Busby (military headdress)

Busby is the English name for the Hungarian prémes csákó ('fur shako') or kucsma, a military head-dress made of fur, originally worn by Hungarian hussars. In its original Hungarian form the busby was a cylindrical fur cap, having a bag of coloured cloth hanging from the top. This bag could be filled with sand and the end attached to the right shoulder as a defence against sabre cuts. The popularity of the military headdress in its hussar form reached a height in the years immediately before World War I (1914–1918). It was widely worn in the Belgian (Guides and field artillery), British (hussars, yeomanry, and horse artillery), Dutch (cavalry and artillery), Italian (light cavalry) German (hussars), Russian (hussars),, Serbian (Royal Guard) and Spanish (hussars and mounted cazadores) armies. Several armies have continued to use the headdress as a part of their full dress uniforms. There were some variations in the materials of which cavalry busbies were made. Russian Cossacks of the Imperial Guard used black sheepskin, Guard Hussars dark brown long-haired fur, and line Hussars black lambswool. All but one of the twenty Prussian Hussar regiments wore sealskin busbies dyed in black, while their officers favoured dark brown otter-skin. The Brunswick Hussar Regiment No. 17 had the distinction of being issued busbies made of bearskin. Possibly the name's original sense of a "busby wig" came from association with Richard Busby, headmaster of Westminster School in the late seventeenth century; the phrase buzz wig may have supplied the derivation for busby. An alternative explanation is that the British hussar cap of the early 19th century was named after the hatter who supplied the officer's version—W. Busby of the Strand London. The Canadian Forces dress instructions authorise the busby as a part of the full dress uniform for hussars, artillery and rifle regiments. The historic busby is still worn by ceremonial detachments of the Dutch Hussars and Royal Gendarmerie (Koninklijke Marchaussee) in full dress uniform.

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Related concepts (3)

Full dress uniform

Full dress uniform, also known as a ceremonial dress uniform or parade dress uniform, is the most formal type of uniforms used by military, police, fire and other public uniformed services for official parades, ceremonies, and receptions, including private ones such as marriages and funerals. Full dress uniforms typically include full-size orders and medals insignia. Styles tend to trace back to uniforms used during the 19th century, although the 20th century saw the adoption of mess dress-styled full-dress uniforms.

Kepi

The kepi (pronˈkɛpiː ˈkeɪpiː) is a cap with a flat circular top and a peak, or visor. In English, the term is a loanword of képi, itself a re-spelled version of the Käppi, a diminutive form of Kappe, meaning "cap". In Europe, this headgear is most commonly associated with French military and police uniforms, though versions of it were widely worn by other armies during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In North America, it is usually associated with the American Civil War, as it was worn by soldiers on both sides of the conflict.

Military uniform

A military uniform is a standardised dress worn by members of the armed forces and paramilitaries of various nations. Military dress and styles have gone through significant changes over the centuries, from colourful and elaborate, ornamented clothing until the 19th century, to utilitarian camouflage uniforms for field and battle purposes from World War I (1914–1918) on. Military uniforms in the form of standardised and distinctive dress, intended for identification and display, are typically a sign of organised military forces equipped by a central authority.