Student cap

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Finnish student cap
Cap from a German student union ( Corps Berlin )
Faroese students in national dress with student hats

Student hats ( lids in Austria and southern Germany ) are worn by students and alumni in Europe and North America . They have been most widespread since the 19th century in Germany , Austria and Switzerland , although they are still used today in particular in traditional student associations as part of the couleur .

European roots in the Middle Ages

When medieval universities began to form in Europe in the 13th century , teachers and students naturally wore the monk-like costume of a cleric due to the great influence of the Church . The entire way of life at the universities was influenced by the clergy , because the universities' predecessors were the monastery and cathedral schools. The theological faculty was considered the most important of the faculties. Long gowns with hoods were part of the costume , which was probably necessary in the large, unheated rooms. Caps and berets were added later , probably to warm the tonsure .

As early as 1321, the statutes of the University of Coimbra in Portugal stipulated that doctors, licentiates and bachelors should wear gowns. In England in the second half of the 14th century the statutes of various colleges forbade excessive clothing ( excess in apparel ). Only the long gown was allowed. In principle, all universities in Europe followed these principles until the developments with the Reformation in the early modern period diverged in the individual countries.

German-speaking area

Marburg student around 1700 with a three-cornered hat

historical development

Pub scene around 1810: students with different headgear

In Germany, Austria and Switzerland, the traditional student cap is now a badge of a member of a colored student union . The color and shape are only determined by the connection and are completely independent of university, faculty and subject, as the connections traditionally consider themselves to be autonomous and independent of the state, parties and university bodies. Rather, from the 18th century until around the middle of the 19th century there were constant bans on wearing “badges of secret societies”. The German student hats - like the other components of the Couleurs - thus developed in constant opposition to the authorities. The first requirement was to change the students' hairstyle. With the French Revolution , braid and tricorn were initially replaced by the revolutionary short hairstyle and bicorn . The discontinuation of the braid and the political developments in Europe quickly put the Napoleonic bicorn into an option, and only now, towards the end of the second decade, was there room for the student hat as an innovation.

At the beginning of the 19th century, fraternity members wore the colors of their association as the color of their regular everyday clothing. Pants, jackets, hats, even the cords and tassels on the long tobacco pipes customary at the time were worn in carefully selected colors. From 1810 to around 1820 in particular, fashion in Germany was extremely diverse - presumably because of the socio-politically troubled times - and was characterized by experimental developments. Young people in particular wore items of clothing that many people found adventurous. From the variety of headgear, the later common student hat crystallized as standard between 1820 and 1830.

In the course of the 19th century this student hat fashion radiated to Eastern Europe (especially Poland), the Baltic States, Scandinavia and the Dutch-Flemish area.

In the 1870s, so-called student hats, which were made according to the pattern of student hats, were introduced for secondary school students throughout Germany . The hats differentiated the pupils according to school and grade level. These hats were abolished by the National Socialists in the 1930s. Separately, bear founded from the mid-19th century student connections hats by the pattern of student organizations, but this as a badge of connection belonging.

Usage today

Different hats

As a rule, the cap is seen as the second most important element of the fraternity color after the ribbon . The combination of ribbon and hat is often referred to as "full color".

Some associations are of the opinion that color traditionally belonged to the everyday clothing of the students (even developed from it), and therefore today wear a ribbon and hat combined with modern casual clothing. Some other types of associations suggest that the fashion changes that occurred in the late 1960s do not suit the student lane. Because in the 1950s and early 1960s the university student wore a suit and tie and the student wore a skirt . In the course of the 1968 movement , which was to a considerable extent opposed to the student associations, this changed completely. As a result, the everyday appearance of the fraternity student changed - but the views on how this could be reconciled with wearing color, in particular the hat, were divided.

Today in many student associations the rule applies that the hat is only worn by the senior or spokesperson, i.e. H. the first chairman of a student association, as "plenis coloribus" (Latin "with full colors") declared events should be carried. You should only wear clothing that is “suitable for color”, usually a suit with a shirt and tie that is not too light.

Hat shapes

Different hat shapes (from left to right): Striker, Cadorna hat, Biedermeier hat, plate hat, beer barrel (AKV Kyburger Zürich).

The basic structure of the hats is the same for all student associations. It consists of a head part ("cap body"), on the lower edge of which a colored stripe ("cap bridge", "push") is usually attached. At the front there is a black leather umbrella.

The hat shapes are usually specific to a connection, so cannot be selected individually. The shape of the headboard in particular can vary widely.

There are very large hats where the upper edge of the head section has a significantly larger diameter than the head circumference (flat cap). The "Bonner Teller" is stiffened at the top by an integrated metal ring (comparable to police hats) so that it cannot be squeezed together and carried in a coat or jacket pocket.

In some particularly large variations, the head part of the cap can hang down to one side in the form of a beret .

On the other hand, there are very small hats that lie more on the head than go around it. They are mostly worn on the back of the head ("occipital color").

Typical for the first half of the 19th century is a hat shape that is characterized by a small head section and a particularly long, forward-protruding peak. One speaks here of the Biedermeier hat .

In southern German and Austrian connections, the cap is called "Deckel".

striker

Kaiser Wilhelm II with striker
General McClellan (center), Commander in Chief of the Union Army in the Civil War , and adjudicators, each wearing a contemporary headgear similar to the “Striker”

Some connections wear the so-called striker as official headgear . This hat shape looks a bit like a hat with a cylinder-like attachment that is folded forward and is reminiscent of the uniform hat of the former armies of the American Civil War . Strikers also have a black screen; A strap runs over this. In contrast to other hat shapes, there is no surrounding color stripe, instead it is decorated with cords in the color of the color. Most of the forwards, but not all, are white. Some connections wear their strikers only in the summer semester, in winter they wear a regular hat. The origin of this headgear is largely unclear, student historians suspect that it was made in Bonn in the 1840s . There is a similarity to the Phrygian cap , which however has a pointed tip and neither a peak nor a strap. However, the Dömitzer and Meißner illuminated manuscripts (from the Wars of Liberation, 1813) already show Swedish soldiers and Prussian Freikorps members (Lützower) with the striker. The picture of Kaiser Wilhelm II is famous, wearing the white striker as a Bonn Prussian .

Hat color

Corps students with different colored caps

The head part of the hat is basically one color in the "main color" of the ribbon. This is usually the first color in the list, but not always. In rare cases, the hat can also be in a color that does not appear in the ribbon at all. This is especially the case in Austria or with connections that have arisen from a fusion of two connections with different colors.

The colored stripe ("Mützensteg", "Vorschlag") that runs around the lower edge of the hat is mostly designed in the same way as the band (often including percussion). If the hat has the first (upper) color of the ribbon, the color stripe may only show the two lower colors. A specialty is the so-called "Göttingen Stripe", which also occurs outside of Göttingen (for example at the Corps Hasso-Nassovia and the Corps Suevia-Straßburg zu Marburg). The hat is in the first color. The surrounding color strip shows the third color, surrounded by two narrow borders in the second color. The rule of thumb is: "The second color includes the third".

For the year 1830, the wreath cap is first documented in a successor association of the Urburschenschaft ( Burschenschaft der Bubenreuther zu Erlangen). In this special hat shape, a velvet, mostly black hat bridge is embroidered with golden oak leaves, which surrounds the hat in a wreath. This hat shape is a commitment to the values ​​of the original fraternity, whose flag was embroidered in red-black-red with golden oak leaves.

In many connections, the foxes (new members) wear a hat with a different color. For example, the surrounding color stripe can show the colors of the fox ribbon, or the fox hat has special features, for example an additional strand . Some corporations wear a so-called jack on their hat.

Special forms

Georg Mühlberg : The gentlemen charged . Charged in the wank with Cerevis.

Cerevis and beret

Cerevise are part of the so-called charge weight for most connections, i.e. the representative clothing of the active board. They are embroidered with oak or vine leaves, and on the top is the circle of the respective connection. The Cerevis is worn in the area of ​​the right forehead, in accordance with the representative purpose, whereby a rubber band running over the back of the head provides the necessary support. In this way, the embroidered compasses can be read from the front and make it easier to classify what has been charged . As a greeting, the fingertips of the extended right hand are placed on the edge of the cerevis or the right temple in a more or less military form.

In some fraternities , especially fraternities , the beret is worn as part of the full weight instead of the cerevise . This beret is a relic of the old German costume from the first half of the 19th century. Here the beret is usually decorated with one or more ostrich feathers , which are attached to the front edge of the hat with a cockade, usually in connecting colors .

The beer barrel

Ornate dress with vine leaves embroidery ( Corps Arminia Munich )
Different barrels

A headgear for rather unofficial occasions is the so-called "Tönnchen" (actually "beer barrel"). It is mostly reserved for the elderly and inactive. This is a small, circular, flat headgear without a visor that is usually worn on the back of the head. Thanks to the velvet trim on the inside, it does not need a ribbon.

The shape of the barrel is practically the same for all connections. The middle is usually designed in the color of the hat and embroidered with the circle of the connection in the color of the percussion (gold or silver). Outside, the colors of the ribbon run around as a comparatively wide stripe - above and below with a strand in percussion color. Occasionally there are also barrel trimmings with fur . In Jena they were sometimes worn as winter clothing, for example when tobogganing .

In the version as "Prunktönnchen" (also known as "street cerevis"), which is worn in many connections for different reasons, the entire barrel is provided with extensive metal embroidery - in corps for example in the form of vine leaves , fraternities wear with a few exceptions Oak leaves .

Baltic states

Baltic star on the "lid" of a Baltic student union in Poland

In the course of the 19th century, the German student hat fashion also radiated into the Baltic States and, as the "lid" (the same name as in Austria), is still part of the color of the Baltic student associations . The head part of the Baltic lid is usually embroidered with a Baltic star. In Baltic connections, the foxes wear a black lid without any colors.

Fennoscandinavia

Dane, Norwegians and Swedes with student hats (Uppsala 1943)

In Fennoscandinavia ( Scandinavia and Finland ) the student caps do not serve as a badge for self-governing student associations (for example at the nations named after the regions of origin of the students at some universities in Sweden ), but are awarded to prospective students at school with the higher education entrance qualification . The design of the hat depends on the school leaving certificate (for example, if it only entitles you to take up a certain field of study), the subject of study, or the type of university or the specific university. The hats in Scandinavia appeared around the middle of the 19th century and are very similar to the hats common in German-speaking countries. They differ only in additional applications such as cockades or tassels .

The first Scandinavian student caps are said to have been worn for the first time at an all-Scandinavian student meeting in 1849. This meeting was under the sign of Scandinavianism , which arose as a reaction to developments in Germany after the March Revolution of 1848. In the Schleswig-Holstein survey , the Kiel students in the Corps Holsatia fought with their couleurs . Many Swedish and Norwegian volunteers fought on the Danish side. To what extent the Scandinavian student hats introduced during this armed conflict were stimulated by the German student costume can no longer be decided today. The external appearance corresponds in any case - with the exception of the cockades and badges on the front of the hats - the German model. In the Scandinavian region, there is also no evidence of a continuous development of the hat shape from everyday clothing, as is the case in Germany, which also speaks for a takeover.

Sweden

Uppsala student cap from 1847
Lund University Academic Choir

In Sweden , the first student hats ( studentmössa ) were made in the traditional universities of Uppsala and Lund in the 1840s . Each of the two universities produced a different version that formed the two basic shapes of Swedish student hats. When the custom was expanded to include technical universities, other versions emerged:

  • Uppsala variant : white cap body (somewhat softer), lined with blue and yellow, black peak, wide black cap bridge ("advance") with cockade in the Swedish national colors blue and yellow; is only worn in summer, from Walpurgis Night to the end of September.
  • Lund variant : white cap body (somewhat stiffer), red lining, black peak, wide dark blue cap bridge ("advance") with cockade in the Swedish national colors blue and yellow; is only worn in summer (from Walpurgis Night to the end of September), for winter there is a variant with a dark blue cap body.

Engineering students in Sweden wear a variant ( teknologmössa ) with a long triangular tip that ends in a tassel that hangs down on the right side. This version was brought to Chalmers Technical University in Gothenburg by Norwegian students , from where it spread to other technical universities.

In 1862, the student exam, an examination for obtaining a university entrance qualification, roughly comparable to the German Abitur, was transferred to secondary schools. Instead of an entrance exam at the universities, it became a final exam at the grammar schools . But since the student hats were awarded on the occasion of this exam, these hats developed into a badge for holders of a higher school leaving certificate. The hat was also worn by school leavers who did not intend to study at a university.

As in Germany, there was also a general rejection of academic and bourgeois symbols and traditions in Sweden as part of the 1968 movement . Many students now rejected student hats or even burned them in public. The subsequent social changes meant that secondary schools were no longer restricted to the bourgeoisie and prospective students. The student exam has been abolished. Secondary training courses developed at the secondary schools which no longer had the aim of studying, but rather vocational training in the technical or business sector. The student hats survived this development. New forms of hats and badges were even formed, which are intended for graduates of these new school courses.

Denmark

Danish student hats (left: student eksamen , right: hf )

The Danish student hat is similar to the Swedish Lund variant, but differs in that it has a black strap that runs over the visor, like a chin strap that is folded over the visor. The basic color of the cap body is also white here. Instead of the cockade, the Danish student cap has a special badge that indicates the professional orientation of the school leaving certificate.

Similar to Sweden, the Danish student cap is also awarded on the occasion of graduation and reflects more the orientation of the graduation than the subject of study.

exam Color of the cap bridge emblem
Abitur ( student exams ), 3 years old burgundy Dannebrogs Cross
Higher preparatory examination ( HF ), 2 years water blue Dannebrogs Cross
Higher trade exam ( HHX ), 3 years cobalt blue Mercury rod
Higher technical eXamen ( HTX ), 3 years old navy blue 'HTX' silver letters
Graduation 10th grade Use of these caps is very rare green Dannebrogs Cross
HG 4-year professional training purple Mercury rod

The Dannebrog cross is derived from the Dannebrog order and the royal coat of arms and as such is more of a national than a religious symbol. In the meantime, however, there are also variants of the student hat for Muslims ( crescents in a green emblem) and for Jews (with a Star of David ). Students with a Pakistani background can also choose green cap bars, based on the flag of Pakistan .

Norway

Arne Garborg with a Norwegian student
cap (1875)

The Norwegian student hat ( duskelue ) is very similar to the other Scandinavian student hats , the main difference being a long, large tassel since 1856 . This tassel also caught on in other Scandinavian countries, especially for engineering students.

Finland

In Finland it is customary for every high school graduate to receive a white student cap ( valkolakki or ylioppilaslakki ) at the high school graduation ceremony ( lakkiaiset , Mützenfest) . This is worn every year on May Day, Finnish Vappu , and at least in Helsinki during the celebrations on Independence Day (6 December; Finnish itsenäisyyspäivä ) until old age .

Student
cap for Teekkari

The original Finnish student cap was blue when it belonged to the Russian Empire. In the 19th century Finnish nationalism developed, which was largely carried by the Swedish-speaking upper class in Finland; a distance to Russia was sought. Around 1875, a white student cap based on the Swedish pattern was introduced in Finland. Instead of the cockade in the Swedish national colors, the Finnish high school graduates wear the badge of the student body of the University of Helsinki , a golden lyre in a laurel wreath, on the front of their cap. It used to be customary for high school graduates to give their mother another badge to wear in a festive dress. The lyre is usually 16 mm in diameter, but 20 mm for Swedish-speaking high school graduates. After high school graduates begin their studies, they can swap it out for their own university's student body badge. The University of Kuopio uses a yellow and black ribbon as a badge that runs over the head of the cap. Engineering students in Finland wear a large dark tassel on a long string on their hats. Engineering students only receive this tassel after their first year of study. This custom originally comes from Norway and was brought to Finland via Sweden.

The color of the lining of the student cap expresses the regional origin of the student. In the past it was mostly the colors of the country teams, nowadays one usually chooses the blue and white national colors. However, the Swedish-speaking students mostly have a red-yellow or blue-yellow-white lining, and the regional colors blue and yellow are used in the Satakunta landscape . In the case of the graduates of the Franco-Finnish school in Helsinki, the lining has the blue-white-red colors of the French tricolor.

The student hats of the first female students at the end of the 19th century differed from those of their male fellow students; but when the number of female students increased, the special women's hats were abolished.

Anglo-Saxon culture

Jurisprudence lecture at Oxford (caricature from 1736): Scholarship holders wear angular “mortarboards”, while those who pay themselves or those whose scholarships are subject to conditions wear round hats.

Great Britain

The oldest English universities of Oxford and Cambridge began to make precise regulations for the outer clothing and headgear of their university members as early as the time of Henry VIII . The regulations went down to the smallest detail. In those times this was an expression of the control that the university exercised over its members. The British universities developed their own specific characteristics.

United States

Academic costume with doctoral hat and gown in the USA (2004)

The British system was adopted in North America, but there was a tendency, especially in the United States in the second half of the 19th century, to standardize the systems nationwide.

The use of faculty-specific colors was determined early on. The color white was assigned to the humanities, derived from the white fur trim on the hoods of the Bachelors of Arts in Oxford and Cambridge. As the traditional color of the church, red became the faculty color of theology . Green , the color of plants, became the color of medicine and the similar olive was supposed to symbolize pharmacy . Golden yellow became the color of the natural sciences as a symbol of the wealth generated by scientific research .

In 1895, a cross-university commission met for the first time at Columbia University to rule on the cut, style and material of academic costumes and the colors for the individual subjects.

In 1932 the American Council on Education (ACE, "American Education Council") again set up a commission to review the existing set of rules and, if necessary, update them. A new version came into force in the same year.

In 1959, the ACE again commissioned a committee ( Committee on Academic Costumes and Ceremonies ) to make further changes. The last revision for the time being took place in 1986. Today, most US universities follow the rules of the commission when choosing the colors that symbolize the individual subjects in the academic costume on the hoods, headgear and applications on the gowns.

Belgium

Students of a Ghent Catholic fraternity with hats of German style (2008)

In the 19th century it was common for students to wear a hat or cap in public. A typical student cap was slow to emerge. German student traditions have been maintained in Belgium without interruption since 1872. This includes - especially in Leuven - the typical student hat based on the hats in German-speaking countries. The German student traditions are limited to a few student associations. The vast majority of fraternities follow their own Belgian traditions.

Penne

Penne , student hat from Brussels (ULB)

The oldest student hat in Belgium, the so-called penne , is a simple blue hat made of cloth with golden piping , designed according to a military model. This hat has a peak and a faculty badge is worn on the front. In 1878 this cap is the only student cap at the universities of Belgium, Ghent (1817), Liège (1817), Leuven (founded in 1425 - re-founded in 1834) and Brussels (1834). It was worn by all students, Flemish and Walloons, Catholic and Liberal students.

At the turn of the 20th century, this hat continued to develop in terms of shape and color. It was now made with green or white cloth instead of the blue one. The piping was increased and a leather protective belt was added. In addition to the faculty badges, gold stars were also affixed - one star for each academic year of the sponsor. Because the hats were mostly not well cared for at that time and soon looked dirty, they were referred to as crapuleuse (German "liederlich"). The attempt to replace this hat with a Faluche modeled on the Parisian model failed.

Calotte

Belgian students at the University of Leuven (around 1920), some wearing a calotte

In 1895 a student cap was introduced for Catholic students to distinguish them from liberal students. As part of the emerging ultramontanism , Edmond Carton de Wiart developed the toque or calotte, a new concept for the student cap . This hat and hat was made from black Persian and resembled the hats worn by papal Zouaves . Outwardly, it resembles the usual barrel in German-speaking countries , except that it is twice as large. The top is made of cloth and trimmed with a golden cord. The color of the cloth symbolizes the university: red stands for lion, white for Ghent, green for Liège. Faculty marks and gold stars are attached to the side of this cap. Soon after its inception, this cap was worn by many Catholic students, both Flemings and Walloons. However, some Catholic students continued to wear the old green or white hats like the liberal students.

Italy

Padova-Goliardia-Pileo in vetrina.jpg
Padova-Goliardia-Pileo in vetrina-2.jpg


The feluca is the traditional student cap in Italy

With the dissolution of the traditional nationes from the Middle Ages around 1800, the student traditions of Italy were also lost. Only in the second half of the 19th century were there isolated efforts to revive student traditions. An important date was the 800th anniversary of the University of Bologna, which is considered the oldest university in Europe, in 1888. To give the celebrations more glamor, the festival committee declared the song Gaudeamus igitur to be the student anthem . A hat was designed for the students, which was modeled on an illustration from 1492, from which the headgear of students of the then natio germanica could be seen. It was called orsina and had the colors of the respective faculty, i.e. white for languages ​​and humanities, blue for law, red for medicine, etc.

The orsina However from 1892 increasingly from the feluca displaced, a traditional costume hat of Italian rural population. It got its name from the ship's hull shape. The Felucke was a two-masted sailing ship used in the Mediterranean trade. The name was later also used in France as faluche to denote the student cap there.

The feluca is adorned to this day with golden fringes and braids for passed exams and with university or city badges. It is mainly worn by members of the Goliardic Orders , the Italian student associations.

France

French student with faluche

The tradition of the faluche student hat worn in France - a beret-like, peaked headgear with a high brim - can be traced back to the last third of the 19th century. Starting in Nancy, general student bodies, the so-called Associations générales des étudiants, were founded at various university locations between 1877 and 1892 . When the Paris student council, founded in 1883, was invited to the 800th anniversary of the University of Bologna in 1888 , at which students from all over Europe appeared in their costumes and with their traditional student hats, they brought the idea of ​​their own student headgear to France. From Paris, the Faluche spread over the whole of France in the course of time.

Today the faluche is made of velor or satin , whereby the combination of the color of the fabric and a label attached to the hat indicates the affiliation to a certain course of study. A yellow faluche , for example, stands for the subjects of literature and linguistics, geography or philosophy. The Faluche the students of literature and linguistics is a Ansteckplakette in the form attached an open book with a quill pen, to the geography a globe, while the philosophy students their cap with the Greek letter Psi decorate.

literature

German language area:

  • Oskar Dolch: History of the German student body from the founding of the German universities to the German wars of freedom. A historical attempt . Brockhaus, Leipzig 1858.
  • Christine Göhmann, Thomas D. Lehmann: Of hats and silhouettes. To the headgear of the Jenenser fraternity Germania . Einst und Jetzt 38 (1993), pp. 225-233. ISSN  0420-8870 .

Scandinavia:

  • Olof Gadd: De nordiska studentmössorna. In: Kulturhistoriska föreningen för södra Sverige (ed.): Cultures , Lund 1986. ISSN  0454-5915 . Pp. 94-109.

Belgium:

  • Mon de Goeyse: O Vrij - Studentenheerlijkheid. Historisch-studentikoze Schetsen . Leuvense Universitaire Pers, Leuven 1987, ISBN 90-6186-251-5 .
  • Frank Staeren: De Vlaamse Student Tradities (1875-1960). Herkomst – Ontstaan ​​– Ontwikkeling . Onuitgegeven Licentiaatsverhandeling KU Leuven, 1994.

France :

  • Manuel Ségura: La faluche, une forme de sociabilité estudiantine , Mémoire de maîtrise en Histoire, Poitiers 1994.

Web links

Commons : Student Hats  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Thomas Hemmann: The Dömitzer Illuminated Manuscript from 1813. BoD, Norderstedt 2010, ISBN 978-3-8391-6669-7 . Thomas Hemmann: The Meissen illuminated manuscript from the years 1809 - 1814. BoD, Norderstedt 2013, ISBN 978-3-7322-3624-4 .
  2. Kristian Selch Larsen: Studenterhue: Regulator & Traditioner. In: studenterhueregler.dk. 2015, accessed June 22, 2017 (Danish).
  3. Student hats: who is allowed to wear which hat and when. In: The North Schleswig . June 22, 2017. Retrieved June 22, 2017 .