Figure 1.--Here we see a German boy with a highly decorated halter during the 1930s. The decorations are flowers, perhaps Edelweiss..

There were both plain and decorated halters. The decoration was on the cross bar. We see large numbers of both. We do not know what the boys felt about the decorations or if there were age preferences. Patterns here may emerge as we develop this topic. The decoration of Lederhosen halters varied significantly. This is a little difficult to assess from the photographic record. Some of the decoration do not show up well in photographs unles they are closeups. This is because the decoration were often tooled ether without any color. Decorations vary in both type and design. The two basic types are embossed designs and medalion-like inserts. The designs vary in sublect matter and style. Some workshops produce a very prominent halter design. The designs on the crossbars vary, but Alpine desisns such as flowers and hinting scenes--especially stags--are the most common. Commonly the cross pieces were decorated with Alpine symbols like dear or probably more accurately a stag and flowers. We are not sure why these two were so common. The dear presumably relates to hunting. We are less sure about flowers, except that they are pertty, but this of course is not commonly a consideration for boys clothing. Perhaps it relates to Alpine medows. The cross bar may be embossed with scenes of deer often this is replaced with a replica (plastic) carved bone medallion showing a similar scene. We do not yet have a complere list of the symbols used, but hope to develop this over time.

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Created: 5:53 PM 6/2/2009
Last updated: 5:53 PM 6/2/2009