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Mohawk hairstyle

Hairstyle

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The mohawk is also sometimes referred to as an iro in reference to the Iroquois, who include the Mohawk people from whom the hairstyle is supposedly derived, though historically the hair was plucked out, rather than shaved. Additionally, hairstyles bearing these names more closely resemble those worn by the Pawnee, rather than the Mohawk, Mohicans, Mohegan, or other groups whose names are phonetically similar.

The world record for the tallest full mohawk goes to Joseph Grisamore, also known as the Mohawk King, who has a 108-centimetre (3 ft 6+1⁄2 in) tall mohawk, while the world record for the tallest mohican hairstyle goes to Kazuhiro Watanabe, who has a 113.5-centimetre (3 ft 8+1⁄2 in) tall mohawk.

Etymology

While the mohawk hairstyle takes its name from the people of the Mohawk nation, an indigenous people of North America who originally inhabited the Mohawk Valley in Upstate New York, the association comes from Hollywood and more specifically from the popular 1939 film Drums Along the Mohawk starring Henry Fonda. The Mohawk and the rest of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy (Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Tuscarora, and Oneida) in fact wore a square of hair on the back of the crown of the head. The Mohawk did not shave their heads when they created this square of hair, but they rather pulled the hair out in small tufts at a time. The following is a first-hand account of James Smith, who was captured during the French and Indian War and adopted into the Mohawk tribe:

[A] number of Indians collected about me and one of them began to pull hair out of my head. He had some ashes on a piece of bark in which he frequently dipped his fingers in order to take a firmer hold, and so he went on as if he had been plucking a turkey until he had all the hair clean out of my head, except a small spot about three or four inches square on my crown the remaining hair was cut and three braids formed which were decorated.

Therefore, a true hairstyle of the Mohawks was one of plucked-out hair, leaving a three-inch square of hair on the back crown of the head with three short braids of hair decorated. The three braids of a True Mohawk hairstyle are represented today on traditional headdresses of the Mohawk known as a Gustoweh. Mohawk Gustowehs have three upright eagle feathers that represent the three braids of long ago. When not decorated, the very short braids were allowed to hang loose as seen in Good Peter's image in the referenced article.

The name Mohican is more common in the UK, popularized by the use of the style in the 1971 BBC adaptation of The Last of the Mohicans, but in that show, it was actually worn by characters representing the Huron people.

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