Mária T. Biró: The Bone Objects of the Roman Collection. (Catalogi Musei Nationalis Hungarici. Seria Archeologica 2; Budapest, 1994)

IV. HAIR-STYLES THE USE OF BONE HAIR-PINS, AND COMB USE OF THE ROMANS

IV. HAIR-STYLES. THE USE OF BONE HAIR-PINS, AND COMB USE OF THE ROMANS 1. Undecorated bone hair-pins. 2. Globular pins. 3. Decorative pins. 4. Combs. Fig. 8. The wear of hair-pins Roman women fixed their plaits or knots of various form with hair-pins made of metal or bone. Such hair-pins helped to fix the hair net protecting their hair-do or the scarf, veil, covering their head. Antique authors call these pins with several names. They differentiate acus crinalis, spina crinalis, but they also used the expression Crinale or comatoria (Tacitus, Germania, cap. 17., Apul. Met. cap 13., Petron 21. Ovid. Met. v. 53.). We have no idea what these names covered and to which archaeological type they belong to. What is more, it is not always possible, as I have mentioned before, to distinguish exactly dress pins from hair-pins. There are representations at our disposal for both employments. As to the ways of use of hairpins they are seen in several cases on Roman portraits modelled by masters engaged to lifelike representations.

72 Despite the great number of surviving representations (Fig. 9.) the archaeological description of these objects is far more neglected in the provinces than in the Barbaricum. This has, of course, several causes but the most important is the different "rank" of these everyday objects in the life of the two different societies. In the research of the Barbaricum the objects imported from the Empire (irrespective their material or quality) deserve special attention. At the same time in the area of the Empire the attention of scholars has turned towards more modest, mass products (like bone combs, pins, etc.) only much later.