Hairdressing

Ancient hairdressing

Hairdressing as an occupation dates back thousands of years. Both Aristophanes and Homer, Greek writers, mention hairdressing in their writings. Barbers were called koureus (κουρεύς) in Greek and tonsor in Latin. Greek and Roman barbers cut and styled hair, shaved beards, trimmed nails, and removed hairs with tweezers. Wealthy individuals were groomed by their own slave attendants, while ordinary people went to the barber shop (κουρεῖον, tonstrina), which was also a popular place to hang out and hear gossip. Female barbers (κουρεύτριαι, tonstrices) were apparently not uncommon. Before the barber began, a rough cloth (ὠμόλινον, involucre) was placed on the customer's shoulders to keep hair off their clothes. The second part of the job was shaving (radere, rasitare, ξυρεῖν), done with a razor (ξυρόν, novacula) stored in a razor-case (θήκη, ξυροθήκη, ξυροδόκης). Some people avoided shaving with razors by using strong hair-removal ointments or plasters like psilothron, acida Creta, Venetum lutum, and dropax. Any hairs missed by the razor were pulled out with tweezers (volsellae, τριχολάβιον). The third part of the barber's job was trimming fingernails, expressed in Greek as ὀνυχίζειν and ἀπονυχίζειν. The tools used for this were called ὀνυχιστήρια.