I've just read Keith Thomas' The Ends of Life: roads to fulfilment in early modern England,  about what people valued during the early modern period (that's 1530-1780, for those who like me need a definition).  KT provides a glorious stream of quotations on 6 areas where people might have sought fulfilment - wealth and possessions, fame and afterlife, honour and reputation, and so on. One of the areas is 'work and vocation', and this chapter provides nice  insights into the division of labour. "Some occupations were thought to be unmanly because they could equally well be performed by women: brewers, bakers, and cooks all suffered from this stigma."   I wouldn't…