Blond

Portrait of Young Woman with Unicorn (Lady with unicorn) (1506) by Raffaello Sanzio depicts a young woman with blonde hair.

Blond (see below) or fair-hair, is a hair color characterized by low levels of the dark pigment eumelanin. The resultant visible hue depends on various factors, but always has some sort of yellowish color. The color can be from the very pale blond (caused by a patchy, scarce distribution of pigment) to reddish "strawberry" blond colors or golden-brownish blond colors (the latter with more eumelanin).

Etymology, spelling, and grammar

The word blond is first attested in English in 1481 and derives from Old French blund, blont meaning "a colour midway between golden and light chestnut". It gradually eclipses the native term fair, of same meaning, from Old English fæġer, to become the general term for "light complexioned". The French (and thus also the English) word blond has two possible origins. Some linguists say it comes from Medieval Latin blundus, meaning yellow, from Old Frankish *blund which would relate it to Old English blonden-feax meaning grey-haired, from blondan/blandan meaning to mix. Also, Old English beblonden meant dyed as ancient Germanic warriors were noted for dying their hair. However, other linguists who favor a Latin origin for the word say that Medieval Latin blundus was a vulgar pronunciation of Latin flavus, also meaning yellow. Most authorities, especially French, attest the Frankish origin. The word was reintroduced into English in the 17th century from French, and was for some time considered French; in French, "blonde" is a feminine adjective; it describes a woman with blond hair.^[1]

"Blond" and "blonde", with its continued gender-varied usage, is one of few adjectives in written English to retain separate masculine and feminine grammatical genders. Each of the two forms, however, is pronounced the same way. American Heritage's Book of English Usage propounds that, insofar as "a blonde" can be used to describe a woman but not a man is merely said to possess blond(e) hair, the term is an example of a "sexist stereotype [whereby] women are primarily defined by their physical characteristics."^[2] The Oxford English Dictionary records that the phrase "big blonde beast" and "big blond beast" were both used in the 20th century to refer specifically to men "of the Nordic type" (that is to say, blond-haired). Particularly this had associations with Friedrich Nietzsche's Übermensch.^[3] The OED also records that blond as an adjective is especially used with reference to women, in which case it is spelt "blonde", citing three Victorian usages of the term. The masculine version is used to describe a plural, in "blonds of the European race",^[3] in a citation from 1833 Penny cyclopedia [sic], which distinguishes genuine blondness as a Caucasian feature distinct from albinism.^[4] By the early 1990s, "blonde moment" or being a "dumb blonde" had come into common parlance to mean "an instance of a person, esp. a woman... being foolish or scatter-brained."^[5] Another hair color word of French origin, brunet(te), also functions in the same way in orthodox English. The OED gives "brunet" as meaning "dark-complexioned" or a "dark-complexioned person", citing a comparative usage of brunet and blond to Thomas Henry Huxley in saying, "The present contrast of blonds and brunets existed among them".^[6] "Brunette" can be used, however, like "blonde", to describe a mixed-gender populace. The OED quotes Grant Allen, "The nation which resulted..being sometimes blonde, sometimes brunette."^[7]

"Blond" and "blonde" are also occasionally used to refer to objects that have a color reminiscent of fair hair. Examples include pale wood and lager beer. For example, the OED records its use in 19th century poetic diction to describe flowers, "a variety of clay ironstone of the coal measures", "the colour of raw silk",^[3] and a breed of ray.^[8]

Varieties

Many sub-categories of blond hair have also been defined to describe someone with blond hair more accurately. Common examples include the following:

• blond/flaxen^[9][10] – when distinguished from other varieties, "blond" by itself refers to a light but not whitish blond with no traces of red, gold, or brown. This color is often described as "flaxen".
• yellow – yellow-blond ("yellow" can also be used to refer to hair which has been dyed yellow).
• platinum blond^[11] or towheaded^[12][13] – whitish-blond; almost all platinum blonds are children. "Platinum blond" is often used to describe bleached hair, while "towheaded" generally refers to natural hair color.
• sandy blond^[14][15] – greyish-hazel or cream-colored blond.
• golden blond – a darker to rich, golden blond.
• strawberry blond^[16] , Venetian blond or Honey blond– a light or dark reddish golden blond.
• dirty blond^[17] or dishwater blond^[18] – dark blond with flecks of golden blond and brown
• ash-blond^[19] – pale or grayish blond.
• bleached blond or peroxide blond^[20] – artificial blond slightly less white than platinum blond.

Evolution of blond hair

Natural lighter hair colors occur most often in Europe and less frequently in other areas.^[21] In northern European populations, the occurrence of blonde hair is very frequent. The hair color gene MC1R has at least seven variants in Europe giving the continent a wide range of hair and eye shades. Based on recent genetic information carried out at three Japanese universities, the date of the genetic mutation that resulted in blonde hair in Europe has been isolated to about 11,000 years ago during the last ice age.^[22]

A typical explanation found in the scientific literature for the evolution of light hair is related to the requirement for vitamin D synthesis and northern Europe's seasonal deficiency of sunlight.^[23] Lighter skin is due to a low concentration in pigmentation, thus allowing more sunlight to trigger the production of vitamin D. In this way, high frequencies of light hair in northern latitudes are a result of the light skin adaptation to lower levels of sunlight, which reduces the prevalence of rickets caused by vitamin D deficiency. The darker pigmentation at higher latitudes in certain ethnic groups such as the Inuit is explained by a greater proportion of seafood in their diet. As seafood is high in vitamin D, vitamin D deficiency would not create a selective pressure for lighter pigmentation in that population.

An alternative hypothesis was presented by Canadian anthropologist Peter Frost, under the aegis of University of St Andrews, who published a study in March 2006 in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior. Frost said blond hair evolved very quickly in a specific area at the end of the last Ice Age by means of sexual selection.^[24] According to the study, the appearance of blond hair and blue eyes in some northern European women made them stand out from their rivals at a time of fierce competition for scarce males. The study argues that blond hair was produced higher in the Cro-Magnon descended population of the European region because of food shortages 10,000-11,000 years ago following the last glacial period when the most of it was covered by steppe-tundra. Almost the only sustenance in northern Europe came from roaming herds of mammoths, reindeer, bison and horses and finding them required long, arduous hunting trips in which numerous males died, leading to a high ratio of surviving women to men. This hypothesis argues that women with blond hair posed an alternative that helped them mate and thus increased the number of blonds.^[25]

A theory propounded in The History and Geography of Human Genes (1994), says blonde hair became predominant Northern Europe beginning about 3,000 BC, in the area now known as Lithuania, among the recently arrived Proto-Indo-European settlers (according to the Kurgan Hypothesis), and the trait spread quickly through sexual selection into Scandinavia. As above, the theory assumes that men found women with blonde hair more attractive.^[26]

Social reasons why men may have preferred blonde women is that light hair color is a marker of youth.^[27] Since many Northern European children have blonde hair, which darkens as they mature, blonde hair could arguably be associated with youth and therefore, fertility.^[27] Blonde as a color has also been associated with light and gold, things that people find attractive and desirable.^[27] Lighter color hair is usually more scarce or rare (exotic), arguably increasing its desirability.^[27]

Geographic distribution

Light hair color distribution^[28]. The yellow represents 80%+ light hair, light orange is 50-79% light hair, light brown is 20-49% light hair, dark brown is 1-19% light hair, and black represents no presence of light hair in the indigenous population.

Blond hair is most frequently found among the indigenous peoples of Northern Europe. The pigmentation of both hair and eyes is lightest around the south of the Baltic Sea and their darkness increases regularly and almost concentrically around this region.^[29] Strawberry blond is a much rarer type containing the most amounts of pheomelanin. Blond hair is also found in Southern Europe, Western Europe, and Eastern Europe. Due to migration from Europe from the 16th to the 20th centuries, blonds are also found all around the world such as in North America, South America, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Siberia, etc.

Generally, blond hair in Europeans is associated with lighter eye color (gray, blue, green, and hazel) and light (sometimes freckled) skin tone. Strong sunlight also lightens hair of any pigmentation, to varying degrees, and causes many blond people to freckle, especially during childhood.

In Central, Western Asia (Middle East) and South Asia, there is also a low frequency of natural blonds found among some ethnic populations. In Afghanistan, blonds are particularly found among the Tajik (10% blond, especially in the Pamir region)^[30], Pashtun, and Nuristani people (related to the Kalash) who have a blond hair frequency of one in three.^[31] In Pakistan the Kalash tribe mostly have blond hair. Blonde hair color can naturally occur even among other people from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa & Northern Areas of Pakistan and in India which includes Khowar people, Pashtuns, Kashmiris, Shina people, Burusho, and descendants of European colonists (the latter found in Goa, Pondicherry).

Kurdish children in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq; 2 of them are naturally blonds.

A natural blond Riffian Berber man.

Blonds are also found in Turkey (especially in northern (Caucasus) and western (European) parts of the country), and in parts of northern Iran, especially in the Caspian provinces. In the Levant, Israel (especially among the Ashkenazi, who have some European admixture), western Syria, the Palestinian territories, Jordan and Lebanon have a frequency of blonds as well. Blond hair is also a common sight among Berbers of North Africa, especially in the Rif and Kabyle region and also among Maghreb Arabs of Berber descent.^[32] Emigration and invasion from North Africa to Southern Europe (especially Spain and Portugal) added the number of natural blonds in that region. Some Berber Guanche populations, particularly the now extinct aboriginal population of Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands, were said by 14th-century Spanish explorers to exhibit blond hair and blue eyes.^[33][34] Because of emigration from Canary Islands, a number of blonds are seen in Spain and in Isleño Spanish populations of Cuba, Louisiana, Texas, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Uruguay, Argentina and other countries of Latin America.

Aboriginal Australians, especially in the west-central parts of the continent, have a high frequency of natural blond-to-brown hair,^[35][36] with as many as 90–100% of children having blond hair in some areas.^[37] The trait among Indigenous Australians is primarily associated with children and women and the hair turns more often to a darker brown color, rather than black, as they age.^[37] Blondness is also found in some other parts of the South Pacific such as the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and Fiji. Again there are higher incidences in children but here many adults too carry this indigenous blond mutation. Blondness was also reported among Indigenous peoples in South America known as Cloud People.^[38] There can be blond hair among Peruvian mestizos of mixed Cloud People and Spanish and/or other European descent.

Relation to age

A Finnish girl with blond hair

Blond hair is most common in Caucasian infants and children,^[39] so much so that the term "baby blond" is often used for very light colored hair. Babies may be born with blond hair even among groups where adults rarely have blond hair,^[36] although such natal hair usually falls out quickly. Blond hair tends to turn darker with age, and many children's blond hair turns light, medium, or dark brown or black before or during their adult years.^[39]

Culture, folklore, and mythology

Loki cuts the hair of the goddess Sif in an illustration (1920) by Willy Pogany

In the early period of the Roman Empire blonde hair was associated with prostitutes, who would wear blonde wigs or dye their hair.^[27] In the later period, it become more sociably acceptable and desirable, even among the upper classes.^[27] For example, the physical appearance of Emperor Nero, descended from an aristocratic family, is by the historian Suetonius described as: "... his hair light blond,... his eyes blue..."^[40] According to Francis Owens^[41] Roman literary records describe a very large number of well-known Roman historical personalities as blonde. In addition, 250 individuals are recorded to have had the name Flavius, meaning blonde, and there are many named Rufus and Rutilius, meaning red haired and reddish haired, respectively. The following Roman gods are said to have had blonde hair: Amor, Apollo, Aurora, Bacchus, Ceres, Diana, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Minerva and Venus.^[41]

In the Middle Ages blonde was usually associated with a seductress;^[27] for example, until the late 14th century depictions of Eve are usually blonde, while the Virgin Mary is usually brunette.^[27]

In Norse mythology, the goddess Sif (wife of Thor) is described as blonde.^[42] In the Poetic Edda poem Rígsþula, the blonde man Jarl is considered to be the ancestor of the dominant warrior class. In Northern European folklore, fairies value blonde hair in humans. Blonde babies are more likely to be stolen and replaced with changelings, and young blonde women are more likely to be lured away to the land of the fairies.^[43]

In European fairy tales, blonde hair was commonly ascribed to the heroes and heroines. This may occur in the text, as in Madame d'Aulnoy's La Belle aux cheveux d'or or The Story of Pretty Goldilocks (The Beauty with Golden Hair), or in illustrations depicting the scenes.^[44] One notable exception is Snow White who, because of her mother's wish for a child "as red as blood, as white as snow, as black as ebony,"^[45] has dark hair.^[46] This tendency appears also in more formal literature; in Greek mythology, Aphrodite, is the goddess of love and beauty and also had "golden hair" (e.g. according to an Oxyrhynchus Papyri attributed to Ibycus, Hesiod's Theogony, and also centuries later in Coluthus' "Rape of Helen").

St. Michael the Archangel's defeat of Satan by Guido Reni, Santa Maria della Concezione church, Rome, 1636

In Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote, the ideal beauty is Dulcinea whose "hairs are gold"; in Milton's poem Paradise Lost the noble and innocent Adam and Eve have "golden tresses",^[47][48] the protagonist-womaniser in Guy de Maupassant's novel Bel Ami who "recalled the hero of the popular romances" has "slightly reddish chestnut blond hair", while near the end of J. R. R. Tolkien's work The Lord of the Rings, the especially favourable year following the War of the Ring was signified in the Shire by an exceptional number of blonde-haired children.

In contemporary popular culture, it is often stereotyped that men find blonde women more attractive than women with other hair colors.^[27] For example Anita Loos popularized this idea in her 1925 novel Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.^[27] Blondes are often assumed to have more fun, for example in a Clairol commercial for hair colorant they use the phrase "Is it true blondes have more fun?".^[27] Some woman have reported after lightening their hair they feel other people expect them to be more fun-loving.^[27] The "blonde stereotype" is also associated with being less serious or less intelligent.^[27] This can be seen in blond jokes.^[27] It is believed the originator of the "dumb blonde" was an 18th century blonde French prostitute named Rosalie Duthe whose reputation of being beautiful but dumb inspired a play about her called Les Curiosites de la Foire (Paris 1775).^[27] Blonde actresses have supported this role, some of them include Marylin Monroe, Judy Holliday, Jayne Mansfield, and Goldie Hawn during her time at Laugh-In.^[27] Alfred Hitchcock preferred to cast blonde women for major roles in his films as he believed that the audience would suspect them the least, hence the term "Hitchcock blonde".^[49] This stereotype has become so ingrained it has spawned counter-narratives , such as in the 2001 film Legally Blonde in which Reese Witherspoon succeeds at Harvard despite biases against her beauty and blonde hair.^[27]

See also

• Red hair
• Human hair color
• Human eye color
• Human skin color
• List of colors
• Disappearing blonde gene

References