It isn’t easy being a woman — sometimes, it means bringing out those figurative and literal fangs and talons. Instagram images from seemingly trustworthy accounts have been haunting me all year and returned around Halloween, depicting supposed Victorian, women’s self-defense gloves from the 1800s. The thick leather accessories, boasting dangerously pointy metal claws, appear a bit too modern to be authentic, and an antique clothing expert I consulted didn’t seem to have heard of such a thing. So, what is the truth?
Reddit, which counterintuitively often proves a hub of common sense, poked some holes in the gloves. Users commented on the “kinky” contraptions, “Worst way to find out how often one touches their face,” “I would forget I was wearing it and totally poke myself in the eye,” and “If they were made to be retractable then they would be perfect.” The gloves would not only be a sure way to shred your outfit, but, in the event of an attack, they wouldn’t prove as effective as a blade or other types of conventional weapons, thus perhaps only managing to provoke worse wrath upon unlucky ladies.
The blog adafruit had a most excellent take to share. To begin with, they didn’t find the Museo delle Curiosità in San Marino, where the gloves are displayed, to be a credible source on the matter of Victorian history, noting that some of the tourist trap’s items are reconstructions. While there is proof that the dangerous fashion statements in question really are located there, the unrelated Museum of Curiosities in Dublin seems to have snagged a pair of these inevitable snaggers as well.
Adafruit further commented:
“There is a real Victorian object that inspired this meme… the Anti-Garotte Glove, patented in 1856-1857 by [America’s Charles Frederick Pike and] Dr. Frank James Wilson Packman of Hertfordshire. […] it was never standard equipment for Victorian women. It was a panic-era prototype during London’s garroting scares — newspapers convinced the public that pedestrians were being strangled in the streets.
Packman’s glove featured small pointed steel blades and hooks sewn into a leather glove.”
Those Terrifying Victorian Claw Gloves Aren’t Quite What the Internet Claims
During the time period, all sorts of bizarre inventions and torture devices were being dreamed up. The blog continued:
“The device was advertised, criticized, and failed. A letter to The Times pointed out the flaws… the hooks would snag an attacker’s clothing, trapping the victim instead of freeing them. By the end of 1857, Packman went bankrupt, and the glove never made it.
A surviving example is at the Crime Museum at New Scotland Yard (formerly the Black Museum), a non-public police collection.”
Adafruit kindly points us toward Masculinity, Crime and Self-Defence in Victorian Literature: Duelling with Danger by Emelyne Godfrey (2010), who explained Packman and Pike’s folly, to learn more about the brutal and amusing reality of how our ancestors approached the issue of self-protection.
There have been historical parallels to the “Armed Glove.” In 1904, Louisa Llewellin came up with a similar design. We can also mention the Japanese combat tool Tekkō-kagi. For more beauty-oriented purposes, there were Chinese decorative nail guards (zhijiatao or huzhi), which were intended to signify status and protect natural nails. Verily, the prospect of breaking a nail is truly horrifying. But one mystery remains: How does anyone manage to go about daily activities with those acrylic avian monstrosities I often spot in modern-day New York?
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