As the name suggests, barber poles are used to advertise the services of a barber, in other words a hairdresser for men and boys. Although these days its probably more likely that you'll see the red, white and blue pole painted on a window rather than physically attached to the side of the building. Barbers are so protective of this symbol that a number of them have tried to ban their use by hairdressers and cosmetologists (who cut both men and women's hair).
So what does this innocent looking striped pole have to do with barbers in the first place, and why shouldn't it be used by all businesses that offer haircuts?
Well it all comes down to a single tool: the razor.
The razor is a tool that's been linked specifically to barbers since the middle ages, but not always as a means of giving a customer a clean shave. As it turns out, the spiraling red stripe of the barbers pole was originally designed to advertise the spilling of blood; a job that also required a sharp and well maintained razor.
And as for the other two colours, well the blue is a symbol for the vein that held the blood, spinning downwards to show the direction of its flow, and logically the white is a symbol for the all important bandage.
Before workplace health and safety decided that maybe there should be rules which govern how barbers use their razors, dropping in for a fresh cut could mean a number of things. A new style of hair, a nice warm shave, a quick amputation of a pesky infected limb, or a bit of bloodletting to help with your sore throat. If you were feeling a bit adventurous you could even pop down and get a hole drilled into your skull to help get rid of that build up of evil spirits that's been getting you down!
The everyday cutting and slashing of surgery was considered to be a bit below the pay grade of the qualified physicians; more of a working class trade than a profession in its own right. Since most physicians happened to be monks and were governed by the rules of the Roman Catholic Church, the dirty work of surgery didn't really gel with the monks vows to respect the holy temple that is the human body.
Well thankfully these days barbers mostly stick to haircuts, but we have the barber's pole to remind us of how much times have changed.
images taken from pixabay.com and pexels.com
article by @capra