Stephens wasn’t particularly interested in antiquities before a 2001 visit to Baltimore’s the Walters Art Museum. She doesn’t have a Ph.D., she doesn’t read Greek or Latin, but she’s blown the academy’s collective mind with historical discoveries made in her basement. Her revolutionary observations about women in antiquity are the result of pure grunt work. In her videos, Stephens plays the part of ornatrix for her hair models, using as-authentic-as-possible hair tools like horn combs and bone needles. No evidence exists that public, for-pay hair salons, like the one where Stephens works, existed in ancient Rome. Poor women likely employed friends or sisters to do their hair. Related: The 50 Most Iconic Hairstyles of All Timeįew examples of ancient women’s hairstyling practices remain - given their feminine and quotidian nature, few were ever even recorded - but it is known that slaves called ornatrices styled rich women’s hair at home. She focuses mostly on the hairstyles of Roman women in the first century A.D. Stephens styles hair at Baltimore’s Studio 921, but she’s better known outside of her hometown for tutorials faithfully re-creating historical updos on YouTube. You can tell that hairdresser/archaeologist/YouTube personality Janet Stephens is an unusual woman by her choice of reading material: “I read Vogue and Bazaar for work, and I read scholarly work for entertainment,” she says. (Photo: DEA Picture Library/Getty Images) Hairdresser-archaeologist Janet Stephens is known for styling ancient updos, like Faustina the Younger’s pictured here.
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