History's Strangest Baldness 'Cures'

Hippocrates, the “the father of Western medicine" had a rather strange remedy for baldness—it didn't work. (Credit: blackboard1965/Shutterstock) For most people, baldness wouldn’t make it into the Top Ten Worst Things Ever; that list is more likely to be dominated by Ebola, cancer, dementia, and Kevin Federline’s Playing with Fire album. Nonetheless, it is a condition that countless men find distressing as they endure taunts like “Mr. Clean,” “cue ball,” or “chrome dome.” Surprisingly, attempts at curing baldness do not originate in our modern, superficial society. Actually, when it comes to palliating the naturally depilated pate, strange “cures” date back thousands of years. The Ebers Papyrus, which dates to around 1550 BC, includes various treatments for keeping big bad baldness at bay: a concoction of fats from a hippopotamus, a crocodile, a tomcat, a snake, and an ibex; applying porcupine hair boiled in water to the scalp for four days; ...