If you watched the recent Shogun remake, you might have wondered why the samurai, fearsome warriors that they are, had such goofy haircuts. I'd asked a teacher about this when I was living in Japan. The two-part answer had to do with the helmets samurai wore in battle. 1. The top of the head was shaved for cooling purposes. Those helmets, made of thin iron plates, get hot. 2. The topknot, or chonmage, provided a raised contact point for the helmet at the rear of the head. The...
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