It is known that barbers' job is to shave and cut their clients' hair, but throughout history their "duties" have included some other things, some of which were quite strange. they cut hair, shaved, extracted teeth, treated high blood pressure with leeches, the most radical barber procedure is the so-called "bloodletting".
The mess that would arise during this "bloodletting" was cleaned up by the barbers with white towels, which would then be washed and used again. It was this ritual that inspired the creation of the barber's symbol – the red and white rod. The white color in this symbol represents the very act of "letting blood", while the red color represents the bloody towels. The ball on the top of the rod represents a bowl full of leeches, which barbers also used for healing purposes, while the lower part represents the bowl into which blood flows during the "bloodletting" procedure. On some barber bars, there is also a blue color, in addition to white and red, which represents the veins.
The barber's trade today has nothing to do with the many operations that barbers have included in their craft throughout history, but this rod is still in use as a symbol of barbers.