What is the significance of the handkerchief in Othello?

In the play Othello the act with the handkerchief was crucial to the plot. Without the proof of the handkerchief, Othello would have never believed Iago that Desdemona was cheating on him with cassio.

The common trust of Iago by most of the characters allows him to lie and deceive them. The way that Iago gains the trust of the major characters is that he brainwashes them by using repetition of the fact that he is “honest Iago”. With this trust underway he can convince his wife Emilia to steal the handkerchief from her much beloved mistress. The power of Iago’s trust can really be seen here for at the end of the play Emilia chooses to die next to her mistress. This proves that she loves her mistress more than her husband and that at the end she finally sees that all of the time that her and Iago were together he was using her. Another way that Iago gains the trust of Othello is that he uses the tactic of not wanting to sell out cassio but doing it anyway. An example of th...