A youth side lock was a plaited lock of hair which pre-pubescent ancient Egyptian youths, particularly boys, wore on the side of otherwise shaven heads. References show that boys would stop wearing the side lock once they had been circumcised around the age of fourteen years.
Ancient Egyptian art also shows children as nude with a finger held to the lip.
Famous quotes containing the words youth, side and/or lock:
“I avoid talking before the youth of the age as I would dancing before them: for if one’s tongue don’t move in the steps of the day, and thinks to please by its old graces, it is only an object of ridicule.”
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)
“For I loved the man and do honour his memory, on this side of idolatry, as much as any.”
—Ben Jonson (1573–1637)
“and wife or husband
who does not lock the door of the marriage
against you, finds you
not as unwelcome third in the room, but as
the light of the moon on flesh and hair.”
—Denise Levertov (b. 1923)