In the early times men wore their hair long and this was continued for a long time and the wearing of short hair made slow progress and only among the higher classes. In the late empire the close-cropped hair became the fashion. Before the time of cropped hair it was sometimes worn in wavy locks and again, by means of the curling-iron, it was arranged in short curls and perfumed. Also false hair was used. The ancient Romans wore their beards very long. The wearing the beard long continued till the later years of the republic when it became the custom to shave the face, but full beards came into fashion again in the later empire. "The first hair cut from the head of a child, and a youth's first beard, were consecrated to the gods; but the coins of the late republican period show plainly that young men usually wore a beard, though carefully trimmed and dressed, and were seldom clean-shaven before forty."[189] There were barber-shops among the Romans and they were the gathering-places of idlers and the centers of male gossip. Among the furnishings were razors, tools to pull out the beard, scissors, pomatums to remove hair where not desired, combs, curling-irons, mirrors, towels, etc. The ways of arranging the hair by the women varied in the different periods. In the first centuries of the republic, there seems to have been two general fashions. The hair was either parted or unparted and then combed back in wavy lines and gathered together in a knot at the back of the head, low down on the neck, and fastened with ribbons or clasps, or it was wound round the top of the head like a crown. In another way the hair was carried around the head in long curls, or the front hair was plaited and connected with the back hair, etc. These simple ways of arranging the hair gave place to many variegated ways and hair-dressing became a science and the women employed special maid-servants for the purpose or had in their employ female hairdressers. In one fashion there was a tower-like headdress, the natural hair being helped out with artificial hair or with wigs. The hair was frizzled and curled and perfumed and dyed. It was kept in place by means of ribbons and pins and hair-pins of metal or ivory and adorned with gold ornaments and pearls and jewels. The hair was sometimes gracefully adorned with wreaths of flowers or of branches with leaves and blossoms.