XVIII.23 On royal hair

, par Stewart

Peoples who do not till the land do not have the same notion of luxury. Just consider, in Tacitus, the admirable simplicity of the Germanic peoples : the arts did not fashion their ornaments, they found them in nature. If their chief’s family needed to be distinguished by some sign, it was in that same nature that they had to find it : for the kings of the Franks, the Burgundians, and the Visigoths, their long hair was their diadem.