The Romans disliked wrinkles, freckles, sunspots, skin flakes and blemishes.[6] To soften wrinkles, they used swans’ fat, asses’ milk, gum Arabic and bean-meal.[7] Sores and freckles were treated with the ashes of snails.[7] The Romans pasted soft leather patches of alum directly over blemishes to pretend that they were beauty marks. Criminals and freedmen used these leather patches, which came in both round and crescent shapes, to conceal brand marks.[8]