Mono Monday: "Traditional" - Barber's Pole

Ingeborg has set “Traditional” as this week’s Mono-Monday theme.
 
I thought monochrome was perhaps a less scary way than colour of presenting the tradition (dating back to the Middle Ages) of a helical stripe on a pole as the sign of a barber’s shop, as the red and white are said to represent blood and bandages. If you don’t want any more gory details then don’t read on…!
 
Having had my hair cut at a local barber’s shop last week I’m glad that I didn’t come away with bandages and trickling blood. However this theme set me on researching the history of the barber’s pole (what follows is a summary of the Wikipedia entry on this topic).
 
The first thing I discovered is that the use of the pole is international. In most countries it seems the stripes are red & white as in the UK, but apparently in the USA and they often add a blue stripe (I think one can guess why – I don’t think they add stars though!).
 
In the mediaeval era barbers were also surgeons, their remit including blood-letting and tooth extractions. The original pole had a brass washbasin at the top, to represent a bowl of leeches, and another at the bottom (into which the blood could drain). The pole represented the staff that the patient gripped onto to encourage the blood to flow.
 
In some states in the USA there has been controversy as to whether barber’s poles can also be used by beauty salons, and there have been several legal battles on this issue.
 
In parts of Asia the tradition is a little different, a barber’s pole being used as a symbol for a brothel; laws against prostitution are sometimes only enforced where public solicitations are involved so the idea seems to be that the pole is not a solicitation in the legal sense. In South Korea the situation is particularly confusing, as both barbers and brothels use the pole. It is said that genuine barbers often use a pole showing a woman with flowing hair on it to indicate that theirs is a genuine hair salon (but I guess that could also confuse the meaning…!). It could be a good excuse of course: “Honestly officer, I thought I was just going for a haircut…”
 
This particular pole on our local barber’s shop looks as if it’s suffering the ravages of time – as, of course, do some of our traditions :-)
 
Many thanks to Ingeborg for triggering me to undertake this interesting piece of research.