If the hair was considered to be the source of a man's strength and
vigour, the removal of it would involve the loss of this and might be
considered especially to debar him from fighting or governing. The
instances given from the _Golden Bough_ have shown the fear felt by
many people of the consequences of the removal of their hair. The
custom of shaving the head might also betoken the renunciation of the
world and of the pursuit of arms. This may be the reason why monks
shaved the head, a practice which was followed by Buddhist as well as
Christian monks. A very clear case is also given by Sir James Frazer:
"When the wicked brothers Clotaire and Childebert coveted the kingdom
of their dead brother Clodomir, they inveigled into their power their
little nephews, the two sons of Clodomir; and having done so, they
sent a messenger bearing scissors and a naked sword to the children's
grandmother, Queen Clotilde, at Paris. The envoy showed the scissors
and the sword to Clotilde, and bade her choose whether the children
should be shorn and live, or remain unshorn and die. The proud queen
replied that if her grandchildren were not to come to the throne
she would rather see them dead than shorn. And murdered they were
by their ruthless uncle Clotaire with his own hand." [321] In this
case it appears that if their hair was shorn the children could not
come to the throne but would be destined to become monks. Similarly,
in speaking of the Georgians, Marco Polo remarks that they cut their
hair short like churchmen. [322] When a member of the religious order
of the Manbhaos is initiated his head is shaved clean by the village
barber, and the scalp-lock and moustache must be cut off by his _guru_
or preceptor, this being perhaps the special mark of his renunciation
of the world. The scalp-locks are preserved and made into ropes
which some of them fasten round their loins. Members of the Hindu
orders generally shave their scalp-locks and the head on initiation,
probably for the same reason as the Manbhaos. But afterwards they
often let the whole of their hair grow long. These men imagine that
by the force of their austerities they will obtain divine power,
so their religious character appears to be of a different order from
monasticism. Perhaps, therefore, they wear their hair long in order to
increase their spiritual potency. They themselves now say that they
do it in imitation of the god Siva and the ancient ascetics who had
long matted locks. The common Hindu practice of shaving the heads
of widows may thus be interpreted as a symbol of their complete
renunciation of the world and of any idea of remarriage. It was
accompanied by numerous other rules designed to make a widow's life a
continual penance. This barbarous custom was formerly fairly general,
at least among the higher castes, but is rapidly being abandoned
except by one or two of the stricter sections of Brahmans. Shaving
the head might also be imposed as a punishment. Thus in the time of
the reign of the Emperor Chandraguptra Maurya in the fourth century
B.C. it is stated that ordinary wounding by mutilation was punished
by the corresponding mutilation of the offender, in addition to the
amputation of his hand. The crime of giving false evidence was visited
with mutilation of the extremities; and in certain unspecified cases,
serious offences were punished by the shaving of the offender's hair,
a penalty regarded as specially infamous. [323] The cutting off of some
or all of the hair is at the present time a common punishment for caste
offences. Among the Korkus a man and woman caught in adultery have
each a lock of hair cut off. If a Chamar man and woman are detected
in the same offence, the heads of both are shaved clean of hair. A
Dhimar girl who goes wrong before marriage has a lock of her hair
cut off as a penalty, the same being done in several other castes.