For those desiring to know more (Guardian article):

"A short and curly history of the merkin

Comedy terrorist Aaron Barschak has another claim to fame - he's put the merkin back in the spotlight.

Before his royal gatecrash, the prankster amused crowds and cameramen outside Windsor Castle by lifting his pink ball gown to reveal a luxuriant, black pubic wig - making him the latest in a long history of merkin-wearers.

The Oxford Companion To The Body traces the merkin back to 1450, a time when the bidet was a distant prospect and personal hygiene fell well short of the mark. Pubic lice were common - so some women, fed up with the constant itching, just shaved the lot off and then covered their modesty with a merkin.

Prostitutes, too, were frequent wearers. In the days before penicillin, it didn't take long to become infected with sexually transmitted diseases. They knew it was no work, no pay, and didn't want to scare the customers off with their syphilitic pustules and gonorrhoeal warts. So the merkin was used as a prosthesis to cover up a litany of horrors.

The Oxford Companion recounts an amusing tale of one gentleman who procured the disease-riddled merkin of a prostitute, dried it, gave it a good comb and then presented it to a cardinal, telling him he had brought him St Peter's beard. Some prostitutes even used them to give their nether regions a bit of razzle-dazzle. So a natural brunette could offer differing collars and cuffs to demanding customers.

These days, merkins are largely the preserve of sexual fetishists - although the Oxford Companion notes that this piece of "female finery" is also an "essential piece of the serious drag queen's wardrobe". They can be made from nylon, human hair or even yak's belly, depending on what the erotic dabbler enjoys feeling against her skin. And they're either woven on to a mesh and stuck on with spirit gum, or attached to a transparent G-string.

"I know a bit about merkins, but I don't know anyone who wears one and won't be designing one myself," says Red or Dead founder Wayne Hemingway. "I can't see them making a comeback, but it is a bloody good word."

Would-be wearers will struggle to find any merkin retailers. "We're not 100% sure our customers would buy into the merkin," says Ann Summers spokesman Philip Tooney. "The trend at the moment is less is more - with the 'full Brazilian' and the 'landing strip' proving popular."

But fanny fashion can be fickle. And if there is a return to the dense undergrowths often seen in 70s porn flicks, then the waxed, electrolysed women of today may be reaching for a merkin until nature restores their full glory.
Gareth Francis "