Back in the Elizabethan times, image was absolutely everything. There was so much thought that went into how they presented themselves as this denoted where you stood in terms of wealth, power and aristocracy. The simplest example of this was their obsession with pale skin. This was for both men and women; and it was for the simple reason that if you were of a lower class, you were poor and therefore had to work outside to earn your living, and so your skin would be more tanned from the sun. If you were of the upper class, you had pale, alabaster skin, showing that you did not have to work to live. Pale skin, to the Elizabethans, was a mark of good breeding and wealth. This pale skinned look was favoured by Queen Elizabeth I, and therefore all upper class men and women took to lightening their skin, as she did.
There were several methods of lightening the skin, the most common being to mix ceruse (a highly toxic white lead pigment) with vinegar and apply it to the face, neck and hands. As your skin is an organ, the ceruse would be absorbed into the body and would cause lead poisioning. This would cause such problems as hair loss, extreme skin damage and eroded teeth- which I believe to have owed to the later Elizabethan look. As the Queens hairline receeded, high foreheads became more popular, resulting in women of the court to actually pluck their hairline to achieve the desired look. As the Queens skin became more eroded, she would layer the toxic foundation on even thicker. In all portraits of the Queen, her mouth is clamped shut to hide her decayed teeth.
‘white lead, wherewith women use to paint themselves was, without doubt, brought in use by the divell, the capitall enemie of nature, therwith to transforme humane creatures, of fear, making them ugly, enormious and abominable… a man might easily cut off a curd or cheese-cake from either of their cheeks’. -Thomas Tuke A Treatise against Painting and Tincturing of Men and Women 1616
The above quote I believe to be so powerful in creating a perfect image of what it was really like seeing Elizabethan women. We can only speculate about how horrific the layers of poisonous makeup must have made them look, but to see them described as "ugly, enormious and abominable" by someone that was actually there to witness, emphasizes just how over the top it was.
At the age of 28, Elizabeth contracted chickenpox. This left her skin badly scarred, and for someone who's image was so important, we can imagine she was devastated by this. She fought hard to maintain her image however, and extra foundation would be layered onto her skin to completely cover it up.
As mentioned before, the lead foundation would erode the skin, and it would also give it a grey, shrivelled appearance. To smooth out their shrivelled skin, they would then apply a glaze on top of the foundation, make from egg white. This was then finished off with a paint called fucus, which gave their cheeks and lips the red colour that was so popular. Madder, cochineal (a type of beetle) and ochre-based compounds were used as cheek colours, although vermillion (mercuric sulfide) was the most popular.
Below are some Elizabethan beauty recipes:
To make you beautiful:
Take iris roots and grind and make juice and put in a vial and leave it to settle. Then take the water from the top of this mixture, put it in fresh water and with this mixture wash the face, and it will be beautiful and have a notable color
To cure redness of the face:
Take white lead [ceruse], rose water and violet oil and mix together and anoint the face.
To remove marks from the face:
Take iris [Iris florentina] roots and boil them in water until it is reduced by half, then purify and with this water wash the face and you will be free of blemishes
To make the hands and face white:
Take leaves and roots of nettle and boil them in water and with this water wash your hands and face and they will become white and soft.
The price women paid for beauty at the time seems extreme, but at a time when your image was everything, the struggle to be "beautiful" must have seemed like a small price to pay if it meant that you were accepted in the court.
No comments:
Post a Comment