| | GWU Millennium Essays (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-09-18) |
 | | Barbers, who had controlled the powerful barber-surgeon’s guild since the founding of the Worshipful Company of Barbers in 1308, continued to exert powerful political influence in the medical community until an act of Parliament established the separate professions of barber and surgeon in 1745. |
 | | Although the barber wrapped the patient’s arm mummy-like with white linen bandages, a round basin was placed beneath the arm to catch the streams of blood the linen could not absorb. |
 | | Thus, the white stripes of the barber pole represent the linen bandages, the blue stripes represent veins, the red stripes represent blood, and the globe represents the leech basin, which normally sat atop the leeching staff when not in use. |
| www.gardner-webb.edu /essays/28Aug-Williams.htm (579 words) |