The elderly lady next door lent me her spindle, a 100 years old beauty, so that I could replicate it...this is the spindle used in my part of Italy (northern Italy, Emilia Romagna, but from my research this kind of spindle is used in all of Northern and Center Italy) and it is a drop spindle.
You use it like you would do with a Turkish spindle, with a half knot on top to hold the thread you are spinning - the notch on top ensures that the knot doesn’t slip.

It was a treasure for every girl and woman, especially in a farmers economy, where it was essential in transforming wool into garments, in a society that was quite poor and where a wheel was a luxury.

In Italian, to spin wool is said "filare" (to make thread, more or less). During the courtship, it was tradition for the young man to gift the fiancee with a spindle. In fact, when a young girl had a suitor, it was used to say that "she had a filarino" (which you could loosely translate as having a little spinning?😅).

It is a saying that is heard just from old people nowadays, because young generations have lost the tradition of spinning and spindle gifting.

But I find it so romantic ❤️

These spindles are made from walnut wood, which is a big presence around where I live.

In the last two pictures you can see the original spindle I used as reference to turn my own, and a row of spindles from the rural culture museum.
This spindle was used for different fibers: here in the mountains, folks used to spin wool on it. On the countryside plains instead, they also cultivated hemp and spun it with these spindles - in fact, in the last picture, you can see it’s bast fibers and not wool on the spindle.

Size: 26 cm (10,23 in) long

Weight: 29 gr (1 oz)

Finish: walnut stain, shellac, beeswax