It wasn’t until the mid-1960s onwards that the bobble hat became a popular item of clothing moved into the mainstream. Author and historian Enid Gauldie wrote about the utilitarian bluebonnet - useful for its flat shape and long brim, which offered protection against the elements - for Selvedge magazine: The Scotts’ Balmoral bonnet was predated by the bluebonnet, worn by Scottish laborers between the 16th and 18th centuries. Pom-poms were also part of the uniform of Scottish Highland regiments, on their Balmoral bonnet, until the 19th century. Proper pom-pom hats were used as part of the military uniform of Napoleon’s infantry, where their color denoted the company to which the man belonged: green for the first company, light blue for the second, orange for the third, and violet for the fourth. The word pom-pom derives from the French word pompon and was adopted in the late 19th century to refer to what you think of when you think of a pom-pom today: a little puff of fabric or feathers or whatever. Soldiers of the French line infantry firing their weapons during a historical reenactment of the Napoleonic wars of the 19th century. In an article written by archaeologist Neil Price included in the text Old Norse Religion in Long-Term Perspectives: Origins, Changes & Interactions, Price says, of the statuette, “The figure is wearing a helmet and a bracelet on each wrist, all of which are highly deliberate design inclusions and therefore not without meaning.” Great. Is that interesting to you? Hm? What if I told you the statuette also has an erect penis? Now I have your attention. The Viking god Freyr, or what is widely thought to be the Viking god Freyr, is depicted wearing a hat or helmet with a pom-pom on it in a statuette that was discovered in 1904 on the farm Rällinge in Södermanland, Sweden. The pom-pom hat’s origins can be traced back to Scandinavia in the year a very long time ago. How about - let’s just hear the explanation and you can decide for yourself if it’s interesting. There is an explanation for why you have that ball, that burst of fun, that round smush of fabric on the tippy top of your head. While the answer to why winter is so cold and dark and sad may never (?) be uncovered, the pom-pom question is a different story. Why is the weather so cold? Why is the outside so dark? Why do I feel so sad all of the time? And finally, why does everyone have a pom-pom on the top of their hat as if it is a normal decoration, and no one ever talks about it, not even if you ask them directly and are very polite? The winter season brings with it many seemingly unknowable questions.
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