The Spinsters...Diego Velázquez, Las Hilanderas (The Spinners/The Fable of Arachne), 1655

For a middle and lower-class Renaissance woman marriage was a matter of survival. With a successful marriage came financial security and a certain level of stability. Not all women, however, had the luxury of surrendering themselves to a man at a young age (the average age for a woman to be betrothed in early modern Italy was 15, while men were around 30 when they married). One of the major obstacles was the lack of a sufficiently large dowry.

So what other options did unmarried Renaissance women have? Not a tonne of good ones to be honest. A convent was one alternative to marriage - convents still required the family to pay fees for their daughters' upkeep but they were much smaller than dowries. As a result, Italy had no shortage of nuns. In mid-16th century Florence, for instance, there were almost 3,000 nuns and only around 400 male friars in a population of just 59,000.

What is frequently overlooked in the literature is that working-class women in early modern Italy were doing just that - working. A large number of unmarried women flocked to cities like Florence and immersed themselves in the rag trade. The growing cloth industry in 15th century Florence, for instance, even allowed some women to become heads-of-households, providing sole financial support for large family units.

The spinners (and not the elegant noble women looking at the tapestry of the Minerva and Arachne story), are the real stars of the complex and beguiling painting by Velázquez.The women are relaxed, dignified and carry out their work with incredible mastery.

Sadly, female financial freedom and independence has never been looked kindly upon throughout history. Thus, a working unmaried woman, who spun wool eventually became known by the derogatory term spinster.

Diego Velázquez, Las Hilanderas (The Spinners/The Fable of Arachne), 1655, Museo del Prado, Madrid