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The 'Fez' (also known as the 'Checheya' or 'Tarboosh') is a red felt hat in the shape of a truncated cone; a black tassel hangs from the crown. The fez cap is of Greek origin^{[1][2][3][4][5][6][7]} and was worn by many different religious and ethnic groups in the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century. Its use has subsequently become less widespread.

Contents

History

Versions

The fez in military use

The fez around the world

The Fez in Western Popular Culture

Notes

See also

History

The Fez cap originated in Ancient Greece^[8] and was subsequently worn by the Medieval Byzantine Greeks.^[9][10] The Ottoman Turks adopted the Fez from the Greeks^[11][12][9] during their conquest of Byzantine Anatolia.
During the reign of the Sultan Mahmud Khan II (1808-39), a European code of dress gradually replaced the traditional robes worn by members of the Ottoman court. The change in costume was soon emulated by the public and senior civil servants, followed by the members of the ruling intelligentsia and the emancipated classes throughout the Ottoman Empire. While European style coats and trousers were gradually adopted, this change did not extend to headwear. Peaked or broad brimmed headdresses such as the top hat did not meet the Islamic requirement that men should press their heads to the ground when praying. Accordingly the Sultan issued a firman (royal decree) that the checheya headgear in a modified form would become part of the formal attire of the Turkish Empire irrespective of his subjects' religious sects or milets.

Versions

The fez or checheya had many names and shapes. In Istanbul it was called a fez, fezzi, or "phecy" while the modern Egyptian version was called a tarboosh, deriving from the Persian words 'sar' meaning head and 'poosh' meaning cover. It was basically a brimless, cone-shaped, flat-topped hat made of felt. The earliest variety was in the form of a bonnet-like headdress with a long turban wound around it which could be white, red or black. When it was adopted in Istanbul the bonnet was modified. At first it was rounded, then, some time later, lengthened and subsequently shortened. At some point the turban was eliminated, and red became the accepted colour. The fez gets its distinctive red hue from a dye collected from the bright red berries of the Turkish ''kızılcık'' (kizziljiek, ''Cornus mas'') - a cousin to the common American dogwood (''Cornus Florida'').

The fez in military use

A version of the fez was used as an arming cap for the 1400-1700s version of the mail armor head protector (a round metal plate or skull-cap, around which hung a curtain of mail to protect the neck and upper shoulder. The fez, presumably padded, raised up the metal plate an inch or two to provide effective protection from heavy blows. The fez could be optionally wrapped with a turban.
The red fez with blue tassel was the standard headdress of the Turkish Army from the 1840s until the introduction of a khaki service dress and peakless sun helmet in 1910. The only significant exceptions were cavalry and some artillery units who wore a lambskin hat with coloured cloth tops. Albanian levies wore a white version of the fez. During World War I the fez was still worn by some naval reserve units and occasionally by soldiers when off duty.
The Evzones (light infantry) regiments of the Greek Army wore their own distinctive version of the fez from 1837 until World War II. It now survives in the parade uniform of the Presidential Guard in Athens.
From the late 19th century on the fez was widely adopted as the headdress of locally recruited "native" soldiers amongst the various colonial troops of the world. The French North African regiments (Zouaves, Tirailleurs, and Spahis) wore wide, red fezzes with detachable tassels of various colours. It was an off-duty affectation of the Zouaves to wear their fezzes at different angles according to the regiment; French officers of North African units during the 1930s often wore the same fez as their men, with rank insignia attached. The Libyan battalions and squadrons of the Italian colonial forces wore lower, red fezzes over white skull caps. Somali and Eritrean regiments in Italian service wore high red fezzes with coloured tufts that varied according to the unit. German askaris in East Africa wore their fezzes with khaki covers on nearly all occasions. The Belgian Force Publique in the Congo wore large and floppy red fezzes similar to those of the French Tirailleurs Senegalais and the Portuguese Companhias Indigenas. The British King's African Rifles (recruited in East Africa) wore high straight-sided fezzes in either red or black, while the West African Frontier Force wore a low red version. The Egyptian Army wore the classic Turkish model until 1950. The West India Regiment of the British Army wore a fez as part of its Zouave-style full dress until this unit was disbanded in 1928. The tradition is continued in the full dress of the band of the Barbados Regiment, with a white turban wrapped around the base.
While the fez was a colourful and picturesque item of uniform it was in several ways an impractical headdress. If worn without a drab cover it made the head a target for enemy fire, and it provided little protection from the sun. As a result it was increasingly relegated to parade or off-duty wear by World War II, although France's West African tirailleurs continued to wear a khaki-covered version in the field until about 1943. During the final period of colonial rule in Africa (approximately 1945 to 1962) the fez was seen only as a full-dress item in French, British, Belgium, Spanish and Portugese African units; being replaced by wide-brimmed hats or forage caps on other occasions. Colonial police forces, however, usually retained the fez as normal duty wear for indigenous personnel.
Post-colonial armies in Africa quickly discarded the fez. It is, however, still worn by the ceremonial Gardes Rouge in Senegal as part of their Spahi-style uniform, and by the Italian Bersaglieri in certain orders of dress. The Bersaglieri adopted the fez as an informal headdress through the influence of the French Zouaves, with whom they served in the Crimean War. The Spanish Regulares (formerly Moorish) Tabors stationed in the Moroccan enclaves of Céuta and Melilla retain a parade uniform which includes the fez and white cloaks. Filipino units organised in the early days of U.S. rule briefly wore black fezzes. The Liberian Frontier Force, although not a colonial force, wore fezzes until the 1940s.
The 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar, which was recruited from Bosnian Moslems, used the fez. Bosnian Muslim infantry regiments in the former Austro-Hungarian Empire had also been distinguished by wearing the fez until the end of World War I.
Two regiments of the Indian Army recruited from Muslim areas wore fezzes under British rule (although the turban was the nearly-universal headdress amongst Hindu and Muslim sepoys and sowars). A green fez was worn by the Bahawalpur Lancers of Pakistan as late as the 1960s.
Many volunteer Zouave regiments wore the French North African version of the fez during the American Civil War.

The fez around the world

Among Muslims of South Asia, the fez is known as the Rumi Topi ("Roman cap"). It was a symbol of Islamic identity and showed the Indian Muslims support for the Khilafat (Caliphate), headed by the Ottoman Emperor. Later, it became associated with the Muslim League, the political party which eventually created the country of Pakistan. The late veteran Pakistani politician Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan was one of the few people in Pakistan who wore the fez until his death in 2003.
In Indonesia, a country with the biggest Muslim population in the world, fez is a part of the local culture itself. Fez is called "Peci" in Bahasa Indonesia The Peci is black in colour with a more ellipse shape and sometimes decorated with embroideries. The peci is used in various ceremonies mostly religious and also in formal occasions by government officials.
Following the foundation of Turkey after World War I, Mustafa Kemal regarded the fez - which Sultan Mahmud II had originally introduced to the Ottoman Empire's dress code in 1826 - as a symbol of feudalism. The fez ("Fes" in Turkish) was banned in 1925, and Turkish men were encouraged to wear European attire - thus, hats such as the fedora became popular.
The fez was introduced into the Balkans initially during the Byzantine reign, and subsequently during the Ottoman period where various Slavs, including Serbs and today's Bosniaks, started using the fez.
A variation of black soft fez was used by Italian blackshirts under the Fascist regime. This was in imitation of the red soft fez still worn used by bersaglieri units.
In tourist hotels in Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco, porters and bellhops often wear a fez to provide local colour for visitors. They are however almost never worn in Turkey (see above).

The Fez in Western Popular Culture

In the Western world, the fez occasionally serves as a symbol of relaxation. In cartoons, characters are shown wearing a fez often while lying in a hammock on vacation or just relaxing after a hard day of work. This curious imagery may be a throwback to the late 19th century English practice of men wearing a loose fitting smoking jacket and braided fez-like headdress when relaxing informally in the evenings. Punch cartoons of the period 1875-90 frequently portray middle-class male figures dressed in this fashion.
The character of Mr Fairbrother, in the BBC comedy "Hi-De-Hi", once commented that "There's something about a fez that makes one look slightly degenerate". More recent examples are seen in the Tom and Jerry (MGM) and The Ren and Stimpy Show all featuring fezzes. Norm the Genie from the Fairly Oddparents wears a fez. Morocco Mole, the assistant to Hanna-Barbara cartoon character Secret Squirrel, was also known to wear a fez.
The Shriners, and British comic Tommy Cooper are notable for wearing fezzes. The Steely Dan album, ''The Royal Scam'', features a song entitled "The Fez" in which the hat is a metaphor for a condom. The refrain is: "Never gonna do it without the fez on." The Ron and Fez show on XM Satellite Radio features Fez Whatley who once wore a Fez hat, thus gaining his nickname.
In Matt Groening's comic strip Life In Hell, the twin brothers/lovers/both Akbar and Jeff both wear fezzes.
They Might Be Giants had fezzes of different (color?) sold at concerts in the 1990s.
In the syndicated comic strip Our Boarding House, major Hoople wears a fez.
The character of Rocky Roccoco, played by Phil Proctor of the Firesign Theatre, is often pictured wearing a fez.
Ren, in the cartoon Ren and Stimpy, wears a fez and robe while smoking his pipe and reading his newspaper.
In certain episodes of Rugrats, Grandpa is seen wearing a fez while meeting with his "senior citizen" brotherhood group.
In his comic-strip religious tract against Freemasonry, Jack Chick records a story that the original fez was red as it was dyed in the blood of murdered Christians. There is no truth in this story.

Notes

1. The Living Age, Making of America, The Living Age Co. Inc, University of Michigan, p.636
2. The Mode in Hats and Headdress, Ruth Turner Wilcox, Stanford University, p.33
3. The Dalhousie Review, Dalhousie University Press, Stanford University, p.208
4. The Middle East and Islamic World Reader, Marvin E. Gettleman, Stuart Schaar, Grove Press, p.126
5. Grand Turk: An Historical Outline of Life and Events, of Culture and Politics, of Trade, Wilfred Thomas, Froggatt Castle, Hutchinson, University of Michigan, p.15
6. The Mode in Hats and Headdress, Ruth Turner Wilcox, Stanford University, p.33
7. New Outlook, Israel Peace Research Society, Jewish-Arab Institute (Givat Haviva, Israel), Makhon le-ḥeḳer ha-shalom (Givʻat Ḥavivah, Israel), Hashkafah Hadashah, Stanford University, p.75
8. Encyclopædia Britannica Online - Tarboosh
9. The Sultan and His Subjects, Richard Davey, Gorgias Press LLC, p.162
10. Political Evolution in the Middle East, William Spencer, University of Michigan, p.69
11. Social Theory and Later Modernities: the Turkish experience, Ibrahim Kaya, Liverpool University Press, p.59
12. Social Theory and Later Modernities: the Turkish experience, Ibrahim Kaya, Liverpool University Press, p.119
13. The Sultan and His Subjects, Richard Davey, Gorgias Press LLC, p.162


Steely Dan's The Royal Scam, track number five, is named "The Fez." With scant lyrics, the most repeated line is "No, I'm never gonna do it without the fez on..."

See also

★ Peci - a similar cap worn mainly in Indonesia

★ Turban

★ Keffiyeh