Jewelry Book Censorship

Today's trip to the library was rather odd, so I thought I would share. I have just finished a Maymester class focusing on the history of jewelry which I greatly enjoyed. The book that we used as a textbook was Jewelry: From Antiquity to the Present by Clare Phillips. It was a thorough text and an easy read, but I wanted to research other titles on the subject. I am in the habit of checking out a library book, either from their catalog or from the interlibrary loan system, in order to peruse a title before purchase.

While flipping through the hardcover version of 7000 Years of Jewelry by Hugh Tait, I noticed something rather strange. Purple sticky notes were placed on some of the pictures. I've been known to use stickies to mark a place in a book, but not in the middle of the page. After viewing the second set I realized the intention of their placement. They were covering up nude images in the artwork. Seriously? In the adult non-fiction section? In the twenty-first century? So for your education, I present to you:

Purple Sticky: Cleansed for Your Protection

The makeshift censorship starts very soon in the book with the covering of a performance scene from an Egyptian tomb painting.

I'm going to guess that the topless dancers on the right were too distracting for the previous reader. I'm not completely certain what he/she found objectionable about the seated double pipes player on the left. Perhaps it was because they kept such bad company.

Was the reader offended by the poorly defined grapes or the satyr's lack of clothing?

.

Looks like the cardinal virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity had wardrobe malfunctions. Please note, the reader must have been running low on sticky notes or else the piece only warrented partial censor. Though in my opinion, that upper putti is suspect. Never trust a putti.

Noah's family was in too much of a rush to properly cover their naughty bits in the above cameo. But there was a storm a brewin'! The chickens needed to be covered 'cause everyone knows that chickens are dirty.

This Art Nouveau buckle is obviously a depiction of a woman lacking virtue and was in need of purple paper to shield viewers from her feminine wiles. Sigh. Isn't Office Depot just the best!?

Once again the puttie on the left escaped censor. Maybe it's because they are just so darn cute!

Lastly, apparently cleavage is also a sin. Cover that up woman! St. Eligius, the patron saint of goldsmiths, might be incited to lust should he gaze upon thee.

The picture is so innocuous that I barked out a laugh when I uncovered it.

Censorship? Bored student prank? I have no idea. But I do live in the bible belt and it would not surprise me if a future TX-Board-of-Education Nutjob decided that children were not to view the above images without some intervention.

I showed the library clerk the book- she thought it was funny. I, on the other hand, was disturbed. Why are depictions of the human body in art thought of as wrong, evil, dirty, or something to be hidden? None of the images covered were even remotely erotic.

If that wasn't irritating enough, the glue from the culprit's notes has left an ooky residue on the color plates. That make them twice the twit in my book.