives in the full-dress full-bottomed wig of English judges, which has flaps of twenty or more rows of stiff and formal curls hanging down in front. The smaller and more ordinary tie-wig (in which the lower part of the wig was tied) is fairly represented by the judge's undress wig and the barrister's or advocate's frizzed wig. Another form was the bag-wig—the lower part of the wig being tucked into a silken bag on the shoulders. The serjeant's Coif (q.v.) is extinct. When the wearing of wigs was fully established small boys of the well-to-do classes went to school in wigs and cocked-hats. In the early part of George III.'s reign it became more and more usual for private persons to do without wigs, wearing their own hair powdered and tied or looped up like a wig; professional men, especially doctors, stuck longer to them. Just before the French Revolution, which dealt the final death-blow to wig-wearing, a gentleman's wig would cost from 30 to 40 guineas. It should be noted that in France the Catholic Church had resolutely but in vain opposed itself to the introduction of the custom. Bishop Blomfield was the first bishop who set the example of wearing his own hair; Archbishop Sumner still wore a wig at the wedding of the Princess Royal of England in 1858. Professional wigs are now only worn by the Speaker of the House of Commons (a full-bottomed one), judges, and barristers; and a wig is part of the livery of some coachmen. Such wigs are made of white horse-hair, laboriously cleaned, curled, and woven on silk threads, and fitted. Wigs to supply natural deficiency of hair are of course made of human hair. Stage-wigs are often made of jute. A barrister's wig of frizzed hair costs five or six guineas. See FASHION, HAIR-DRESSING.