As lady’s maid to the president’s wife, her tasks included caring for the expensive silk and woolen clothing and the linens worn closest to the body, as well as delicate lace and handkerchiefs.

Ona Judge, the teenage lady’s maid of America’s most famous woman, was getting her first taste of freedom.

As she walked, the young lady’s maid passed the site where the Declaration of Independence had been written and adopted twenty years earlier.

"The Queen was aware of how useful a tool style was to help convey her image as monarch," said Alicia Healey, who worked in the Queen's household for four years and has since written a book called "Wardrobe Wisdom from a Royal Lady's Maid: how to dress and take care of your clothes".

The composers of two songs in the vernacular span the social spectrum: One, playfully elegant, is by Marguerite, Queen of Navarre, and the other is by Martha Baerts, a lady’s maid.