The Minhag of married women shaving their head was throughout all of the Ashkenazic lands, including in Germany, Amsterdam and England. What stopped it among various communities was Czar Alexander’s decree in the 1850s prohibiting Jews in Russia, Poland and Lithuania from doing so. It was part of his same decree prohibiting Jews from wearing long jackets (kapotas). This is when most Litvish men stopped wearing kapotas and Litvish women stopped shaving. The Chasidim, for the most part, resisted the new law.
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