Beginning in the 12th century, Arab physicians began to prescribe their patients a most unorthodox remedy: the ground remains of mummies procured from Egyptian tombs.
Mummy powder proved so profitable that soon after its introduction, Egyptian tombs were ransacked not only for the riches they might contain, but also for bodies that might be processed into the expensive folk medicine. It wasn’t long before the practice of applying mummy powder was incorporated into medieval Europe’s catalog of dubious medical practices. By the 16th century, the product had become so commonplace in both Europe and the Middle East that the once seemingly endless supply of authentic, mummified Egyptian cadavers quite literally dried up.
Mummy powder, however, was not the only everyday use of the Egyptian dead that arose before the dawn of modern archaeological preservation. In the 16th and 17th centuries, pulverized mummy was the key ingredient in a popular shade of brown artist’s pigment, and preserved human and animal remains of Egyptian origin were used in the production of this “mummy brown” paint until the early 20th century.
Whether this statement was merely jest on the part of the American literary icon, well known for his sense of humor, has been the subject of debate ever since it was published. What is known, however, is that the supply of authentic Egyptian corpses by the beginning of the 1800s was so small only that upper crust Europeans could afford to purchase one whole. In the wake of Napoleon’s conquest of Egypt, it became vogue amongst the aristocracy to hold “unwrapping parties,” where carefully preserved corpses would be haphazardly stripped of their bandages, so that revelers could gaze upon the millennia-old face concealed beneath them. Small burial ornaments concealed in the linens would then be dispensed to partygoers as souvenirs, while exposure to air caused the delicate bodies to crumble into dust, never to be seen again.
To our concept of fashion we invariably attach words like style and beauty and the history of admiring beauty is an undeniable aspect of the human experience. Certainly beauty began being put on a pedestal as far back as the first creations of art and mythology and our familiarity with Western civilization’s Goddess of Love and Beauty, Venus, attests to this. Though notions of beauty have varied and continue to vary from culture to culture, it is considered a virtue and worthy of attention. What is more recent and maybe peculiar to some, though not to all, is the beauty pageant and the public ceremony of beauty judgment.
The history of beauty pageantry as some kind of ceremonial and public event is more recently documented as a phenomenon of the late 1800’s, although the celebration of beauty has surely been part of community life for millenia. In the mid-1800’s the entertaining and enterprising P.T.Barnum held the first American beauty pageant which, though unsuccessful in its reception, opened the door to this kind of show for the increasingly media- and spectacle- oriented American public. By the 1880’s, aided by the availability of photography, the first Bathing Beauty Pageant was held on the East Coast and by 1921 Americans could behold the first Miss America Pageant. Though initially these pageants were not received very well, by World War II when young women were employed as beauty figures to sell war bonds, they gradually developed a wider following.
People, men and women alike, have always been able to distinguish among themselves who is deemed more or less attractive according to a cultural norm but the pageantry of beauty is interesting in our time period for the sometimes controversial factors involved and for the questions it raises in an inquisitive and introspective culture. Whether beauty contestants should be judged for more than their appearances, whether contestants have cosmetically enhanced their appearances, whether their public and/or private persona is considered worthy of public celebration, and even the question of how and why we should judge children in beauty pageants are controversies that surface from time to time. That humans experience so much through vision probably means that beauty pageants and judgments based largely on appearances for the public spectacle will remain part of our cultural experience. How we interpret this experience is what is interesting as is how our notions of beauty may change over time.
image: sculpture, Venus de Milo
image: painting, Birth of Venus, Sandro Botticelli
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Tags: 1800s, Ancient Replica Goddesses, Aphrodite of Melos Statue, art, Bathing Beauty Pageant 1921, beauty and culture, beauty history, beauty pageants, beauty world war 2, Birth of Venus, Bust of Aphrodite, ceremony, goddess, goddess of love, judgment of beauty, miss america, P.T. Barnum and beauty pageants, pageants history, Sandro Botticelli, society, venus, Venus de Milo, Venus goddess of beauty, Venus of Lespugue, Venus of Willendorf, WWII
Canned food is a ubiquitous part of our society. Grocery aisles are stocked with all manner of canned goods and the average cupboard or pantry also has an assortment of the items. They last a long time and the canning process is reliable and safe but long term food preservation is a fairly recent phenomenon.
The glass jars were too fragile for regular travel and during the 1810 work of Peter Durand, cylindrical cans made of tin or iron became popular. The cans were cheaper and easy to make but tin openers were thirty years away. Soldiers had to smash open the can or cut them with bayonets. The process of canning and transportation was slow so it was not successfully introduced in the mass amounts needed by the French army of the time.
Increasing population and the industrial manufacturing capability led to high demand for canned food. The time to process and cook the canned food had made dramatic leaps.
