Is that a tassel I see?
My earliest crush, after the cartoon prince in Swan Lake (scroll down for a visual and know it was a phase), was King Tut. I’ve admitted this before. So when I was charged with a challenge to write about tassels (don’t ask), I was pleasantly surprised to learn that, according to AI, it was “highly probable” that boy king was rockin’ them before his unfortunately early demise.
If you can believe it, tassels have gone on quite the ride. They started as most enduring fashion trends do – by the hand of God. In the 13th Century BCE (when did we start adding an E?) Lord let Moses know to let the people know they needed to start wearing tassels so they didn’t forget their commandments.
About 1,000 years later, Egyptians and Mesopotamians donned tassels to protect from evil spirits and because, well, they were stylish.
When Justinian landed the Byzantine Empire’s top job in 527 AD (E?), he immediately started doing big things – codifying law, conquering his neighbors, restoring the Roman Empire, dealing with plague – and in his free time, he paid off two monks to steal silkworm eggs from China. Why pay the Chinese for silk when you can rob them of the means and produce it in-house?
Like most knock-offs, Byzantine silk never quite hit the mark, but it did boost the luxury tassel industry. Years later, the accessory caught the ever-wandering eye of the Catholic Church, who used it to identify who in the clergy was important, and who was not.
If we fast forward through the horrors of the Black Plague, where one’s desire for a tassel paled in comparison to one’s desire for, say, a piece of bread or perhaps survival, we arrive to the turbulent but transformative 16th Century, when Tenochtitlan was falling and Constantinople was thriving. Shakespeare was furiously penning the English language’s most famous love affair and good ol’Mica was breaking his back painting the Sistine Chapel for today’s Millennials to ruin with forbidden flash-equipped cameras that are 150% not supposed to enter the premises.
Anyway, it was around this period that something called the Guild of the Passementiers was created in France. Passementerie is literally “the art of making elaborate trimmings or edgings…for clothing or furnishings”. One had to apprentice for 7 years to become a master (about the same amount of time it takes to become a lawyer). The French ate it up, hiring passementier lads to cover every inch of their aristocratic dwellings in glittering tinsel and beaded ornaments, and other gaudy Versailles-esque details.
This home decor fad continued for years until someone realized that, unless you invited all your neighbors to your place for a rowdy night of wine and cards and orgies (or whatever the French were doing at that time), how would anyone know how fashion-forward you really were? The style had to be taken to the streets. Tassels were super versatile, why not tie one to your shoulder and hit up the opera?
By the 18th Century, if you were rich and you didn’t wear a tassel, were you really that rich? Wealthy trend-setters rocked tassels of all shapes and sizes on coats, hats, and gowns, riling the envy of the entire working class.
And then the freaking Victorians came along and wiped out the good ol’tassel, opting instead for frilly gloves and parasols. “Something more modest,” they claimed. (A modest parasol?) Fashion took a turn toward boring, and our playful protagonist went into hiding.
But not for long. Luckily for the tenacious tassel, the Art Deco era swooped in and saved the day, tacking it in all its glory to curtains and geometrically-enhanced upholstery in hotels from Miami Beach to Mexico City.
At this point, you must be wondering, why is she telling me this?
To be perfectly frank, it’s an experiment. For you and for me. To see if I could bring to life the story of an otherwise mundane object. To keep you engaged until the end of this rather anticlimactic story.
I’ve also inadvertently discussed life. Like the journey of the enduring tassel, the human ride is one big cycle of highs and lows.
There are times when you’re feeling like the center of someone’s world, riding high on a nobleman’s top hat. There are times when you feel useless, at war for the attention being devoured by a lacy sun umbrella.
That’s when you retreat and reinvent yourself, and find your way back to the spotlight.
A new thread, a new color, a new style, a new version of you.
I’m going with red.
With love,
Bethany
Buy my books! Wander Lust and 80 Simple yet Powerful Lessons are both available on Amazon.
