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Where did the idea of shaving come from? After all a shaved face is not man’s natural state is it? Unfortunately the guy who first thought it up hasn’t been around for about 100,000 years or so. We can only guess, but it may have had something to do with hygiene or, more likely, a request from a charming Neanderthal lady that started the whole process. With the why lost in the fog of history, we can trace shaving accessories and trends well back in time.
The first shaving devise was a couple of clam shells used as tweezers to literally pluck each hair. Not a good way to go IMHO and was eventually replaced with flint blades. The oldest date back to about 30,000BC. Depending on where you live you might also use a sharks tooth or volcanic obsidian glass to perform the task. The first major breakthrough happened in and around 3,000 BC with the development of metalworking. Copper razors were frequently found in India and Egypt around this time period.
Greece
The guy who really gave shaving its’ first real shot in the arm was Alexander the Great and it wasn’t at the request of a charming lady, Neanderthal or otherwise. He did believe that shaving gave one a tidier appearance but the real motivation was likely a deadly one. He strongly recommended that his troops shave before combat to eliminate the enemy’s ability to “beard grab” during battle. Alexander’s subjects use a novacila (see picture), to get that smooth clean shave.
Rome
Around 300BC Publicus Ticinius Maenas, a wealthy Greek businessman brought professional barbers from Sicily to Rome. This introduced a whole new Roman craze for shaving. Soon the wealthy had a skilled live-in servant to shave them. The less well-off visited the tonsor, or barber. They use thin-bladed iron razors, which are sharpened with water and a whetstone. This type of shaver corrodes quickly and becomes blunt, so customers often got cut. The tonsor fixed this by applying the world’s first styptic stick, a plaster made from a perfumed ointment and spider webs soaked in oil and vinegar. Even then the barbershop was the preferred meeting spot of the day, with Rome’s men flocking there daily to get the latest updates in gossip and news. Young men about age twenty-one were required to have their first shave as part of an elaborate party-like ritual where the young man’s bead shavings were offered to the gods. Scipio Africanus and Julius Caesar both preferred the hairless face look, although Caesar reverted to the old fashion plucking routine. Julius’s army, unfortunately, had to rub theirs off with a pumice stone. As shaving spread throughout most of the world, men of unshaven societies became known as “barbarians,” meaning the “unbarbered.” The positive shaving trend endures until the days of Emperor Hadrain (76-138 A.D.); who would revive the fad for beards to hide some nasty skin problems.
Through the following centuries shaving goes in and out of style with some noted improvement in shaving accessories and materials. The next big mile stone was the development of the precursors of the safety razor in the 1700 but that’s a story for another day.