B as in Barber

Already in the days of the Roman Empire, the craft of the barber was widespread. But the daily visit was not only about shaving and grooming hair, beard, and facial skin. The versed craftsmen were also always well informed. Still Thomas Buddenbrook, the main character of Thomas Mann’s Nobel Prize winning novel, heard about the latest news and gossip while visiting barber Wenzel every morning, “who shaved only the crème de la crème.”

In the Middle Ages, the barbers were in charge of primary health care: they practised bloodletting, took care of wounds, and extracted aching teeth. When medicine became more professional and above all after the invention of disposable and electric razors the barbers’ shops disappeared from the cityscapes – at least in the so called Western World. Yet they have returned with the newly awakened love for groomed facial hair over the last few years.