Forensic Investigation of a Shawl Linked to the "Jack the Ripper" Murders

A set of historic murders, known as the "Jack the Ripper murders," started in London in August 1888. The killer's identity has remained a mystery to date. Here, we describe the investigation of, to our knowledge, the only remaining physical evidence linked to these murders, recovered from one of the victims at the scene of the crime. We applied novel, minimally destructive techniques for sample recovery from forensically relevant stains on the evidence and separated single cells linked to the suspect, followed by phenotypic analysis. The mtDNA profiles of both the victim and the suspect matched the corresponding reference samples, fortifying the link of the evidence to the crime scene. Genomic DNA from single cells recovered from the evidence was amplified, and the phenotypic information acquired matched the only witness statement regarded as reliable. To our knowledge, this is the most advanced study to date regarding this case.

The Iceman's lithic toolkit: Raw material, technology, typology and use

The Tyrolean Iceman, a 5,300-year-old glacier mummy recovered at the Tisenjoch (South Tyrol, Italy) together with his clothes and personal equipment, represents a unique opportunity for prehistoric research. The present work examines the Iceman's tools which are made from chert or are related to chert working - dagger, two arrowheads, endscraper, borer, small flake and antler retoucher - and considers also the arrowhead still embedded in the shoulder of the mummy. The interdisciplinary results achieved by study of the lithic raw material, technology, use-wear analysis, CT analysis and typology all add new information to Ötzi's individual history and his last days, and allow insights into the way of life of Alpine Copper Age communities. The chert raw material of the small assemblage originates from at least three different areas of provenance in the Southalpine region. One, or possibly two, sources derive from outcrops in the Trentino, specifically the Non Valley. Such variability suggests an extensive provisioning network, not at all limited to the Lessini mountains, which was able to reach the local communities. The Iceman's toolkit displays typological characteristics of the Northern Italian tradition, but also comprises features typical of the Swiss Horgen culture, which will come as no surprise in the toolkit of a man who lived in a territory where transalpine contacts would have been of great importance. Ötzi was not a flintknapper, but he was able to resharpen his tools with a medium to good level of skill. Wear traces reveal that he was a right-hander. Most instruments in the toolkit had reached their final stage of usability, displaying extensive usage, mostly from plant working, resharpenings and breaks. Evidently Ötzi had not had any access to chert for quite some time, which must have been problematic during his last hectic days, preventing him from repairing and integrating his weapons, in particular his arrows. Freshly modified blade tools without any wear suggest planned work which he never carried out, possibly prevented by the events which made him return to the mountains where he was killed by a Southern Alpine archer.

Technological complexity and the global dispersal of modern humans

Anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) dispersed out of Africa roughly 120,000 years ago and again after 75,000 years ago. The early dispersal was geographically restricted to the Arabian Peninsula, Levant, and possibly parts of southern Asia. The later dispersal was ultimately global in scope, including areas not previously occupied by Homo. One explanation for the contrast between the two out-of-Africa dispersals is that the modern humans who expanded into Eurasia 120,000 years ago lacked the functionally and structurally complex technology of recent hunter-gatherers. This technology, which includes, for example, mechanical projectiles, snares and traps, and sewn clothing, provides not only expanded dietary breadth and increased rates of foraging efficiency and success in places where plant and animal productivity is low, but protection from cold weather in places where winter temperatures are low. The absence of complex technology before 75,000 years ago also may explain why modern humans in the Levant did not develop sedentary settlements and agriculture 120,000 years ago (i.e., during the Last Interglacial).

She Wears the Pants: The Reform Dress as Technology in Nineteenth-Century America

This article examines the American dress-reform movement, detailing the ways in which reformers conceptualized clothing as a social and bodily technology. In the mid-nineteenth century, women began making and wearing the "reform dress"-a costume consisting of pants and shortened, lightweight skirts-as an alternative to burdensome feminine fashions. When ridiculed in public for wearing overtly masculine garments, dress reformers insisted their clothing was healthful, functional, and natural. This article discusses women's use of medical science and technical knowledge in their rejection of fashion, promotion of sexual equality, and efforts to change mainstream clothing practices. When approached from a technological perspective, the reform dress reveals broader tensions in an industrializing American society, such as changing gender relations and new understandings of the relationship between humans and technology.

[The changes of nurse uniform style in Pakhoi Po Yan Hospital in recent hundred year]

Nurse uniforms are the nurse's professional clothing, the main features of which are to keep clean and for easy identification. Culture consciousness has been added into nurse uniforms by people's behavior during the course of its application. Through the investigation on the historical materials of Pakhoi Po Yan Hospital (founded by Church Missionary Society in April 1886 in Pakhoi), it can be found that the nurse uniforms of different ages reflect the cultural background of the changes and the development of nursing career. This not only deduces the nurse culture and progress, but also reflects the continuation of nursing care, its responsibility and innovation.

[The fake lady on trial: transvestitism in psychiatry and the sexual sciences, or the regulation of public dress-code]

With the publication of Carl Westphal's "die conträre Sexualempfindung" or "the Contrary Sexual Feeling" (1870), non-conform sexual/gender behavior, such as wearing clothing from the opposite gender, fell within psychiatry's field of activity; psychiatrists cooperated with law enforcement to maintain the public ordering of the sexes. On the basis of the Charité's medical records of a male patient, reported to have publically appeared in women's clothing and thereby making headlines in 1910 as the 'fake lady', the positions of psychiatrist Theodor Ziehen and sexual scientist Magnus Hirschfeld stand in contrast to one another--a development, which affected their forensic argumentation. As Hirschfeld had, in the same year 1910, introduced the concept of transvestitism to describe this very phenomenon, a transfer of competing interpretations out of sexual science and into psychiatry can be studied. The circulation of Magnus Hirschfeld's questionnaire to the vita sexualis allows for an investigation of the effects of such on the collective, biographical narration of sexual minorities, as well as on diagnostic capacity in psychiatry, in reference to transvestitism. An analysis of press-reports on the case and trials of the 'fake lady' approaches the question, how non-conform sexual behavior was to be recognized or identified in public and, for the sake of prevention, how it was explained. Such an analysis also investigates the role of the press in the popularization of Hirschfield's transvestitism concept.

[Clothes of the HOUSE, or Clothes of REASON? Children's clothing during the Age of Enlightenment]

Children's clothing is a subject that forms part of the history of pediatrics. Many studies focus on the ideas developed by Locke and Rousseau. Here we choose to focus our study on an author who is rarely quoted: Jacques Ballexserd (1726-1774), "citizen of Geneva," who is little known to historians of pediatrics. However, George Frederic Still (1868-1941) devotes two pages to his views in his Histoire de la Pédiatrie.

Viking and early Middle Ages northern Scandinavian textiles proven to be made with hemp

Nowadays most plant textiles used for clothing and household are made of cotton and viscose. Before the 19th century however, plant textiles were mainly made from locally available raw materials, in Scandinavia these were: nettle, hemp and flax. It is generally believed that in Viking and early Middle Ages Scandinavia hemp was used only for coarse textiles (i.e. rope and sailcloth). Here we present an investigation of 10 Scandinavian plant fibre textiles from the Viking and Early Middle Ages, believed to be locally produced. Up till now they were all believed to be made of flax. We show that 4 textiles, including two pieces of the famous Överhogdal Viking wall-hanging are in fact made with hemp (in three cases hemp and flax are mixed). This indicates that hemp was important, not only for coarse but also for fine textile production in Viking and Early Middle Ages in Scandinavia.

The use of paleo-imaging and microbiological testing in the analysis of antique cultural material: multislice tomography, and microbial analysis of the Trogir Cathedral cope hood depicting St. Martin and a beggar

Paleoradiology is the study of biological and other materials from archeological settings through the use of various medical imaging techniques. Although it is most often used in the scientific study of ancient human remains, it can also be used to study metals, ceramics, paper, and clothes. The aim of this study was to test two paleoimaging techniques (MSCT and mammography) in the analysis of an important Croatian liturgical vestment: the hood of a bishop's cope from St. Lawrence's Treasury in Trogir depicting St. Martin and a beggar. To ensure a safe environment for scientists participating in the analysis, a preliminary microbiological analysis was performed, which contributed to the database of microbiological flora found on Croatian archeological remains and relics studied to date. Due to a great amount of metal filaments, the paleoradiological analysis did not produce satisfactory results. However, a digitally enhanced image clearly showed fine metal embroidery of the hood that was not so easily perceived by naked eye. This article argues in favor of expanding paleoradiological studies on materials other than human remains and also of publishing unsatisfactory results, as important lessons for future development of techniques and methods to analyze ancient remains and seek answers about human historical and cultural heritage.

[Formal, functional, and fashionable: nurse uniforms in Croatia between the 1920s and 1940s]

This article recollects the development of the official uniforms of graduate nurses in Croatia from the early 1920s to the 1940s. These were the early days of a profession that has gained its authority not only in health care, but also in social work, especially when it comes to health education and social support. This new profession called for a clear visual identity that would appropriately represent its status and the competence of the women who wore the uniforms. The article follows the line of continuity in the design and symbols of nurse clothing over the early days of the profession.

[About the signumanistics of medical units and departments of North-West of Russia]

Armbands, indicating belonging of the military man to the Armed forces, to separate type, alliance or military unit or department, are an integral part of modern military uniform. Author presents some armbands of military-medical units and departments locating on the North-West of Russia. Different variants of the armbands are suggested. Rules of construction and adoption of the armbands are recommended according to heraldic laws and directive documents. The article allows to learn about famous armbands of military-medical service and is of special interest to further development of heraldic theme of units and departments of medical service of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

Sensing design and workmanship: the haptic skills of shoppers in eighteenth-century London

This article explores how eighteenth-century shoppers understood the material world around them. It argues that retail experiences exposed shoppers to different objects, which subsequently shaped their understanding of this world. This article builds on recent research that highlights the importance of shop environments and browsing in consumer choice. More particularly, it differentiates itself by examining the practice of handling goods in shops and arguing that sensory interaction with multiple goods was one of the key means by which shoppers comprehended concepts of design and workmanship. In doing so, it affirms the importance of sensory research to design history. The article focuses on consumer purchases of ceramic objects and examines a variety of sources to demonstrate the role of haptic skills in this act. It shows how different literary sources described browsing for goods in gendered and satirical terms and then contrasts these readings against visual evidence to illustrate how handling goods was also represented as a positive act. It reads browsing as a valued practice requiring competence, patience and haptic skills. Through an examination of diary sources, letters and objects this article asks what information shoppers gained from touching various objects. It concludes by demonstrating how repetitive handling in search of quality meant that shoppers acquired their own conception of what constituted workmanship and design.

The importance of fastidiousness in nursing

There has been a lot of criticism of nurses recently. Some would say that one of the biggest problems today is that nurses are not as disciplined or don't pay sufficient attention to detail. One hundred years ago in the BJN, there was an article questioning just how fussy and careful nurses were about small details such as dress and cleanliness.

'Good in all respects': appearance and dress at Staffordshire County Lunatic Asylum, 1818-54

Dress was integral to the ideals and practice of Staffordshire County Lunatic Asylum, an institution catering for all social classes. Lunatics' appearance was used to gauge the standard of care inside the asylum and beyond. Clothing was essential for moral treatment and physical health. It helped to denote social and institutional class: clothes were integral to paupers' admission; rich patients spent time and money dressing; for disturbed inmates and those who destroyed asylum attire, the consequence could be'secure dress', which was fundamental to therapeutics. Later, when an ethos of non-restraint was introduced, the superintendent used patients' appearance to propagate an image of his enlightened care.

['No naturally shaped human foot would end in wedged-in, pointed toes" (Knud Ahlborn)--Wandervögel, youth movement and movement for rational footwear]

The nineteenth century "movement for rational clothing" not only aimed at reforming women's clothes (leaving behind corset-fashion), it set out to improve women's rights in general. Few people know that footwear also was modernized in the second half of the nineteenth century. After shoes had been made for 350 years on the basis of a symmetry pattern, without or with almost invisible distinction between left and right feet, scientists around the Frankfurt born professor of anatomy Georg Hermann von Meyer (1815-1892) demanded with him radical reform of footwear--for both sexes--using new lasts that were modelled on the natural shape of feet. Around the turn of the century, after physicians, shoemakers and hygienists had spent decades debating new ideas, members of the Wandervogel movement adopted the issue for their own purposes and chose anatomic over fashionable yet unhealthy fits which tended to be pointed, slim and--above all--symmetrical. Once the Wandervogel movement had split into several smaller groupings in 1904 and become part of the Jugendbewegung (youth movement), some of its members wanted clothing to also carry symbolic meaning. Naturally-shaped hygienic boots should no longer just allow for walking without damage to the feet: they should become the embodiment of a new spirit and, beyond that, of a reformed society. A new "lay practice" and "do-it-yourself"-shoemaking replaced former academic programs for new natural footwear. Interestingly enough, alongside those quite radical concepts, a kind of "footwear reform light" established itself in the market: on the surface only slightly different from the old-fashioned, symmetrical shoes, these "modern" pairs, which consisted of a right and left shoe, remained successful even after the world wars and became the new standard in the twentieth century, because the shoes made according to this pattern lasted longer, fitted better and were more comfortable.

Reading photographic portraits of Australian women cyclists in the 1890s: from costume and cycle choices to constructions of feminine identity

During the 1890s, in Australia and around the world, there was a convergence of the cycle, the camera and women. With the advent of the revolutionary safety bicycle, cycling had become a craze. At the same time, photographic technology had undergone changes that meant photographs were cheaper and more accessible. Women became avid consumers of both these new technologies; they became cyclists in unprecedented numbers for the first time, and they also became the popular subjects, and proud owners, of photographic portraits. These two trends converged, resulting in a proliferation of photographic portraits of women cyclists, many of which were published in newspapers and magazines. These bicycle portraits have now become a rich source for historians. More than just visually interesting artefacts, these photographic depictions of the Australian woman cyclist are important windows into the history of Australian women's cycling in the last decade of the nineteenth century. Bicycle portraits provide significant insights into the study of Australian women cyclists, from historical detail ranging from costume, bicycle and cycling activity choices to more complex understandings of the expression of feminine identity among Australian women cyclists in the 1890s.

Women’s fashions in transition: Ottoman borderlands and the Anglo-Ottoman exchange of costumes

Following the considerable increase in the interactions between Ottomans and Europeans, Ottoman port cities, referred to here as “borderlands,” became meeting places of distinct worlds. Ottoman and British people met, clashed, and grappled with each other in the borderlands of the Ottoman Empire. There was unbalanced, disparate, and disproportionate, but also mutual and constant interchange between the two societies. This article discusses one facet of this interchange: the Anglo-Ottoman exchange of women’s costumes.

J. M. Despréaux' lichens from the Canary Islands and West Africa: an account of a 19th century collection found in an English archive

This is an historical and descriptive account of 28 herbarium specimens, 27 lichens and an alga, found in the archives of Charles Chalcraft, a descendant of the Bedford family, who were dye manufacturers in Leeds, England, in the 19th century. The lichens comprise 13 different morphotypes collected in the Canary Islands and West Africa by the French botanist J. M. Despréaux between 1833 and 1839. The collections include samples of "Roccella fuciformis", "R. phycopsis" and "R. tinctoria" (including the fertile morphotype "R. canariensis"), "Ramalina crispatula" and "R. cupularis", two distinct morphotypes of "Sticta", "S. canariensis" and "S. dufouri", "Physconia enteroxantha", "Pseudevernia furfuracea var. ceratea" and "Pseudocyphellaria argyracea". The herbarium also includes authentic material of "Parmotrema tinctorum" and a probable syntype of "Seirophora scorigena". Most of these species are known as a source of the purple dye orchil, which was used to dye silk and wool.

What was uniform about the fin-de-siècle sailor suit?

The sailor suits widely worn by children in late-nineteenth-century Britain have been interpreted at the time, and since, as expressions of an Imperial ethos. Yet, a closer examination of the ways that these garments were produced by mass manufacturers, mediated by advertisers and fashion advisors and consumed by families makes us question this characterization. Manufacturers interpreted sailor suits not as unchanging uniforms but as fashion items responding to seasonal changes. Consumers used them to assert social identities and social distinctions, selecting from the multiple variants available. Cultural commentators described sailor suits as emulating Royal practice—but also as ‘common’ and to be avoided. A close analysis of large samples of images and texts from the period 1870–1900 reveals how these different meanings overlapped, making the fin-de-siècle sailor suit a garment that undermines many of our assumptions.

The illicit consumption of military uniforms in Britain, 1914–1918

Focusing on the British home front during the First World War, this article explores civilians’ motives for acquiring and wearing military garments and accoutrements to which they were not entitled. It suggests that uniforms could be donned either to avoid the attentions of recruiting sergeants, or to perpetrate criminal deceptions. That said, individuals did not always wear illicit uniforms in order to ‘disguise’ their civilian identity. Rather, many men claimed a sense of entitlement to such items, either on the basis of previous war service, or, more often, on the basis of their contributions to the war effort on the home front. The acquisition of military items could also reflect men's roles as consumers: for many civilians, acquiring and wearing the newly glamorous uniforms was a consumer choice that could also open the door to further leisure and consumer opportunities. Overall, illicitly wearing military items undermined the uniform's link with service and sacrifice on the battle fronts: it allowed individuals to assume the appearance of combatants or to assert their patriotic identities without actually exposing themselves to military duties or dangers. It also reflected (some) men's continued perception of themselves as consumers, keen, even in wartime, to adopt what they saw as the most desirable sartorial option.

[Origin of three symbols in medicine and surgery]

BACKGROUND

Humans use many ways to communicate with fellow humans. Symbols have been one of these ways. Shamans probably used these in the beginning and adopted other distinctive symbols as they were introduced.

DISCUSSION

The origin, the reason and use of three symbols in medicine and surgery are discussed. Some symbols currently remain the same and others have been modified or have disappeared. The oldest of these three symbols is the staff of Aesculapius, related to the Greek god of medicine and health. Since the 19th century, in some countries the symbol of the medical profession has become the caduceus, but the staff is the natural symbol. The second symbol is the barber pole that was created at the beginning of the Middle Ages. This was the means to locate the office and shop of a barber/surgeon in towns, cities and battlefields. On the other hand, the surgeon made use of the emblem of the union, trade or fraternity to which he belonged, accompanied by the bowl for bloodletting. The third symbol is the wearing of long and short robes that distinguished graduate surgeons from a medical school and the so-called barber/surgeons.

CONCLUSIONS

Symbols facilitate the manner in which to identify the origin or trade of many working people. Some symbols currently remain and others have either been modified or are obsolete, losing their relationship with surgery and medicine.

A twentieth-century triangle trade: selling black beauty at home and abroad, 1945–1965

This study examines the careers of African American beauty culturists as they worked in the United States, Europe, and Africa between 1945 and 1965. Facing push back at home, African American beauty entrepreneurs frequently sought out international venues that were hospitable and receptive to black Americans in the years following World War II. By strategically using European sites that white Americans regarded as the birthplace of Western fashion and beauty, African American entrepreneurs in the fields of modeling, fashion design, and hair care were able to win accolades and advance their careers. In gaining support abroad, particularly in Europe, these beauty culturists capitalized on their international success to establish, legitimize, and promote their business ventures in the United States. After importing a positive reputation for themselves from Europe to the United States, African American beauty entrepreneurs then exported an image of themselves as the world's premier authorities on black beauty to people of color around the globe as they sold their products and marketed their expertise on the African continent itself. This essay demonstrates the important role that these black female beauty culturists played, both as businesspeople and as race leaders, in their generation's struggle to gain greater respect and opportunity for African Americans both at home and abroad. In doing so it places African American beauty culturists within the framework of transatlantic trade networks, the Black Freedom Movement, Pan-Africanism, and America's Cold War struggle.

Athletic fashion, "Punch," and the creation of the new woman

Between 1885-1900 "Punch" satirized the personality of the New Woman. However, virtually single-handedly it also gave a body and emancipated culture to this otherwise socially abstract personality. Using illustrations from "Punch," this essay argues that using sport specific clothing and equipment in its cartoons, "Punch" completely unintentionally created a liberating picture of women while simultaneously using its captions and border texts to make the New Woman's body signify the anxieties patriarchal culture had about her social personality and politics.

Form and deformity: the trouble with Victorian pockets

This essay explores the Victorian debate about the place of pockets in men's and women's clothing. By studying the representation of men as naturally pocketed creatures and the general denial of useful pockets to middle-class women, the essay demonstrates the tenacious cultural logic by which men's and women's pockets were imagined to correspond to sexual differences and to index access, or lack thereof, to public mobility and financial agency. Interconnected readings of visual art, essays, and novels show how the common sense about gendered pockets was utilized and promulgated in Victorian narratives. The question of who gets pockets is thus positioned as part of the history of gendered bodies in public space.

A pair of little gilded shoes: commission, cost, and meaning in Renaissance footwear

This article focuses on women's luxury footwear to examine issues of economic, material, and familial life in Renaissance Italy. It uses graphic work by Albrecht Dürer to explore footwear design, and draw from disparate sources to propose a new method for evaluating its cost. The article argues that sumptuous footwear was available for a range of prices that are not reflected in surviving payment records, and that it was largely less expensive than moralists and legislators implied. In conclusion, it employs Minerbetti documentation to consider the role particular shoes may have played in developing personal subjectivity.

"No fertile soil for pathogens": rayon, advertising, and biopolitics in late Weimar Germany

Recent research on twentieth-century German history has begun to re-examine the centrality of race as a category of analysis. While not discounting its importance in the shaping and enacting of Nazi policies and practices, race is seen instead as one among many factors leading to the crimes of the Nazi regime. In this paper, the author considers the role consumerist desires and fantasies played in the wider context of the inter-war European fascination with notions of technology, "hygiene," democracy, and modernity. Using advertisements that were created to promote manufactured-fiber (rayon) apparel, this article suggests that continuities across cultures and time periods necessitate a re-evaluation of race as the signal organizing principal. Instead, the author argues that by complicating the intersections between class, science and technology, and an emerging, but troubling, modernity, 1920s rayon advertising offers an especially rich site for analysis of the ways in which biopolitics and nascent consumerism both sold products and constructed ideologies before 1933, and influenced the post-war welfare state.

Religion, politics and gender equality in Turkey: implications of a democratic paradox?

This article examines the gendered implications of the intertwining of Islam and politics that took shape after the process of democratisation in Turkey had brought a political party with an Islamist background to power. This development revived the spectre of restrictive sex roles for women. The country is thus confronted with a democratic paradox: the expansion of religious freedoms accompanying potential and/or real threats to gender equality. The ban on the Islamic headscarf in universities has been the most visible terrain of public controversy on Islam. However, the paper argues that a more threatening development is the propagation of patriarchal religious values, sanctioning secondary roles for women through the public bureaucracy as well as through the educational system and civil society organisations.

“An Adamless Eden” in Ingonish: what Cape Breton's archives reveal

This essay reads the archived life of a Sydney-based woman - Ella Liscombe (1902–69) - as it was recorded in her diaries, notebooks, and especially her photograph album of a 1927 camping excursion to Ingonish, Cape Breton Island. This album features pictures of women in "cross-dress," and the writings that gloss these camping records express Ella Liscombe’s erotic same-sex feelings about her female companions. As this essay explores Liscombe’s sartorial and emotional aesthetics, it also makes distinctions between "mannish" behaviour and "boyish" performance/costume, ultimately suggesting that Ella and her friends indulged in "twilight moments" to escape the strictures of domestic femininity.

The women preachers of the secular state: the politics of preaching at the intersection of gender, ethnicity and sovereignty in Turkey

This article analyzes the politics of preaching in Turkey in the last decade by focusing on the appointment of women as preachers and vice-muftis by the Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet), a state institution established for the protection of secular foundations through religious service. It asks what happens when women wearing headscarves become civil servants and give religious guidance in a secular state, which prohibits headscarves in public offices and schools. It shows that the context, the use and the interlocutors of preaching make ordinary religious activity a complicated political practice that interacts with gender, ethnicity and state sovereignty. It argues that exceptional integration of headscarved women into public offices would seem to be an achievement given the long lasting political activism of women over the headscarf, but in the final analysis it serves the sovereign power of the state, which aims to absorb both Islamist and Kurdish challenges by mobilizing women preachers.

The economics of abundance: coal and cotton in Lancashire and the world

As a subterranean, highly elastic energy source, coal played a vital role in the cotton industry revolution. Coal was also vital to Lancashire's primacy in this revolution, because it was necessary both to the original accumulation of agglomeration economies before the steam age and to their reinforcement during the steam age. In no other part of the world was the cotton industry situated on a coalfield, and the response of other parts of the world cotton industry to Lancashire's agglomeration advantages was dispersal in search of cheap water and/or labour power. Lancashire coal helped to shape the global pattern of cotton production.