associated trades and artisans such as bladesmiths, leather craftsmen, and potters. Forums and outlets provide products, directions, and advice to straight razor users. Straight razor manufacturers exist in Europe, Asia, and North America. Antique straight razors are also actively traded. Straight razors require considerable skill to hone and strop, and require more care during shaving. Straight razor design and use was once a major portion of the curriculum in barber colleges. History Various forms of razors were used throughout history, which are different in appearance but similar in use to modern straight razors. In prehistoric times clam shells, shark's teeth, and flint were sharpened and used for shaving. Drawings of such blades were found in prehistoric caves. Some tribes still use blades made of flint to this day. Excavations in Egypt have unearthed solid gold and copper razors in tombs dating back to the 4th millennium BC. The Roman historian Livy reported that the razor was introduced in ancient Rome in the 6th century BC by legendary king Lucius Tarquinius Priscus. Priscus was ahead of his time because razors did not come to general use until a century later. The first narrow-bladed folding straight razors were listed by a Sheffield, England manufacturer in 1680. By the late 1680s, early 1690s, razors with silver-covered handles along with other Sheffield-made products known as "Sheffield wares" were being exported by John Spencer (1655—1729) of Cannon Hall, a wealthy landowner and industrialist, to ports in the Gulf of Finland, approximately 1200 miles (1931km) from Sheffield. From there, these goods were probably sent to Finland and even Russia. By 1740, Benjamin Huntsman was making straight razors complete with decorated handles and hollow-ground blades made from cast steel, using a process he invented. Huntsman's process was adopted by the French sometime later; albeit reluctantly at first due to nationalist sentiments. The English manufacturers were even more reluctant than the French to adopt the process and only did so after they saw its success in France. Sheffield steel, a highly polished steel, also known as 'Sheffield silver steel' and famous for its deep gloss finish, is considered a superior quality steel and is still used to this day in France by such manufacturers as Thiers Issard. After their introduction in 1680, straight razors became the principal method of manual shaving for more than two hundred years, and remained in common use until the mid-20th century. Electric razors