History of the Fan

CHAPTER I

THE ORIGIN AND USES OF THE FAN

N the beginning, before the human advent, when the earth was peopled only by the Immortals, a bright son was born to Aurora, whose soft and agreeable breath was as honey in the mouth of the gods, and the beating of whose gossamer wings imparted a delicious coolness to the air, moderating the heat of summer, and providing the first suggestion of, and occasion for, the dainty little plaything we have under consideration, somewhat waggishly described as a kind of wind instrument, not, perhaps, so much to be played upon as to be played with, and invaluable as assisting to follow out the wisest of the Sage’s maxims when he bids us keep cool.

This delicate toy, this airy creation of gauze, ivory, and paint, frail and fragile almost as the flowers kissed by Aurora’s son, endowed apparently with the gift of perpetual youth, may claim a lineage older than the Pyramids; having its origin and being in the infancy of the world, before the birth of history, in that golden age when life was a perpetual summer, and care was not, when all was concord and harmony, and old age, long protracted, was dissolved in a serene slumber, and wafted to the mansions of the gods, the regions of eternal love and enjoyment.

It was in these halcyon days that the human family sat in its palm groves, which afforded not only refreshing shade, during the hours when the sun is at its height, but also provided the precursor of this ‘Servant of Zephyrus’—serving further to temper those beams which are the source of all life, and light, and music, for are not all the learned agreed with the late Mr. George Augustus Sala, that if a thorn was the first needle, doubtless a palm leaf was the first fan?

The poets, however, who lay claim rather to inspiration than to the dry bones of mere learning, supply us with many fanciful suggestions as to the fan’s origin—a Spanish story (duly told on a printed fan) has it that the first fan was a wing which Cupid tore from the back of Zephyrus for the purpose of fanning Psyche as she lay a-sleeping on her bed of roses.

A quaint, though somewhat inconsequent, conceit is that of the French eighteenth-century poet, Augustin de Piis, quoted by M. Uzanne in his work on the fan, in which Cupid, at an inopportune moment, surprises the Graces, who were as much embarrassed as the god was delighted—to hide their confusion, with the hand that was unemployed, they endeavoured to cover up both eyes by spreading the fingers.

Whether we accept this explanation or not, and whatever circumstances attended the origin of the fan, it is abundantly clear that Cupid had a hand in it. Has not Gay told how the master Cupid traced out the lines, conceived the shape, converted his arrows into sticks, and from their barbed points, softened by love’s flame, forged the pin? Is not the fan one of the chief weapons in the armoury of the Love-God? Is it not the rampart from behind which the fiercest fire of love’s artillery is directed? Nay, is it not in very truth the sceptre of the Love-God? Did not the Greeks early recognise this fact by placing the plumed fan in the hands of Eros himself? The fan is at once the creation of Amor and the chief ensign of his sovereignty!

And its uses?

Madame la Baronne de Chapt, in the first volume of her Œuvres Philosophiques, discovers a hundred such:—‘It is so charming, so convenient, so suited to give countenance to a young girl, and to extricate her from embarrassment, that it cannot be too much exalted; we see it straying over cheeks, bosoms, hands, with an elegance which everywhere provokes admiration.

‘Love uses a fan as an infant does a toy—makes it assume all sorts of shapes; breaks it even, lets it fall a thousand times to the ground....

‘Is it a matter of indifference, this fallen fan? Such a fall is the result of reflection, of careful calculation, intended as a test of the ardour and celerity of aspiring suitors.—And the successful suitor, the favoured swain? Is it not he who discovers the greatest celerity in returning the fan to its charming owner, and, in doing so, imprints a secret but chaste kiss upon the fair hand that takes it, and is rewarded by a look ten thousand times more eloquent than speech?’

And if, peradventure, by the spell of some magician, this little instrument could itself be endowed with speech! Aha! ma chère madame, what tales could it not unfold from the recesses of its fluted leaves, what whispers! what confidences! what assignations! what intrigues!

‘Pour une Espagnole,’ writes Charles Blanc, ‘toutes les intrigues de l’amour, tous les manœuvres de la galanterie, sont cachées dans les plis de son éventail. Les audaces furtifs du regard, les aventures de la parole, les aveux risqués, les demi-mots proférés du bout des lèvres, tout cela est dissimulé par l’éventail, qui a l’air d’interdire ce qu’il permet de faire, et d’intercepter ce qu’il envoie.’

Disraeli (Contarini Fleming), in similar strain, with no less eloquence, says: ‘A Spanish lady with her fan might shame the tactics of a troop of horse. Now she unfolds it with the slow pomp and conscious elegance of the bird of Juno; now she flutters it with all the languor of a listless beauty, now with all the liveliness of a vivacious one. Now in the midst of a very tornado she closes it with a whirr, which makes you start. Magical instrument! in this land it speaks a particular language, and gallantry requires no other mode to express its most subtle conceits, or its most unreasonable demands, than this delicate machine.’

‘Women,’ says the witty Spectator, ‘are armed with Fans as men with Swords—and sometimes do more execution with them.... There is an infinite variety of motions to be made use of in the flutter of a Fan. There is the angry Flutter, the modest Flutter, the timorous Flutter, the confused Flutter, the merry Flutter, and the amorous Flutter. Not to be tedious, there is scarce any emotion in the mind which does not produce a suitable agitation in the Fan; insomuch that if I only see the Fan of a disciplined Lady I know very well whether she laughs, frowns, or blushes. I have seen a Fan so very angry, that it would have been dangerous for the absent lover who provoked it to have come within the wind of it: and at other times so very languishing, that I have been glad for the Lady’s sake the lover was at a sufficient distance from it. I need not add that a Fan is either a Prude or Coquette according to the nature of the person who bears it.’

Mr. George Meredith, too, would appear to have studied its motions: ‘Lady Denewdney’s fan took to beating time meditatively. Two or three times she kept it elevated, and in vain: the flow of their interchanging speech was uninterrupted. At last my father bowed to her from a distance. She signalled: his eyelids pleaded short sight, awakening to the apprehension of a pleasant fact; the fan tapped, and he halted his march, leaning scarce perceptibly in her direction. The fan showed distress.’2

In one of the sprightliest of Steele’s letters to the Tatler, the beauteous Delamira, upon the eve of her marriage, resigns her fan, having no further occasion for it. She is entreated by the matchless Virgulta, who had begun to despair of ever entering the matrimonial state, to confide to her the secret of her success. ‘That swimming air of your body,’ says she; ‘that jaunty bearing of your Head over your shoulder; and that inexpressible Beauty in your manner of playing your Fan, must be lower’d into a more confined Behaviour; to show, That you would rather shun than receive Addresses for the future. Therefore, dear Delamira, give me these excellencies you leave off, and acquaint me with your Manner of Charming.’...

Delamira explained that all she had above the rest of her Sex and contemporary Beauties was wholly owing to a Fan (left to her by her Mother, and had been long in the Family), which, whoever had in Possession, and used with Skill, should command the hearts of all her Beholders; ‘and since,’ said she, smiling, ‘I have no more to do with extending my Conquests or Triumphs, I’ll make you a present of this inestimable Rarity.’ ‘You see, Madam,’ continued she, upon Virgulta’s inquiry as to the Management of that utensil, ‘Cupid is the principal Figure painted on it; and the skill in playing this Fan is, in your several Motions of it to let him appear as little as possible: for honourable Lovers fly all Endeavours to ensnare ’em; and your Cupid must hide his Bow and Arrow, or he’ll never be sure of his Game. You may observe that in all publick Assemblies, the sexes seem to separate themselves, and draw up to attack each other with Eye-shot; That is the time when the Fan, which is all the Armour of Woman, is of most use in her Defence; for our

minds are constructed by the waving of that little Instrument, and our thoughts appear in Composure or Agitation according to the Motion of it. You may observe when Will Peregrine comes into the side Box, Miss Gatty flutters her Fan as a Fly does its Wings round a Candle; while her elder Sister, who is as much in Love with him as she is, is as grave as a Vestal at his Entrance, and the consequence is accordingly. He watches half the Play for a Glance from her Sister, while Gatty is overlooked and neglected. I wish you heartily as much Success in the Management of it as I have had;.... Take it, good Girl, and use it without Mercy; for the Reign of Beauty never lasted full Three Years, but it ended in Marriage, or Condemnation to Virginity.’3

If the fan is efficacious as a weapon of offence in Love’s sieges, it is no less effective as a shield against Love’s darts. On a painted Spanish fan in the Schreiber Collection in the British Museum are represented three fair nymphs in a wooded landscape, one of whom is receiving on her fan an arrow discharged by the Love-God, who is accompanied by my lady Venus in her car. On a scroll is the inscription, ‘l’utilité des éventails,’ ‘la utilidad de los abanicos.’

This use of the fan as shield, is adopted also by the shinláung, or monastic novitiate of Burma, who employs his large palm-fan, both as a shelter from the fierceness of the sun’s rays, and as a screen from the sight of womankind, moving, in the latter instance, his fan from right to left as occasion requires, i.e. whenever a woman happens to pass.

A story, the source of which is not given,4 is told of Goldoni, who, being one evening the guest of a Venetian lady, was complimented by her upon the productions of his genius.

‘Why, my lady,’ he replied, ‘anything provides a subject for a comedy.’

‘Anything?’ replied the lady.

‘Anything,’ emphatically replied the dramatist.

‘Even this fan?’ insisted the Beauty.

‘I shall be indebted to you for life,’ exclaimed Goldoni, struck with a happy thought. ‘You have suggested to me my best comedy; in a week you will read it.’5

Many and manifold are the uses of the fan. What device, for example, could better display the beauty of a rounded arm, or the ivory whiteness of tapered fingers? Such an instrument provides graceful and often much-needed employment to those same delicate fingers; it supplies that necessary sense of completeness to the tout ensemble of the picture. And the comedy actress, desiring some trifle to emphasise a movement, to give point and expression to some particular action—what more effective instrument than a fan, the use of which, on the stage, has almost been elevated into a fine art!

This at once recalls the saying of Northcote, who, although reluctantly compelled to admit Queen Charlotte’s excessive plainness, an elegant and not a vulgar plainness—she had a beautifully shaped arm, and was fond of exhibiting it—exclaimed, ‘She had a fan in her hand. Lord! how she held that fan!’6

Madame D’Arblay, in one of her most delightful letters, records a conversation between herself and Mr. Fairly (Col. Stephen Digby), who, upon the occasion of a visit to her, ‘finding she entered into nothing,’ took up a fan which lay on the table and began playing off various imitative airs with it, exclaiming, ‘How thoroughly useless a toy!’

‘“No,” I said, “on the contrary, taken as an ornament, it was the most useful of any belonging to full dress; occupying the hands, giving the eyes something to look at, and taking away stiffness and formality from the figure and deportment.”

‘“Men have no fans,” cried he, “and how do they do?”

‘“Worse,” quoth I plumply.

..........

‘“But the real use of the fan,” cried he, “if there is any, is it not—to hide a particular blush that ought not to appear?”

‘“Oh no, it would rather make it the sooner noticed.”

‘“Not at all; it may be done under pretence of absence—rubbing the cheek, or nose—putting it up accidentally to the eye—in a thousand ways.”’

The uses of the Fan? They are legion!—They record for us public events, military, political, civil; they tell us our fortunes; instruct us in Botany, in Heraldry, in tricks with cards; they propound conundrums; take us to the theatre, to bull-fights, to church, to the first balloon ascent; and to Mr. Thomas Osborne’s Duck-hunting!

In Shakespeare’s day no lady thought of stirring abroad without this accompaniment, the care of the toy devolving upon the gentleman usher—

From the Aubrey MS., 1678, we learn that ‘the gentlemen (temp. Henry VIII.) had prodigious fans, as is to be seen in old pictures,7 like that instrument which is used to drive feathers, and in it a handle at least half a yard long; with these the daughters were oftentimes corrected (Sir Edward Coke, Lord Chief-Justice, rode the circuit with such a fan; Sir William Dugdale told me he was an eye-witness of it;8 the Earl of Manchester also used such a fan); but fathers and mothers slasht their daughters in the time of their besom discipline when they were perfect women.’9

Hotspur’s exclamation, I Henry IV., II. iii., further serves to show that this instrument could, upon occasion, be used as an offensive weapon:

‘Zounds! an I were now by this rascal, I could brain him with his lady’s fan.’

The strength hidden in such an apparently harmless toy is thus recognised equally by both sterner and gentler sex: the hint contained in the quaint and charming conceit addressed to the fan of his mistress by Louis de Boissey, author of Le Babillard, will not be lost upon lovers:

CHAPTER II

FANS OF THE ANCIENTS

EGYPT

The word fan, or van, is derived from the Latin vannus, the Roman instrument for winnowing grain. This winnowing-fan, held sacred by all the peoples of the ancient world, together with the fire-fan (bellows), also a sacred instrument, and used by the priestesses of Isis to fan the flame of their altars—these must be accounted amongst the earliest of the ancient and prolific fan-family. To the first named are several references in Holy Writ. Isaiah, xxx. 24, speaks of the oxen and young asses that shall eat clean provender which hath been winnowed with the shovel and with the fan. Jeremiah, xv. 6-7, lamenting the backsliding of Jerusalem, exclaims, ‘I am weary with repenting; and I will fan them with a fan in the gates of the land’; and again in li. 2, ‘Send unto Babylon fanners that shall fan her, and shall empty her land.’

In Matt. iii. 12, and Luke iii. 17, John the Baptist, announcing the coming of ‘one mightier than I’—‘He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire: whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner.’

Both these instruments appear on a bas-relief from a tomb at Sakkarah, of the twelfth Pharaonic dynasty, circa B.C. 2366-2266, sixteen hundred years before Isaiah wrote. In this some shepherds are roasting trussed and spitted ducks over fires which are being kept alive by the plaited, wedge-shaped hand-fan; the winnowing-fan appearing in the same picture.

Servius, in commenting on Virgil’s mystical fan of Bacchus, (‘mystica vannus Iacchi,’ Georg. i. 166) affirms that the sacred rites of Bacchus pertained to the purification of souls; in Assyria, also, it was introduced in the ceremonies connected with the worship of Bacchus and became a sacred emblem.10 This instrument, carried at the Dionysia or festivals in honour of Bacchus, was called Lichnon (Λίχνον), and was so essential to the solemnities of this god, that they could not be duly celebrated without it. So also Osiris, when judge of Amenti, holds in his crossed hands the crook and flagellum, the mystical vannus—‘whose fan is in his hand,’11 each of these instances having reference to the generative principle, and the improvement of the world by tillage.

The passage in Jeremiah xiii. 24, ‘Therefore will I scatter them as the stubble that passeth away by the wind of the wilderness,’ suggested the proud motto of the Kentish family of Septvans (Setvans):

On the brass of Sir Robert de Septvans, 1306, Chartham, Kent, the knight’s shield and aillettes upon the shoulders are charged with the winnowing-fans from which he takes his name, and small fans are embroidered upon his surcoat. In the Lansdowne MSS. 855 B.M., the arms are thus given: ‘Sir robt de sevens dazur e iij vans dor.’

The Greeks named ῥιπίς the large flat instrument which was used to fan the fire: the diminutive ῥιπίδιον was applied to objects of similar form in ordinary use amongst both sexes for the purpose of fanning as well as to drive away the flies. Indeed the use of the fan as bellows appears to have been practically universal, and to have dated from a very early period of the world’s history.

The employment of these instruments, as well as the forms which they assumed, is continued even to the present day:13 in the Republic of Colombia, where fans are employed as much by men as by women, the kitchen of every hut and house throughout the country is provided with a fan in lieu of bellows, rectangular in form, albeit broader at the outside than at the short handle, and about 12 inches by 9 inches in size: These are formed of the young inside leaf of the cabbage-palm, the handle and back being the rib of the leaf, the fan portion being the fronds of the leaf plaited.

The Portuguese fire-fans (Abano) made in the south of Portugal, and in universal use in that country, are round in shape, coarsely plaited in straw or rush, and fixed in a rough wooden handle.

These, representing the two simplest elemental forms, are the primeval fans which have come down to us from the remotest periods of history, have endured through the centuries, and, like the fans in use in India at present, identical as a matter of fact with these in form, are as modern as they are ancient.

These two fans, the winnowing-fan and the fire-fan, minister to the two most pressing of man’s necessities—to the first of his physical necessities, his daily bread, and to his chief mental necessity, the attainment of the bread of life; the fire-fan keeping alive the flame sacred to the great goddess who is the mother of all things, mistress of the elements, giver of the golden grain, which, when ripened, is separated from the chaff by the winnowing-fan; the one instrument, therefore, being the complement and counterpart of the other.

The Egyptian plaited hand-fan, used for fanning the fire, as well as for other domestic purposes, was made in a precisely similar way to the Portuguese ‘Abano’ above referred to, except that instead of being a complete circle, it assumed the form of a rather full crescent. In the painted decoration of a tomb at Eileithyia, representing the interior of a storeroom, a workman is cooling, by means of one of these hand-fans, the liquid which is contained in a number of vases or amphoræ.

In a great funeral procession of a royal scribe at Thebes, servants carry, among other offerings, similar crescent-shaped matted fans, together with, in three instances, the more ornamental semicircular feather hand-fan used by ladies for the purpose of fanning themselves, and also, with a somewhat longer handle, waved by servitors in attendance upon great personages of both sexes.

On an Egyptian tablet or stele of the twelfth dynasty, in the British Museum, the lady Khu is seated with her husbands, receiving offerings from their children; a hand-fan of semicircular form rests against the seat; this evidently not of feathers, but rigid, since the construction is suggested in the representation, and obviously used by the lady herself rather than by attendants.

The handles of these fans were of ivory, of wood painted, or of sandalwood, which latter, when warmed by the fingers, exhaled a delicious perfume.

A few fan-handles exist in the various public museums; two occur in the British Museum, together with a portion of a handle inscribed with the name of Nebseni, inspector of the goldsmiths of Amen, eighteenth dynasty, illustrated opposite.

A primitive fly-whisk, of the type seen on the Assyrian monuments, appears in the Louvre, under Egypt, but undated and undescribed; it is formed of grassy reeds of a buff ochre colour, bent backwards at the handle, and rudely tied with the same substance, the length being about 2 feet 6 inches.

The standard, banner, and processional fans are usually formed of the feathers of the larger birds, fixed in a long wooden handle, the feathers, as well as the handle, being painted or dyed in brilliant colours. These, as will be seen by a reference to the examples from Rosellini, are designed with the consummate sense of proportion distinguishing all Egyptian work. In both the examples given, the tips of the feathers are surmounted by a tuft of small fluffy feathers, this being a device common to many countries, and is seen in the North American Indian fan illustrated, page 82.

Many of these standard and processional fans, doubtless, were formed of some material stretched upon a semicircular frame, the fan decorated in various ways. They were in attendance on the king wherever he went; they were also used as standards in war, the king’s chariot being always accompanied by at least two. The fact that they were dedicated to the service of the gods is evidenced by a stele in the museum at Boulak, on which is represented Osiris enthroned with a flabellifer behind, waving the long-handled fan. The radiate fans, writes Professor Flinders Petrie, were used as sunshades, appearing in hieroglyphs as the determination of Khaib, i.e. shadow.

In the temple of Rameses XII., B.C. 1135, a tablet represents the departure of the Khonsu from Thebes to the land of Bakhatana. A standard fan of ostrich feathers of the Indian murchal type is fixed in the bow of the boat bearing the god in his ark, and a semicircular standard fan in the stern; both being inclined so as to meet above, and overshadow the ark.14 In the temple of Derri in Nubia, the sacred barque of the god Phré is solemnly borne by twelve priests, the king accompanying in military costume; a flabellifer waves the long-handled fan.

Numerous representations of these long-handled, semicircular, standard fans occur on the monuments. At Thebes (Rhamessium) is CEREMONIAL FANS
(From Rosellini.) figured a reception of the military chiefs and foreign envoys by Rameses III. Two servitors behind the king carry these fans, and two fan-bearers wave the ostrich-feather emblem.

At Medinet Abu, the same king is seated in his chariot with three servitors waving the long-handled, semicircular fans.

The tall, single ostrich plume was probably in the first instance a fly-whisk. It was the principal ensign of the office of fan-bearer, which was one of great distinction, and one of the highest in the gift of the monarch, none but royal princes or scions of the first nobility being permitted to hold it. The ceremony of investiture took place in the presence of the king seated upon his throne, and was usually performed after a victory, and granted for some distinguished service in the field. Two priests invest the holder with the robe, chain, and other insignia of his office, the fortunate recipient of the honour raising aloft the flabellum and crook, thus expressing his fidelity to his king and master. This was the usual formula of investiture of high office; its resemblance to the biblical account of Joseph’s advancement will at once be apparent.

‘And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand and put it upon Joseph’s hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck.’

Upon the field of battle the fan-bearers either attended the monarch on foot or took command of a division with the rank of general. During the heat of battle, whether mounted in cars or engaged on foot, they either carried the emblem of their office in their hand, or slung it behind them. Their privileges were many, amongst them being the right of presenting prisoners to the king after a victory. The office was divided into two grades—those who served upon the right and left of the king respectively, the most honourable post being always conferred upon INVESTITURE OF THE OFFICE OF FAN-BEARER
(From Wilkinson.) those of the highest rank, or for the most distinguished services. A certain number were always on duty, and were required to carry the monarch in the palanquin or chair of state, and to attend during the grand solemnities of the temple and upon all occasions of high state ceremonial.

The monuments bear eloquent testimony to the importance and significance of this object. At Thebes (palace of Medinet Abu), Rameses Méiamoun appears in a magnificent palanquin, surrounded by no less than twenty bearers of the fan emblem, amongst whom are the sons of the king.

In the same palace the ten sons of Rameses appear in the order of their precedence, bearing the emblem; the hieroglyphics, by their side, indicating their name and functions.

On an occasion when the king (Rameses IV.) receives the homage of the chiefs of the army, two servitors with the long semicircular fans, and two bearers of the fan emblem, are in attendance.

The highest significance of the fan emblem is when it is grasped by the talons of the sacred vulture, guardian and protectress of the monarchs. This figure occurs repeatedly on the monuments; at Medinet Abu, Rameses-Méiamoun is seen subduing an army of Asiatics, the vulture waving the fan emblem over the head of the king.

In the temple of Beit Oually in Nubia, Rameses II., helmeted, is striding over a fallen barbarian; the vulture of protection hovers around the head of the hero. On the same monument Rameses seizes by the hair a barbarian with broken bow, the vulture again in attendance. Upon the completion of the victory, four fan-bearers, each with crook and flabellum, offer the spoils of conquest to the king.

On a bas-relief at Thebes, Seti I. is seen in his war-chariot subduing the barbarians, also accompanied by the vulture.

At Philæ, Ptolemy Philometor appears with a group of vanquished Asiatics, the vulture once more in attendance.

In the papyrus of Hunefer (Book of the Dead) a winged Utchat, with Eye of Horus, waves the fan emblem over the head of Osiris.

In the papyrus of Anhai, over the Standard of the West, which crowns the Solar Mount and supports the hawk Rā-Harmachis, two winged Hori appear as the protecting principle.

This symbol of the vulture forms a motif for surface decoration on the ceiling of the hypostyle hall of the Rhamessium. Above the great bell capital, the vulture, grasping in each talon a fan emblem, is treated as a repeated ornamental pattern; it also appears as decoration of the umbrella or canopy of the chariot of Rameses III. (Sesostris).

We are thus enabled to realise the great part played by the fan alike in the military, civil, and religious life of Egypt. As an instrument in the hands of private persons, or even of slaves in attendance on individuals, it is less in evidence on the monuments, although we may naturally assume that in a climate such as Egypt this instrument would be in constant requisition. We strain the eye of imagination to the very earliest period of the history of this mystic land, and see in fancy the Queen of Menes the Thinite, surrounded by slaves only a little less fair than herself, waving the fan of square form actually appearing on a cylinder in the Louvre; we see, also in fancy, the famed and beautiful Queen Nitôcris, the handsomest woman of her time, builder of the third Pyramid, reclining upon her couch, the air being rendered less oppressive by the waving of the soft feather fan with which the monuments have made us familiar. Lastly, have we not Shakespeare’s glowing picture of the fanning of the voluptuous ‘serpent of old Nile,’ Cleopatra?

FANS OF THE ANCIENTS—Continued

ASSYRIA

The employment of the fan in the religious ceremonies of Assyria has already been hinted at. There can be no possibility of doubt that the ceremonies and customs, both sacred and secular, connected with the fan, were common to all the countries of the East, these being the offspring of similar conditions and necessities. Thus we have in Assyrian sculpture frequent representations of the fly-whisk. On a bas-relief from Nimroud King Sennacherib is standing in his chariot superintending the moving of a colossal figure at the building of his palace at Kouyunjik, two attendants behind the chariot bearing an umbrella and fly-whisk; on another relief we see Assur-bani-pal standing, bow and arrow in hand, pouring out a libation over four dead lions before an altar, his umbrella-bearer and fly-flapper being in attendance. We are also introduced to the garden or palm-grove of Assur-bani-pal’s palace, wherein the king is being entertained by his queen at a banquet; the queen holding in her left hand what is evidently a small fan and of the shape and general appearance of the pleated fan, but probably rigid.

The royal fan-bearers were two in number, invariably eunuchs, their usual place being behind the monarch. The long-tasselled scarf appears to be the badge of the office, which was one of great dignity. Its holder was privileged to leave his station behind the throne and hand his master the sacred cup, the royal scent-bottle, or handkerchief, which latter article invariably appears in the left hand. The usage of this office seems to have been very similar to that of Egypt; in the absence of the vizier, or in ASSYRIA      PERSIA subordination to him, he introduced captives to the king, reading out their names from a scroll or tablet in his left hand.15

The matter of the ‘handkerchief’ opens up an important question. Sir George Birdwood, in a masterly address before the Society of Arts on the subject of ancient fans, says: ‘On a “marble” in the British Museum, from Kouyunjik (near Mossul, i.e. Nineveh), representing Sennacherib, B.C. 681-705, enthroned before Lachish, two attendants stand behind the throne, each waving in his right hand, over the monarch’s head, a murchal (fly-whisk) of undoubted peacocks’ feathers, and each bearing in his left hand what I identify as the cover of the murchal. It is absurd to take it to be a pocket-handkerchief.’

On the other hand, Mr. S. W. Bushell, in his Handbook of Chinese Art, refers to the fan- and towel-bearers in the Chinese sculptures of the Han dynasty; these, although somewhat differing in shape from those of the Assyrian reliefs, evidently served a similar purpose.

It is an extremely difficult point to determine; in the reliefs of Assur-bani-pal at Susiana, of Sennacherib at Kouyunjik, and others, two flabelliferæ walk behind the king’s chariot bearing in their right hands the fly-whisks, their left hands not being seen. Standing in the umbrella-covered chariot, immediately behind the king and charioteer, a figure bears a smaller handkerchief or cover in his right hand, but no evidence of a fly-whisk. The left hand in this instance also does not appear in the relief. In a representation of Assur-bani-pal in the Louvre (Layard, Monuments, Series II. Plate 51), the king holds in his right hand a small fan; an attendant behind holds the cover or handkerchief in his right hand, but no fly-whisk. These objects are in most instances fringed, and in some cases embroidered with a narrow border.

Assyrian fly-whisks were usually of feathers, set in a short handle of ivory, wood, or other material, carved or otherwise ornamented. There were two kinds, a smaller one which was a kind of brush, made of horse-hair or vegetable fibre, and a larger one of feathers; the short brush fan belongs to the earlier period, the long feathered form to the later.16

The two forms, however, appear at the same time. In the bas-relief of the banquet above referred to, attendants bear dishes of fruits and meats, each being provided with the small fly-whisk, evidently for the purpose of driving away insects from the royal dishes.

The ceremonies and usages connected with the fly-whisk open up a vast field of inquiry, far too involved to be adequately dealt with here; some few aspects may, however, be touched upon.

Baal-zebub, Beel-zebub, Beel-zebut, Bel-zebub, the Philistine god of Ekron, whom the Jews represented as Prince of Devils, was literally Lord Fly, or Lord of the Flies. When Ahaziah was sick he sent to consult the Lord Fly’s oracle.17

The word Baal simply means owner, master, or lord. In Phœnicia and Carthage it was the custom of kings and great men to unite their names with that of their god, as Hannibal, ‘grace of Baal,’ Hasdrubal, ‘help of Baal.’ Amongst the Jews also many names of cities were compounded with Baal; as Baal-Gad, Baal-Hammon, Baal-Thamar. In the ‘authorised version’ the name is Baal-zebub, afterwards changed to Beel-zebub; the original conception is, however, one of great difficulty and obscurity, unless, indeed, we may directly connect the worship of Baal with that of the sun. Josephus declares that the Assyrians erected the first statue of Mars, and worshipped him as a God, calling him Baal. We read in the book of Kings how Josiah destroyed the altars which had been reared by Manasseh, and ‘put down the idolatrous priests, ... them also that burned incense unto Baal, to the sun and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of heaven’; these instances suggesting that Baal and the sun were two separate deities. On the other hand, Baal-Hammon is represented on a Carthaginian monument with a crown of rays. Baalbek was called by the Greeks Heliopolis (sun-city) and at Baal-Shemeh (house of the sun) there was a temple to Baal.

If, therefore, we may regard Baal and the sun as synonymous, the matter is at once simplified, since the sun is the bringer of flies, and is in actual fact Lord of the Flies.

According to Pliny, the Cyrenians offered sacrifices to the fly-catching god Achor, because the flies bred pestilence, and this author remarks that no sooner is the sacrifice offered, than the flies perish.

The Greeks had their Jupiter Myiodes, or fly-hunter, to whom a bull was sacrificed in order to propitiate him in driving away the flies which infested the Olympic Games. There was also a Hercules Myiodes, the origin of whose worship Pausanias declares to have been the following:—Hercules, being molested by swarms of flies while he was about to offer sacrifice to Olympian Jupiter in the temple, offered a victim to that god under the name of Myagron, upon which all the flies flew away beyond the river Alpheus. Pausanias further refers to the festival of Athena at Aliphera in Arcadia, which was opened with a sacrifice and prayer to the Fly-catcher, and states that after the sacrifice, the flies gave no further trouble.

Ælian (Nat. An., xi. 8) affirms that at the festival of Apollo in the island of Leucas, an ox was sacrificed; the flies, glutted with the blood, gave no further trouble. The same author states that the flies of Pisa (Olympia) were more virtuous, because they did their duty, not for a consideration, but out of pure regard for the god.18

Scaliger derives the name of Beel-zebub, the false god, from Baalim-Zebabim, which signifies lord of sacrifices. This deity was worshipped during the time of our Saviour, who is accused by the Pharisees of casting out devils by Beel-zebub, the prince of the devils. So Holman Hunt, in his picture of the finding of the Saviour in the Temple, with fine perception, places a fly-whisk in the hand of a child.19 A child is here propounding to his elders a purer and loftier system of ethics than had heretofore been dreamed of; a child, likewise, banishes the servants of Belial.

With the Jewish writers of the Middle Ages the worship of Baal frequently signified the practising of the rites of the Christian religion; thus Rabbi Joseph Ben Meir in his Chronicles states that Clovis forsook his God and worshipped Baal, and that a high place was built at Paris for Baal Dionysius, i.e. the Cathedral of St. Denis.20

The Assyrians employed the tall standard and sceptral fans in a precisely similar way to the Egyptians. In the restoration of the palace of Sargon (Khorsabad), compiled by Felix Thomas, given by Perrot and Chipiez, History of Art in Chaldæa and Assyria, vol. ii. p. 24, two enormous frond standards are placed at the entrance to the Harem Court, these being circular, formed of palm fronds in bronze gilt. ‘In India, as in Japan,’ to quote again Sir George Birdwood, ‘the standard is often blazoned with some totemistic, symbolical, or heraldic device, and it was probably so blazoned in Assyria, for from Assyria the practice spread to Greece and Rome of using such devices on both standards and shields. Later this ritual was revived by the Saracens, and was spread over mediæval Europe by the Crusaders returning from the Holy Land.’

The Assyrian disc-standards were probably of brass or other metal, fixed to the inside of the chariot. Two devices appear on the monuments—the Divine Archer standing on a bull, and two bulls running in opposite directions. These were enclosed in a circle at the end of a long staff ornamented with streamers and tassels.21

The Assyrians employed the primitive plaited fan, used in Egypt, both crescent-shaped, square, and triangular. On a relief from Nimroud, in the British Museum, in a circular arrangement divided into four compartments, representing the interior of a castle with towers and battlements, a eunuch is waving in his right hand, over a stand on which are vases and bowls, a square, flag-shaped fan, certainly of the plaited variety; in the left hand is what appears to be a fly-whisk.

On a silver dish in the Strogonoff collection illustrated in Orientalische Teppiche, Alois Riegl, a Sassanian monarch is seated, cross-legged, holding a tazza, and attended by two servitors, one of whom waves a plaited flag-fan of oblong shape. The dish, which bears strong traces of Indian influence, is probably of the period of Varannes II., A.D. 273-277.

The swinging-fan, suspended from the ceiling, and operated by pulling a cord, is an ancient device for cooling the air of rooms. The testimony of an Assyrian bas-relief from Nineveh indicates its use at the period to which these sculptures belong—seventh to tenth century B.C. Wicquefort, in his translation of the embassy of Garcias de Figueron, gives the name of fan to a kind of chimney or ventiduct, in use among the Persians, to furnish air and wind into their houses, without which the heat would be insupportable.22

A variant of this device for ventilating rooms is recorded in Chinese annals. Under the Han dynasty, B.C. 205-A.D. 25, a skilful workman at Ch’ang—and named Ting Huan—made a fan of seven large wheels 10 feet in diameter, the whole turned by a single man.

The luxurious Guez de Balzac, in the twentieth letter, written from Rome in 1621, to the Cardinal de la Villette, with his customary extravagant hyperbole, describes his method of guarding against the heat during the broiling month of July—‘Four servants constantly fan my apartments; they raise wind enough to make a tempestuous sea.’