Women throughout history have been subjected to both beguiling and bewildering ideals of
beauty, and taking a look at some of the things that were considered beautiful through the
ages proves just how arbitrary beauty standards truly are.
Ancient Greeks loved a unibrow
Frida Kahlo might have sported a now-iconic unibrow in the 20th century, but her fashion
statement went against the grain of modern beauty standards.
While many people thought she was flouting more modern ideals of beauty, she was actually
embracing a centuries-old tradition.
To the ancient Greeks, nothing was more attractive than a woman with just one eyebrow.
Like Kahlo, ancient Greek women did not just let their unibrows grow freely, but would
also take extra measures to make them even more prominent.
While unibrows aren't typically considered attractive in modern times, thicker brows
are making a bit of a comeback.
Model and actress Cara Delevingne, for example, doesn't sport a unibrow, but her thick and
full eyebrows helped to spark a modern trend for a bushier brow.
Short, Spartan locks
Those familiar with the tale of the Trojan War know that Helen, the Spartan queen whose
affair with the Trojan prince Paris led to bloody war between their two kingdoms, was
famed for her beauty.
Sparta was considered to be a land of beautiful women, but the beauty standards were far different
back then from what you might expect today.
As a queen, the historical Helen, who would have lived roughly 3,500 years ago during
the Bronze Age, would have had tattoos of red suns on her chin and cheeks.
Her hair would have also been shaved when she was in her teens, and, when it grew back,
would have been arranged to look like snakes.
In classical Greece, which began in the 5th century B.C., Spartan beauty standards had
changed a bit.
Men kept their hair long and styled it, but women were expected to cut their hair off
upon marriage and to keep it short for the rest of their lives.
An Irish manicure
In ancient Ireland, a woman's worth often came down to what her hands looked like.
While light skin and golden hair were also prized, it was a woman's hands that revealed
whether or not she came from a good family.
The ideal hands were "well-formed, with slender, tapering fingers" according to historians,
and women of the upper classes were expected to have rounded, well-kept nails.
Even among the men in ancient Ireland, nail grooming was considered mandatory and it was
considered to be shameful for upper class men to have unkempt nails.
Though many of us today associate the color green with Ireland thanks to St. Patrick’s
Day, red was actually much more popular in ancient Ireland, and crimson-colored fingernails
were all the rage.
Pale Renaissance women
Who needs spray tans when you’re a Renaissance woman?
Women during the Renaissance were all about pale skin.
Light skin was considered to be beautiful not necessarily for the aesthetic quality,
but because paleness served as an indicator of status - a light complexion meant you were
wealthy enough to not have to work outdoors.
In Elizabethan times, the more translucent your skin was, the better.
In fact, this obsession with light skin was so great that even Queen Elizabeth I herself
would apply a powder made of lead to her face.
This had the effect of lightening the skin, but also slowly poisoned the wearer.
You win some and you lose some.
The curvier, the better
The Western ideal of beauty has trended towards slimness for more than a century, but for
a stretch of time full-figured women were in vogue.
Renaissance painters such as the 17th century Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens painted beautiful
women with ample flesh on their bones, and his works are still celebrated in modern times.
Today, the word Rubenesque is still used to refer to voluptuous women.
While many modern women desire to have a flat stomach, the Rubenesque ideal favored a thicker
mid-section, and rounded stomachs were considered the height of femininity.
During the Renaissance, larger women were considered particularly beautiful.
Voluptuous curves were viewed as a sign of wealth, and in Italy were also thought to
be a sign that a woman would bear healthy sons.
While we often think of corsets primarily as a way to achieve a thinner waist, they
were also used to accentuate the bosom and hips and to give less-endowed women the appearance
of substantial curves.
Fragile: handle with care
In the 1920s, the feminine ideal of beauty was a woman who looked like she was on the
verge of passing out at any moment.
Linda Lin, a psychologist at Boston's Emmanuel College, explained to the Daily Burn that
"femininity was tied to frailness, weakness and vulnerability" a century ago, saying:
“Power, strength and muscularity were thought of as masculine traits, and gyms were for
bodybuilders and athletes.”
Even as recently as the 1960s, strenuous exercise was viewed as something that could damage
a woman's health.
It wasn't until the 1990s that the idea of a toned, strong, muscular woman began to be
considered not only acceptable, but also attractive.
While being toned in modern times is considered aesthetically appealing, the new standard
isn't necessarily an improvement over the old one.
As Linda Lin explains:
"The culture is defining what's attractive, and it's not more accepting.
Now women can feel bad if they don't have the right muscle tone."