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professorsparklepants:

CASTING CALL FOR MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMEN IN HISTORY

Because of reasons I’m making a list of the most beautiful women in human history. My criteria are:

• Must be before the invention of photography (1840)
• Need to have been described as such by contemporary literature, or through secondhand account within a reasonable close time frame.
• Need not be called the most beautiful woman period,but should be the most beautiful woman in a geographic area (i.e. Europe, the Islands of Britain, etc.) or at least one of the most beautiful women of the time.
• Prominent pseudo-historical women (*) are allowed if there’s an approximate time period but they’re on thin fucking ice.

Anyway, here’s the current list.

EUROPE

• Helen of Troy*
• Eleanor of Aquitaine: multiple contemporaries call her “more than beautiful.”
• Elizabeth Woodville: called the most beautiful woman in all of Britain.
• Elizabeth of York: said to be a great beauty who strongly resembled her mother.
• Mary Tudor: considered one of the most beautiful princesses in Europe and called a “nymph from heaven” by her first husband.
• Catharine of Aragon: described as “the most beautiful creature in the world.”

ASIA

• Xi Shi: one of the four beauties of ancient China. Supposedly so beautiful that when she looked into a pond the fish were so dazzled they forgot to swim and sank.
• Wang Zhaojun: second of the four beauties. Said to be so beautiful that when geese saw her they fell out of the sky in shock.
• Diaochan*: third of the four beauties and mostly fictional. Said to be so beautiful that when she went outside at night the moon hid behind the clouds in shame.
• Yang Guifei: fourth of the four beauties. Said to be so beautiful her face put flowers to shame. The emperor was so enamored with her he had a fleet of couriers traveling non-stop from southern china just to deliver fresh lychees, her favorite fruit.
• Ono no Komachi: so well known for her beauty that “komachi” became a synonym for female beauty in Japanese.
• Oda Oichi: famous in her time for her beauty, honor, and conduct.

AFRICA

• Cleopatra: Plutarch said she wasn’t “outstandingly” beautiful, but he was clearly trying to make her look bad.
• Yennega*
• Moremi Ajasoro*

AMERICAS

• literally nothing.

As you can see, I am floundering in certain demographics. PLEASE send help.