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Interesting facts about beauty. Interesting facts about the beauty of women through men's eyes. Forget about salicylic acid from the pharmacy

So which women are considered beautiful in different countries?

Spain
A real Spanish woman is half Carmen, half St. Magdalene somewhere around 30-35. And it is very important that she exudes sex appeal and sensuality.
Curvy and preferably elastic forms are usually emphasized here with a deep neckline, short skirts, tight-fitting clothes and bright colors in the wardrobe. The main goal is to demonstrate what nature has generously provided.
Also, the local ideal of beauty corresponds to dark skin, sable eyebrows and brown almond-shaped eyes, and the ability to sob and laugh contagiously, expressively gesticulate and erotically “move” various parts of the body are welcomed in behavior. And women from hot Spain easily and joyfully fulfill this request from their men.

Great Britain
The ideal of beauty in English is naturalness. A natural pale face is desirable. The presence of freckles is encouraged as proof of aristocratic origin. Leanness is welcomed in the figure, and noble restraint and unhurriedness in movements. Hair dye and makeup - the most natural tones. No one except English women spends so much time in front of the mirror, achieving complete “naturalness” with the help of artificial means.
It is not customary for women residents to get rid of wrinkles (the country ranks among developed countries in the popularity of anti-aging surgeries). It is believed that wrinkles do not spoil women, but give them a special charm. Especially wrinkles - “rays” around the eyes.

Germany
They say that sports were invented in England, and physical education in Germany. If there is an ideal of beauty, then only German women are disciplined enough to consistently strive for it at any age. A real resident of this country has blond hair, moderately sharp facial features and blue eyes. What is missing by nature is easily compensated with the help of ordinary tricks: colored lenses, hair dye.
But the most important thing is that the German woman is beautiful with a cold, detached beauty, which, however, hides not mystery, but rather pragmatism. German women generally know what they want and will not miss the opportunity to achieve success, including due to their visual attractiveness at any age.

France
Here, like in no other country, female maturity is valued. A well-groomed lady over 40-45 attracts much more admiring glances than a nymphet.
In addition, restraint, both internal and external, is very important. A true Frenchwoman will never expose her charms and will not abuse clothes that are too tight or transparent. Her wardrobe contains only laconic, impeccably tailored items in muted tones, and her entire look has an indescribable charm and elegant simplicity.
In general, being a woman in France is great. The men there are real womanizers by nature, they are guided by the principle “there are no ugly and old women” and behave in such a way that anyone will blossom in their arms.

USA
Although the blonde with steep hips and ample breasts still rules the American ball, she is gradually being replaced by beauties with bronze skin, blue-black hair and amazingly beautiful eyes.
The era of Marilyn Monroe seems to be already at its end, and the leading position is increasingly occupied by “Barbie in chocolate”, in other words, the Latin American ideal of beauty in a sporty version.
Moreover, with age, American women are supposed to look younger and younger. The experience of years should be felt in achievements and position, but not in appearance.

Burma
In eastern Burma, on a high plateau, live the women of the Padong tribe, famous for their unusual necks. From the age of five, copper rings are strung around the neck of girls, one after another, gradually stretching it in this way. Over time, the height of the neck reaches up to 30-35 cm.
The chin of such a long-necked woman rests on a small platform. This ten-kilogram metal structure is decorated with silver chains that symbolize wealth, elegance and social status of the proud bearer of the giraffe neck.
Scientists have found out whether the elongation of the neck occurs as a result of its stretching - deformation of the vertebrae or the connections between them. It was decided to take an x-ray, which showed severe sagging of the chest due to the constant weight pressing on it. Burmese women wear similar bracelets on their arms and legs - from the ankle to the knee. The total weight of such jewelry is on average 15 kg.
As a result, women's gait becomes slow and bouncing. The voices of these lovely women sound as if they are speaking from a deep well. They cannot drink from a cup and use bamboo tubes. Their neck muscles are severely atrophied and they are unable to hold their head up on their own. Because of this, Padong women do not even think about bad behavior. The punishment for the offense is cruel - the bracelets are removed from the neck and their head falls to the side, causing slow suffocation.

Türkiye
If you have blond hair, blue eyes and white skin, then walking along the leisurely streets of Turkey will make you feel like a star. Beautiful and not so beautiful, young and not so beautiful Turks will look back at you, curling their necks and clucking their tongues loudly. Do not judge the local Don Juans - they sincerely express admiration for your unearthly charm.
And if you have a seductive belly, and there is no way to confuse you with the skeleton of a herring, you are a queen. Kralice, in Turkish.
Turkish women, aware of the preferences of their stronger half, strive with all their might for the ideal, fortunately these days it is not a problem to give their hair a light shade and insert colored lenses. So it turns out that in Istanbul you can find much more blondes per square meter than in Moscow.
In general, working Turkish women take care of themselves, even too much. Coming to the office with unstyled hair or yesterday's manicure is bad manners. Therefore, hairdressing salons are thriving here: in a patch of fifteen houses there can be five beauty salons. But this is not an image laboratory at all, where the task of the master is to quickly bring the visitor into decent appearance and let her go. Here, hairstyle or cosmetic procedures are rather a pleasant excuse for a visit. And the first thing is communication; if you want - gossip.

Japan
Japanese men consider the sexiest girls under the age of 20, with a delicate face, crooked teeth, charmingly protruding ears and equally protruding big toes. In our opinion, the list is quite strange, but only in our opinion.
For many millennia, the Japanese developed their civilization in almost complete isolation from the world. The habits I developed left their mark on my appearance. For example, any Japanese woman looks cute in national clothes - a kimono, but not everyone suits a European business suit, and especially a skirt. It's all about the features of the figure, adapted to national clothing.
The kimono pulls the chest very tightly, a thick and wide belt fits tightly around the waist, and a tight hem fits the hips and legs. On the feet are straw or wooden sandals. To feel what this means, ask to tie a bath towel around your chest, and use a second towel to tie your legs at the knees. Wear beach flip-flops. Now imagine that at the same time you still have to kneel every now and then, holding a tray or a child in your hands. Now your long legs and short slender thighs, which you were so proud of, are no longer your friends: sitting down and getting up from the floor is more convenient just with long thighs and very short legs, reducing the distance to the tatami.
The ideal figure in the traditional sense looks like this: long neck (clearly visible in the open collar of the kimono); almost complete absence of chest and waist; drooping buttocks-stools; short and crooked legs with knees turned inward, as if tied; protruding fingers, which are convenient for catching zori slippers that fly off while walking. It's simple: beauty is in rationality.
Customs also affect shoes: the habit of zori and the need to often take off shoes forces Japanese women to wear shoes a couple of sizes larger than necessary. Hence the strange - “dragging” - gait. Traditional hairstyles have been replaced by European haircuts, but Japanese women have learned to skillfully open their ears.
Modernization dealt the strongest blow to the bodies of Japanese women - ideal parallelepipeds went out of fashion. The young ladies joined the fight for the possession of the largest busts and the thinnest waists, and in the first part, it must be admitted, they were very successful. Recently, one girl, accused of theft, proved in court that she could not fit through the window due to the outstanding size of her breasts - the investigative experiment completely satisfied the male jury. With waists, everything is not so optimistic - teenage girls’ love for American fast food interferes - there’s no time for a corset, a skirt would fit...
Recently, Japan has been swept by the fashion for bihaku - the beauty of whiteness. Cosmetic companies earn hundreds of millions selling creams, scrubs and masks for Japanese women who want to have a complexion like a “sakura petal”. The real bihaku boom has discolored Japanese girls and women. Even old ladies now don’t leave the yard on a bicycle without a wide-brimmed hat and huge glasses, and without applying a special cream. At the same time, they put their hands in special leggings attached to the steering wheel - so as not to become chapped.
Over time, the famous gentle and submissive look of Japanese women has also changed - now they look at us as if from a strange, distorting mirror. Blue, cyan and green lenses have come into fashion - like anime heroines.

Strange beauty standards:

Who said that princes marry petite and thin girls? In the kingdom of Tonga (an island state in the Pacific Ocean), girls with a body are considered beauties. And if the bride weighs more than 100 kg, she is a real treasure, which both the prince and any of his subjects will be happy to possess.

They say that the custom of blackening the teeth of girls and women of reproductive age in Vietnam, China, Japan, Indonesia and the Philippines arose because long white teeth were considered scary (like those of animals or demons). The varnish coating also helped protect teeth from decay. Now this custom has practically disappeared, supplanted by Western standards of beauty. But in some places, customs have been preserved that cause even greater shock: in Angola you can meet women with knocked out front teeth, in Polynesia - with a shark-like grin of triangular fragments, and in the Congo - with ground off “stumps”. It is believed that a toothless female mouth looks childishly defenseless and attractive to men.

It’s hard to believe, but there are women on Earth who don’t know how exciting the quest “Cellulite: Find and Destroy” can be. Their skin is naturally flawless and smooth. Do you know what helps them add excitement to their lives? They voluntarily cover their bodies with decorative scars. Making raised scars is a painful, long and hazardous procedure. But their men like it when their skin is covered with raised bumps. These are probably very good men, since women risk blood poisoning for their sake. By the way, this exotic fanaticism has been actively mastered in recent years in the USA and even Europe - no tattoo can compare in effectiveness with such scars.

Young women from Papua New Guinea, as a rule, have breasts of exactly the shape, size and fullness that seem ideal in the West. There are many photographs of delightful native women on the Internet, but you would hardly like them in these photos. The ideal breast for them is flat and stretched.

In the African tribes Surma and Mursi it is customary to wear a labial disc. In the photo are women of the Mursi tribe (Ethiopia). It’s curious, but the custom of stretching girls’ lower lips did not arise at all because of strange ideas about beauty. Young beauties mutilated and disfigured themselves to escape slavery. Gradually, the bitter necessity became familiar, and the men of the tribe even began to find charm in the custom (it is unlikely that a wife with a plate in her lower lip can verbally pester her husband). Now the diameter of the disc has become a measure of beauty. Now you don’t have to stretch your lips, but then the groom will not give a generous ransom for the bride.

A high, smooth and clean forehead is truly beautiful. This is especially important for Fulani women. And to emphasize (or imitate) the height of their forehead, they sometimes shave their hairline high and even remove their eyebrows.

A Tuareg bride will never find a husband if her neck is not hidden in folds of fat. And a real beauty, if she leans forward, must have at least 12 folds on her stomach. In youth and in hungry areas this is difficult to achieve, but with age it is easier to get closer to the ideal of beauty.


True beauty certainly touches the soul of the person who sees it, but everyone has different tastes, and, as they say, they don’t argue about them, and therefore beauty is a relative concept. In one corner of the planet, a person can be considered beautiful, while in another - a person of completely unremarkable appearance, lacking certain features that correspond to local canons. What does it mean to be beautiful and how have ideas about this concept changed? Our portal has collected interesting facts about beauty, as well as its attributes, and brings this information to your attention.

Attractive things nearby: the most interesting facts about beauty

You can talk about beauty for a long time and a lot, because it is endless. At the same time, for many centuries there have been debates about what is hidden under this concept. We will present only some of the facts, the most interesting, in our opinion.

  • The scientific world calls a pathologically violent emotional experience that can be caused by the contemplation of beauty Stendhal syndrome.

“I have seen masterpieces of art generated by the energy of passion, after which everything became meaningless, small, limited, so when the wind of passions ceases to inflate the sails that push the human soul forward, then it becomes devoid of passions, and therefore of vices and virtues.”

Stendhal, Naples and Florence: a journey from Milan to Reggio

  • Surprisingly, the left half of the human face, as a rule (in 90% of cases), is more beautiful and expressive than the right. This is explained by the fact that the left side of the face is under the control of the right hemisphere of the brain, which is responsible for emotions.
  • The intellectual level of people with attractive facial features is on average eleven points higher.
Become smart and you will be beautiful!
  • Archaeologists call Queen Cleopatra the first to combine recipes for skin and hair care into a single book. The beautiful Egyptian woman is also considered the founder of manicure. While slaves could afford a discreet manicure, noble Egyptian women decorated their fingers with rather bright nail colors.
  • Eye shadow served in Ancient Egypt as a prophylactic against conjunctivitis.
  • Rhinoplasty ranks first in the world in demand among men.
  • And in Iran, “plastic surgery” on the nose is simply mega popular, both among women and men. In addition, it is considered attractive and somewhat fashionable to wear bandages on the nose after surgery more than is medically necessary. And it doesn't even matter that the person may not have undergone any surgery at all, but he or she can walk around with a bandage on the nose just for beauty.
How multifaceted beauty is, how many talented people it has inspired creativity and action
  • It turns out that operations to correct the shape of the nose were performed back in the 8th century.

  • In the Middle Ages, beauty was considered a manifestation of sinfulness.
  • In ancient times, in the Middle Kingdom, long nails were considered a symbol of wisdom.
  • To prolong youth, the empresses of China rubbed their faces with silk cloth.
  • In ancient Greece, tanned skin was considered unattractive.
It should be remembered that the sun has an extremely strong effect on the skin, and is one of the main factors that accelerates the aging process of the skin.

Proper use of sunscreen and proper skin hydration will make it possible to maintain a young and healthy appearance for many years. Modern medicine has a wide range of cosmetics to preserve the skin in the fight against photoaging. Do you know how to make friends with the sun?

  • In the 17th century in England, a clearly visible venous network on open parts of the body was considered a sign of a woman’s high origin and attractiveness. Therefore, ladies, in order to emphasize these qualities, used a blue pencil to draw veins on the shoulders, neck, arms and chest.
  • When Queen Victoria, with her highest permission, forbade women to use cosmetics, they very quickly found a way out of this situation: to emphasize their attractiveness, unable to use either lipstick or blush, the ladies began to pinch their cheeks and bite their lips.
International Beauty Day is celebrated annually on September 9
  • In the 16th century Artists were specially invited to apply makeup on a woman’s face. After getting their beauty done, the ladies tried not to wash their face for several days. It turns out that you can look effective without makeup!
  • In Rus', women had a custom: to maintain their beauty, they washed themselves with dew collected from fragrant flowers. In the modern world, there are more effective products for washing, removing makeup and caring for facial skin.
  • The most popular plastic surgery in the world today is liposuction.
  • Most men consider more attractive those representatives of the fair sex whose faces are endowed with the features of children.
  • In Turkey, girls with blue eyes and blond hair are a priori considered beauties, and as you know, the look is the mirror of the soul!
  • A bushwoman is called a beauty if her buttocks are naturally hypertrophied.
  • In many African countries, in order to be considered beautiful, sexy and to attract a future spouse, women deliberately scar their bodies.
  • A true beauty from the Congo should have no teeth at all.
  • Muslim women have the strictest taboo - plucking their eyebrows. And, in principle, a Muslim woman can make any changes to her own appearance only with the permission of her husband.
  • Attractive-looking adults inspire more confidence in children.
  • In the history of international beauty contests, the main crown most often became the property of representatives of Venezuela.

The above facts about beauty only prove once again how large-scale this concept is, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, sometimes subjective.

Well, beauty is an undeniable concept, but it often varies greatly over the centuries and, most importantly, among representatives of different countries and nationalities.

You might be interested in watching the video “How to Develop a Beauty Habit”:

Based on materials from the book by L. Aureden
"How to become beautiful"

Once, one of the Parisian fashion houses conducted an experiment. The life-size statue of Venus de Milo was dressed in clothes made in the latest fashion. The best Parisian hairdresser gave her a modern hairstyle, and a famous makeup artist applied the appropriate makeup. The results of the work done were amazing - the classic beauty did not look like one, although not a single critic could find anything ugly.

The experiment failed because even the classical ideal of beauty is not the ideal of the present time. After all, the idea of ​​female beauty has been different in all historical eras. Only the natural beauty of a woman does not change - what nature gives, but her appearance - what is the result of cosmetic and hygienic procedures - is not the same in different periods. In every historical era we find a characteristic type of female beauty, skillfully emphasized by certain cosmetics, hairstyle, costume, etc.

Three and a half thousand years ago in Egypt, the ideal of female beauty was the pharaoh’s wife, Nefertiti, a thin woman with a boy’s figure. Looking at her thin eyebrows, expressive eyes, bold and lovely line of her mouth, we feel that nature and art have worked together here. On dressing tables of that time one could see various lipsticks, special spatulas for ointments, alabaster compacts and jars of nail paint. There were razors and tweezers for removing hair on the face and body. Egyptian women sought to have smooth skin anointed with incense and oils and therefore mercilessly removed every excess hair.

During the same era, India, China and Japan also began to cultivate female beauty. Balms, plant extracts, incense, amber, tansy, tuberose come from these countries. Mascara and nail polish appeared here. The fragrant oil of “Rose of Shiraz”, rose water and almond milk are the inventions of Persian specialists. Japanese makeup and Japanese baths, where men and women were almost boiled in unusually hot water, were many centuries ahead of the cosmetic art of the Roman Empire.

Nowadays, every woman, regardless of age, usually wants to tan as best as possible in the sun. Greek and Roman women valued, above all, light, shiny skin, which they sought to lighten even more using various means. Cream made from bread crumb and milk, soap made from goat fat and beech tree ash - these are just two of the many cosmetics that were used then for these purposes. For example, the Roman Empress Poppaea took with her 500 donkeys on all her trips, in whose milk she bathed daily.

DID YOU KNOW THAT...

...the wife of the American surgeon Earl Haas loved to ride a horse. But her usual sanitary pads prevented her from doing this on her critical days.

She had no desire to take a break from her hobby because of her period. A caring husband found a way out of the situation, who came up with a tampon for her, rolled up from surgical cotton, stitched along the entire length with a cord and placed in a cardboard tube (applicator) for ease of insertion. Haas named his tampon Tampax, from the English words “tampon” (tampon) and “pack” (packaging). And three years later, this same “Tampax” was recognized as a discovery in the field of hygiene. As a result, today about 100 million women use tampons as the most modern, convenient and safe means of menstrual hygiene.

When visiting their friends, Roman women shared with them the following recipes for preserving their beauty, which today evoke mocking smiles: ground date kernels should be mixed with crushed rose petals and add (a terrible secret!) crushed crocodile dung. Daily bathing in water with the addition of various aromatic substances ended with a massage, which the Greek slaves did with great skill. Women of that time loved to wash their faces with milk.

Roman hairdressers, as inventive as the barbers of later times, came up with different hairstyles for each season. If, for example, in the spring the latest craze was a Greek hairstyle, then in the fall it was replaced by Egyptian curls a la Cleopatra. A sculpture of Empress Faustina with carefully curled hair has been preserved - an excellent example of hairdressing art. In ancient Rome, as in modern Italy, blond, curly hair was considered the ideal of beauty.

The cosmetic art of Egypt, Persia, Greece and Rome concentrated and reached its highest peak at the imperial court in Byzantium, where the cult of beauty reigned. But time passed. With the decline of Rome, the era of the celebration of beauty ended. Even in Egypt, where the joys of life were always valued, ascetics and hermits fought so hard for the purity of the soul that they completely forgot about the purity of the body. As a result of frequent wars and migrations of people, trade with the East was disrupted, and as a result, the delivery of incense from Arabia and Persia stopped.

But what was the situation in Europe? Travelers' stories about water structures and marble baths built in Seville and other Spanish cities by the Moors were perceived as tales of the Arabian Nights. The barbaric era that came after the invasion of the Huns finally consigned to oblivion even those few traditions of body culture that existed in Europe. Revealing your body, as was done in Ancient Rome, was considered a shame. Low general culture: primitive sanitary conditions, lack of running water excluded the possibility of regular use of the bathhouse, where one could take care of one’s body. When the plague epidemic broke out in Europe, most baths were closed altogether. The use of water and soap, air and sun - the basis of every real cosmetic - was gradually reduced to almost a minimum.

True, the knights of the Middle Ages, participating in the crusades, encountered beautiful female representatives who looked after their beauty in every possible way. The Seljuks, Turks, Arabs, and Moors had balms, fragrant essences and other cosmetic treasures that the knights brought from their campaigns to gloomy, poorly heated castles. But these little-known things were not always used for their intended purpose. Superstitions, alchemy, black magic, the search for the philosopher's stone - all this was reflected in the attitude towards cosmetics of that time. Charlatans began to engage in it, who, wearing the pointed hats of magicians, wandered from one fair to another. At this time, they sacredly believed in the most meaningless things. Extraordinary beauty became a danger for those who possessed it, since it was believed that it could only be obtained by agreement with the devil.

DID YOU KNOW THAT...

...the villagers of the Middle Ages had absolutely no problems with teeth, so their smile was almost Hollywood-like.

German scientists came to this conclusion in the light of recent research. Specialists from the University of the German city of Witten, led by Professor Wolfgang Arnold, examined the remains of villagers buried between the 5th and 9th centuries AD. Scientists were in for an amazing discovery - it turns out that medieval peasants could boast of magnificent teeth, despite the complete lack of means to prevent caries.

Scientists are inclined to explain this phenomenon by the fact that in those distant times people ate mainly raw vegetables and cereals cooked in water. Rough food required prolonged chewing, so the teeth of medieval peasants were constantly strengthened by this kind of training. Although people then had no idea about toothbrushes and toothpaste, their smiles would be the envy of many modern TV stars, the researchers conclude.

The ideal of female beauty in the Middle Ages was far from the ideal of beauty of Ancient Rome, Greece, and Egypt. She was a woman with high small breasts, narrow hips, long legs and small feet. The Renaissance brought a ray of light into this “dark kingdom.” Arts and crafts are flourishing again, the ideals of beauty and harmony of reality are being affirmed, and interest in female beauty is awakening. Poets glorify beauties in poetry, artists capture them on canvas. There is a need for face and body care products.

The first European city where cosmetics began to revive again was Venice. Venetian women were famous for their hair, dyed in various shades of reddish color. Titian immortalized this color on his canvases. Venice was famous for its masquerades, beautiful women, and magnificent mirrors. It is not surprising that gentlemen from all over the world came to this city. A trip to Venice turned into a kind of trip to the “promised land” for every man of a noble family. And just like once upon a time, the crusaders, the sons of nobles and wealthy merchants, became fans of the cult of beauty, which dominated the courts of Vienna, Dresden, Paris, and the rich houses of Amsterdam and Rotterdam.

During the Renaissance, the ideal of female beauty was a curvaceous woman, in my opinion, even a fat one. (True, I have never heard of any female representative wanting to look like Cranach’s Venus or Susanna while bathing.) The female body in the paintings of artists of that time is distinguished by looseness and pale skin color. These women rarely encountered water, air and sun, and their figures “blurred” in the luxury of difficult-to-wash and clean toilets made of satin, lace and velvet.

In the Middle Ages, “flea fur” became widespread - a piece of fur worn on the arm or near the neck, where, according to medieval ladies, fleas were supposed to collect and from where they could then be shaken out somewhere on the ground. The best gift for lovers and spouses is stuffed fur-bearing animals encrusted with precious stones for the same purposes.

Neglect of basic hygiene rules continued into the Rococo era. At the court of the French King Louis XIV - the “Sun King” - instead of water for washing, they used cologne to moisturize their face and hands. Marie Antoinette, however, had a silver bath, but it was brought only when the queen herself asked, and this happened quite rarely. It was known about the king himself that he bathes only in the spring. To drown out the smell of a body unwashed for years, the courtiers used a huge amount of perfume, powder and various lipsticks, and to disguise traces of smallpox (after the smallpox epidemic there was practically not a single woman’s face that was not spoiled by this disease) - the so-called “flies” - pieces of black tulle glued to pockmarks. The heavily powdered, exposed breasts were supported by a corset. The hair was also thickly covered with powder. However, exquisite hairstyles were so expensive that noble ladies did not comb or cleanse their hair for weeks, not to mention wash it. All this created conditions for the spread of lice, moths and fleas. It is not surprising that at that time special devices for scratching the head and special hammers made of precious metals were invented, which were used to kill annoying insects.

The fashion for powdered hair existed not only in France. It was also greeted with great enthusiasm in England. Even today, English judges wear powdered wigs during court hearings. The English government did not fight this fashion through various bans, but introduced very high customs duties on imported powder. All this made powdered hairstyles very expensive and they became unpopular.

The era of French gallantry marks the discovery of two more important attributes of beauty, the value of which remains unchanged to this day - high-heeled shoes, which make the gait more graceful, and silk stockings, which emphasize the beauty of the legs. After a century of imprisonment, beautiful legs appeared on the stage again, and Paris became a trendsetter in the field of fashion for a long time.

Subsequently, many revolutionary extremes in clothing lost their positions, but necklines, silk stockings, high-heeled shoes, powder and lipstick have survived to this day. Hairdressers introduced curls into fashion, the color of which ranged from black to golden. Little by little, thanks to the influence of representatives of French classicism, water and soap began to return to everyday life. The ideals of beauty of the Ancient world were again propagated. True, at the same time, opposite trends also appeared, one of the exponents of which was Napoleon’s wife, Empress Eugenie, who wore crinolines that covered her legs. The last authority to speak out against open legs and consider them the height of indecency was Queen Victoria, who wore a skirt so long that clouds of dust rose when she walked. The fight against hypocrisy, for the natural ideal of beauty, was started by the famous English poet Byron. Gradually, the number of his supporters grew, and the natural beauty of the female body again rose to its deserved height.

If you look at photographs of bathers from the beginning of the century, you will see women in bathing suits, covering their bodies from the water and sun from the chin to the knees. In such costumes, women, instead of enjoying themselves, clank their teeth from the cold, packed like sacks in wet, thick clothes. Photo chronicles of the early 20th century show a tennis player dressed in a long, ground-length dress with a hard white collar and cuffs, and a straw boater-type hat on her head.

DID YOU KNOW THAT...
…female attractiveness depends on the menstrual cycle

A sociological survey conducted shows that both men and women believe that a woman’s face looks most attractive on the most favorable days for conception. Craig Roberts (University of Newcastle) and his colleagues decided to find out how female attractiveness changes throughout the menstrual cycle in order to understand whether it can be used to judge a woman’s fertility, writes the journal Nature.

By the way, animals have certain signs by which females “talk” about their fertility. For example, in female chimpanzees, the genital area becomes more swollen and pink.

About 50 women aged 19 to 33 years were selected for the experiment. Each woman was photographed twice. In the first photograph, the woman was in the period most favorable for conception - approximately 8-14 days after the first day of the menstrual cycle, and in the second - another 14 days later. Then 125 women and 125 men were asked to rate which photo the woman looked more attractive in. A photo taken during the most fertile period was chosen by 51%-59% of both men and women surveyed. Scientists have not yet determined exactly what guided the respondents in their assessment. Perhaps the determining role was played by the color and condition of the skin. The fact is that previous studies show that during ovulation, a woman’s skin becomes lighter.

Scientist Ian Penton-Voak from the University of Stirling found that during the period of ovulation, women prefer men who look masculine, while at other times they prefer men with softer features. Men may use other indicators, such as smell, to determine their partner's fertility. Other experiments show that in the days close to ovulation, a woman's face and breasts become more symmetrical.

Light, sun and air became popular thanks to the development of sports. The Olympic Games played a big role in this. Along with the latest advances in medicine, balneology began to flourish. The rapid development of sports contributed to the fact that the corset - an instrument of torture - disappeared from the closet of beauties. The rest was completed by the First World War, which eliminated a lot of prejudices. The boyish figure and six-month perm, categorically rejected at first, became widespread. Silk stockings showed off the beauty of the leg, the bra replaced the hard shell of the corset. Sports style gradually won its place in the sun.

The tanned face of the skier, which previously would have caused the indignation of governesses, has become the standard of beauty. The decade from 1914 to 1924 instantly changed not only the face, but the entire ideal of beauty. The automobile replaced long veils, umbrellas and long skirts from everyday life. A short tennis skirt, a small, figure-flattering swimsuit, and ski pants suddenly became as common as swimming pools and bathtubs.

This change happened surprisingly quickly. The emancipation of women and their involvement in the labor process became possible as a result of the interest in sports that appeared before the First World War. But all these factors could not have changed the ideal of beauty so quickly if the media and cinema had not advertised it, convincing millions of it every day.

When in 1910 the whole of Europe was delighted with the cancan performed by dancers from the Parisian Moulin Rouge, inventive advertising agents quickly realized that the end of the past ideal of beauty was coming. What ideal of beauty will attract the younger generation? In search of him, they selected the most attractive girls, united them into dance groups and sent them to all corners of the globe. This event was a very great success, for which the girls had to thank not only the charm emanating from them, but also the sport, which made their bodies strong and slender.

Beauty contests then organized in many countries (the first took place in 1924 in Atlantic City, USA) finally revealed to the public a new ideal of female beauty in all its manifestations.

The great invention of the 20th century - cinema - needed beautiful actresses. The close camera mercilessly emphasized all the imperfections of the face. But those people who survived such shootings with positive results became models for millions of women. Fame, career, happy marriage, fantastic fees - these are the arguments in favor of modern cosmetics and beauty care products, which no one has yet been able to oppose. From the “secret knowledge” of appearance care, a powerful cosmetics industry has grown, thanks to which products that were once available for a select few have turned into a mass product for millions. It is clear to every woman today that it is important not so much to be beautiful as to be able to emphasize the winning features of her face and the lines of her body.

Elizabeth Arden and Elena Rubinstein, who in 1910 foresaw the global success of modern cosmetics, not only created a multimillion-dollar industry, but also did everything possible to research what treatment methods and what cosmetics could give millions of women the self-confidence what a well-groomed face and body give them.

Of course, not every woman can look like a movie star. But every woman is able to emphasize her strengths while hiding her shortcomings. Thanks to systematic self-care, women can remain young and athletic longer and thus get closer, as far as possible, to the ideal of their type of beauty.

DID YOU KNOW THAT...

..back in 1869, dentist William Finley Semple committed an act that would forever inscribe his name in the annals of great failed inventors, namely: he patented chewing gum.

Semple proposed making it from rubber with the addition of chalk, charcoal and a number of flavorings. He claimed that all this would have a beneficial effect on the condition of the teeth. In addition, among the undoubted advantages of Semple’s “improved chewing gum,” the inventor considered its durability: the dentist assumed that a piece of chewing gum could be used for weeks and months, since the rubber is very durable.

Alexandra DYACHEVA

SANATATE magazine is your guide to a healthy lifestyle!

Everyone knows that beauty is a terrible force, but since “there is no friend according to taste,” it turns out that the question of beauty becomes purely subjective. Several interesting facts about female beauty in the eyes of men of all times and peoples, presented below, only prove this once again.

It is not surprising that the men of Ancient Egypt considered slender and graceful women with full lips and large almond-shaped eyes to be beautiful. Interestingly, enterprising Egyptian beauties dripped a special plant called “sleepy stupor” into their eyes to dilate their pupils.

A small, fragile woman with tiny legs is the ideal man from Ancient China. Large leg size, according to the Chinese, was considered a deformity and to prevent the leg from growing, little girls had it tightly bandaged, which caused terrible pain, but beauty has always required and continues to require sacrifice...

Ancient Greek men preferred ladies with a trained body, pleasantly full breasts and butt, a beautiful face with a straight nose and big eyes. The sculpture of Aphrodite with its forms is a clear example of their taste: the sculpture’s height is 164 cm, chest girth is 86 cm, waist girth is 69 cm and hips are 93 cm.

Ancient Roman beauties attracted their men with fair skin and blond hair.

But in the harsh and puritanical Middle Ages, the spirituality of the female inner world was considered true beauty, and the universally revered standard of medieval beauty was the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary with her elongated oval face, gentle eyes and small mouth. But the earthly attractiveness of a woman’s body and face was considered sinful, and admiration for it was considered shameful and prohibited in decent society. Dyeing hair was considered an unholy activity; hair had to be hidden under a cap, and the shape of the figure was hidden by an abundance of heavy fabrics.

At the beginning of the 18th century, the beauty of a woman began to be compared with the beauty of a rose - tenderness, fragility and elegance became popular. Interestingly, it was during this period that men admire women with small breasts.

Women learned to shave the back of their heads and pluck their eyebrows to emphasize the “swan neck” and high forehead, the standard parameters of a beauty, during the Renaissance. But in Rococo times, the main attribute of attractiveness was the hairstyle. Since getting your hair done was a luxury even for monarchs, many did not wash their hair for months, years, their entire lives...

No matter how exotic the preferences of ancient men may seem, it is shocking that in the modern world many male representatives have very extravagant taste. For example, men of the Mayorun tribe (Peru) recognize as beautiful only that woman whose body is decorated with various bright tattoos and drawings, whose lips are covered with splinters, and accessories such as feathers, shells, sticks and monkey teeth decorate her hair, nose and ears... Connoisseurs of female beauty from the Indian tribe The Natches who lived in the Natchez Bluffs area (near the present city of Natchez, Mississippi) claim that a woman whose skull is not artificially deformed is simply ugly. But men from the Palaveño people (Philippines) prefer beauties with blackened and sawn teeth. Senegalese beauties from the Wolof people wear a hairstyle of erect braids, but seductresses from the Vietnamese Zarai tribe deliberately deform and lengthen their graceful neck by wearing spiral bracelets...

Despite the fact that healthy athletic beauties with a proportionate body and well-developed muscles are now in fashion in the civilized world, based on recent studies conducted on men and women entering into marriage, scientists have concluded that more than 58% of husbands are more attractive than their wives according to several basic parameters: height, facial features and figure, that is, tall men with regular facial features and appetizing body shapes prefer to see short, short-legged or plump women as constant companions, and with some significant facial feature, for example - disproportionate lips, a long nose, small slitted eyes or a square chin... Are modern men really trying to establish a new ideal of beauty? In fact, the reason for this choice is the complexes and demands of handsome men who, on a subconscious level, when choosing between a beautiful, independent and self-sufficient companion and one who is ready, inferior to her husband in beauty, to care for and please him, will choose the path of least resistance and greater pleasure .

Beauty is a terrible force, people worship it and dream about it. they strive for it, and this topic worries not only women, so several interesting facts about beauty will interest many

Is ideal beauty a subjective concept? In fact, there is a concept of the so-called “ideal face shape”, its formula is simple - the distance between the pupils should be 46% of the width of the face, and the distance from the lips to the eyes should be exactly 36% of its length, these are the proportions of true beauty.

As for the perception of a person’s profile, scientists through numerous experiments have found that the left side seems much more attractive than the right. But it’s still difficult to explain why our perception is this way.

Here's another interesting fact about beauty. Modern men consider women with childlike features the most attractive, but women now tend to determine the degree of a man’s beauty by the number of signs of attention from other women. By the way, men prefer smiling girls, but the weaker sex, on the contrary, in most cases regards a broadly smiling man as frivolous.

The opinion that beautiful people are luckier in life is supported by justification from a psychological point of view, for example, it is easier for beautiful people to achieve promotion on the career ladder than their less attractive colleagues, since people who are confident in their appearance and attractiveness to other people more relaxed in communication, assertive. In general, we tend to listen and understand better precisely beautiful people, thanks to the attention we pay to them, their appearance and, consequently, their words.

In the process of evolution, women become more and more beautiful, and men remain at the level of their ancestors. This statement was made by scientists as a result of research, they also expressed the opinion that beautiful women give birth to 20% more children compared to others.