People today know the trades and details about ordinary workers mostly from paintings, carvings, and occasional inscriptions. Some professions existed, but scarcely more than that is known. This is certainly the case with professions devoted to making and repairing items for. women. For example, the comic playwright Plautus includes a monologue that helps us learn what sort of professions existed in the Roman Republic of his day. A character is lamenting what happens when a man gets married and moves to the city. He speaks of the days when the wife's bills come due:

These days you'll find more delivery-wagons in front of - buildings in the city than you'd see in the country when you go to your remote Villa. But even that's a nice view compared to when your expenses track you down. Up pops the...