Collars, Tags and Marks

Posted by Tanos on Mon 20 Mar 06, 1:28 AM

This is my third draft essay about my personal style of D/s, which I'm calling "Household D/s." Links to the other pieces are on the HDS page.

The collar is the single most powerful symbol in Household D/s, representing the submissive's bond to the master of the house. Collars have deep roots in the history of restraint and slave ownership, and their use in HDS incorporates much of their evolution over the centuries.

The human neck is the easiest part of the body on which to place a restraint: the narrowing at the neck, compared to the adjacent head or shoulders, is much more marked than in the case of the waist, wrists or ankles. Neck restraints are therefore proportionately harder to slip, even when made of rope or wood which a prisoner can attempt to stretch or loosen. The neck is also particularly vulnerable, with its arteries, veins, windpipe and spine: a captive who might be prepared to scrape off some flesh to slip out of a manacle will choke if they pull too hard against a collar.

For these reasons, collars emerged in antiquity, originally in the form of restraints. For example, depictions of the victories of Egyptian pharoahs show lines of captives roped together by the neck; and several iron slave chains with multiple collars survive from the time of the Romans and their Gaulish and British opponents.

The Romans took the idea of the collar a step further, by fitting slaves with collars to indicate their status, even when the collar was not functioning as a physical restraint. Literacy was common enough for Romans to go on to develop collars with tags bearing identifying inscriptions. Many of these survive, giving the slave's name, their owner, and instructions for their return. One of the most detailed inscriptions is: "I am Asellus, a slave of Praeiectus an official of the prefect of the grain harvest. I have gone outdoors, beyond the walls. Hold me fast, because I have run away. Return me to the barber's shop near the temple of Flora."

The presence of a metal neck ring which the wearer could not remove remained a way of indicating slavery for almost two thousands years. Crude iron rings were used in the middle ages, and in the 18th and 19th centuries, engraved collars and tags re-emerged. In the US, Charleston's laws required slaves to be identified with a numbered tag when hired out. In 18th century Britain, slave servants existing in a legal limbo, when legal precedents which granted freedom to slaves on reaching English soil were largely ignored. Nevertheless, slaves frequently wore ornate silver collars with their owner's name, to show their status and to underline their rich owner's ability to import and maintain such a rare type of servant.

The most striking Victorian precedent for the use of the collar in HDS was Hannah Cullwick's "slave chain." This represented her consensual Master/slave relationship with her owner, Arthur Munby, and took the form of a thick chain locked by a padlock, with the key held by Munby.

Following in these traditions, HDS uses the collar as a mark of service or ownership.

Since a collar is symbolic bondage, its full significance is only felt if the collar has a lock. There is nothing like the sound of a padlock clicking shut on a stout collar, and the realisation that the submissive can no longer choose when to remove it. It becomes a physical reminder of the master's presence in the submissive's life. Just as the helplessness of bondage is only felt when the restraints are inescapable, the collar needs to feel unremoveable.

However, it may be useful to use a collar without a lock to represent the preliminary stages of a relationship, and reserve the locking collar for the time of a collaring ceremony, which may include vows of obedience and comittiment.

Leather collars are the most common type sold by BDSM shops, although they are frequently not designed for long term use, and may even be vulnerable to a stout pair of scissors.

However, they do come in a wide variety of styles, including special purpose types such as the posture collar - a wide band of leather, several inches high, which is contoured to fit the shoulders and the jawline, and stops the head turning or looking up or down. As well as restricting movement as part of a BDSM scene, posture collars can also be used as part of some forms of advanced service training.

Sturdy leather dog collars can be obtained from pet shops, and their cheapness emphasises practicality over fashion, and may be suitable for some low privilege roles in a household.

However, metal remains the more traditional collar material, and here the main choice is between chain and solid rings or bands.

Chain is less formal, and a simple chain with a padlock is frequently used for supplicants and for new submissives. Sometimes this is referred to as a "training collar", and it symbolises a period of temporary submission rather than a permanent position in the house.

Nevertheless, chain collars can be used in the long term - as Hannah Cullwick did - and can be fitted with a "proper" padlock: that is, with a unique key and some resistance to being picked, unlike some of jewelry padlocks which have a single lever mechanism rather than a true lock.

Hardware and DIY stores sell a variety of chains, some of which are light enough to be used as collar chains. Choke chains from pet shops and chain necklaces sold as jewelry tend to be free of sharp edges, and less likely to cause allergic reactions.

Solid collars are mainly restricted to specialist manufacturers from the BDSM scene, although some fetish and goth vendors also sell them. The simplest are leather collars fitted with a thin strip of chrome-plated steel, and these share the same problems as purely leather collars. Successively heavier styles are available, up to rigid bands of steel, several millimetres thick and two or three centimetres high, and possibly fitted with an attachment ring. These heavier styles are very similar to historical slave collars, and are just as inescapable, either in the role of restraints, or badges of ownership or service.

Leather, chain and solid metal collars are all suitable for bearing inscriptions or tags to explicitly state their symbolic purpose. Just as with pets and Roman slaves before them, the submissive's name, master and contact information are natural choices. The Slave Register provides an additional option, with it's nine digit Slave Registration Numbers and ability to enter a submissive's details into their Register profile page.

For reasons of practicality and discretion, it may be necessary to use a symbolic collar which doesn't take the form of a neck restraint. This has some historical precedents too, including Mediterranean galley slaves who were identifiable ashore during the winter labouring season by a single shackle hammered shut on their ankle, and Hannah Cullwick again, who wore a leather strap on her wrist for many years, as an additional symbol of her submission to her master.

Ideally, symbolic collars should be inescapable too, but if this is impractical, then tattoos and even brands are an option, and they have the advantage that a design can be chosen which includes symbols significant to the submissive or master in question.

Edited Thu 14 Sep 06, 1:51 PM by Tanos

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