Women and wool

Wool yarns can be produced mechanically or manually using traditional spindles. The latter serve to twist fibres, thus obtaining the yarn that can be used for the manufacture of fabrics, knitting or for embroidery and sewing. Spinning was an arduous and time-consuming job, which involved a large sector of the population, especially women and children. Finally, the need for improving and speeding up the work process led to the invention of a pedal-driven wooden wheel; this innovation facilitated the production of yarns, in a significant way. 

Wheel spinner or arcolaio had already been designed by Leonardo, but its use became popular only between 1800 and 1900. Around the fifties, in the Aurunci and Ciociaria, manual spinning went through a progressive decline and, nowadays, it has been completely abandoned.