by I know we’re supposed to be rejecting everything we stood for last year, sloughing off our 2023 selves that have worn out old exploits to emerge sparkling fresh, dewy and morally superior, but, I don’t know, seasonal self-loathing seems so … lively. If you’re like me (I pray you’re not), you feel listless, lumpen and broke. Besides, have you looked outside?
Rather than torture ourselves with “new year, new you” flannel, let’s take a horrible, judgmental look at some “new year, bad old them” pictures. Because things could definitely be worse. Historically, “pain is beauty” has been taken literally, leading to centuries of wild claims, dangerous hacks and unattainable standards.
Related: The shock of the old: eight sad and antisocial board games
Before today’s vampire faces and slimy snail moisturisers, arsenic “complex rallies” promised a “perfectly clear turn”. Renaissance women used deadly nightshade to make their eyes bigger, and cat poo to remove hair. One Roman remedy for palliation involved grinding the intestines “of a small land crocodile that feeds only on the most fragrant flowers”, which may now be for sale on Goop.
But have we bought an inaccurate cliché? The idea that, in the past, women used deadly poisons ignorantly or recklessly to serve their own desires is “a misogynistic trope that has been circulating since classical times,” writes art history professor Jill Burke in her book How to Be a Renaissance Woman. Burke describes a poisoned ring from 16th century Rome, where women used it water tofan – to make a concoction including ground arsenic and lead disguised as skin care products – to slowly poison their violent or simply “drunk and unfaithful” husbands (at least 46, although some speculated on as many as 600).
But even when the purpose was not murder, women throughout history may have known exactly what they were doing. Beauty conferred power, status and control in a world where women held little of those things in high regard. No wonder it’s worth the dangerous or out there treatment. And is it really any different from cleaning up a mess or injecting a deadly toxin into your forehead? Let’s see.
Roman carved and hand-made tools
The Romans were very much in trouble: the men for sports performance and the women because of the patriarchy. “No step of the wild goat under your armpits, no legs bristling with rough hair!”, wrote Óvid, which was apparently funny (you probably had to be). He was not alone among the Roman writers: “They all write about how you have to keep body hair and you know, my god, no man will be interested in you if you have armpit hair,” according to Cameron Moffett of English Heritage. This is clearly seen in the Roman City of Wroxeter in Shropshire, which has found “an amazing number of tweezers” in its bathing complex used by professional pluckers.
Elizabeth I, c 1588
Did Elizabeth really cover her face with lead? Possibly: lead-based Venetian Ceruse was a contemporary cosmetics but there is no evidence that she used it. Actually, Renaissance Goo – the really cool name of a collaborative research project between Burke and Professor Wilson Poon (a soft materials scientist) – wasn’t half so bad. The team has recreated and tested historical miracles and found them to be quite good, including a face cream full of sheep fat, vitamin E and antioxidants.
Electric corset, 1890s
As if corsets weren’t bad enough, here comes science to make them even worse. Mrs. Whiting, a lifelong sufferer of constipation, was “much better” because of this electric corset. (Was he squeezing her like a boa constrictor? Yikes.) The seductive little print promises “the chest helps her develop healthy”, making this sound like something a Kardashian might try to get you sell on TikTok. The electric corset came from 52 Oxford Street, London, now Holland & Barrett. Good luck curing your hysteria and “organic laughs” with three packets of dried apricots.
Dr. Mackenzie’s Arsenic Soap, 1897
In the 1850s, reports of Austrian arsenic eaters highlighted their unnecessary complexes, starting a craze for arsenic-laced beauty products. The wafers, creams and soaps gave the desired tuber pallor. After all, “the fairest skins belong to people in the earliest stage of consumption,” as Mrs SD Powers authoritatively wrote in her 1874 beauty bible The Ugly Girl Papers (chapter headings include Hope for Homely People, Brief Madness and , my favorite, Easier to be Awesome than Clean). Unfortunately, arsenic wellness products made you pale by destroying your red blood cells, but that’s okay, this one was “guaranteed to be completely harmless”.
Hip reduction machine, 1899
Philidelphia Jack O’Brien, world 1905, the chap with the thousand yard poet who works this device (a series of mechanized rolling pins; I doubt whether it would help keep that boy’s form, as he claims six). light-heavyweight boxing champion. Why? Is he supporting it? He could definitely see that he prefers to pick something.
The reign of Edwardian women’s beauty, 1906
Ah yes, how to “repair the ravages of the season”, a perennial problem. I doubt that meant stuffing pigs in blankets in front of the World’s Strongest Man for the women of Edwardian society, but their creative beauty treatments inspire more contemporary mischief. Why not take a “light bath” in a cupboard (“may reduce weight accumulated through unnecessary eating out”), lie in a bath full of magnets (“strengthening and nourishing”), or enjoy An “electric massage” from a stern woman who seems disgusted with your life choices? Furthermore, if “your nose had gone out of fashion”, it could be “altered to fit any pattern that was desired” (I hope the sharp lady was not meant).
Lip tattoo, 1929
As someone who replaced my non-existent eyebrows 25 years ago by doing what I can only assume was the work experience child of the beauty parlor, and whose scars are still an indelible and psychological orange , I am perfectly positioned to shout back over time. , “Noooo, don’t do it” at this reckless young thing. However, her expression of pure listless resignation suggests that she knows exactly how bad this is going to be.
Perm radium, 1920s
A reader recently informed me that the radioactive wellness products were in play at the beginning of the 20th century. Radium bath salts, madame? Or maybe the radium toothpaste? I can’t find any information on how radium was supposed to make your hair curl, but it sure does.
Radium makeup remover, 1937
France’s Tho-Radia range of beauty products were supposed to improve circulation and remove wrinkles, but they were also shown to give the unearthly radiant glow you see here. They received a cunning promotion with “expertise” from a doctor named Alfred Curie, although he was no relation to Pierre and Marie, who apparently considered legal action against the company. The French authorities restricted the use of radium in 1937, meaning that this version could be radium-free: where would I get my glow?
Spa salon treatment, 1968
Is cucumber even beautiful? One paper claims that it is “excellent for rubbing the skin to keep it soft and white”, contains “naturally occurring organic acids such as glycolic, lactic and salicylic acids” and that it inhibits tyrosinase ( seems like a good thing). This woman has basically turned into a wedding buffet salmon; Another unreal beauty that we cannot live with.
