nothing new

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18617, 12 July 1930, Page 10

nothing new

EGYPT'S BEAUTY DOCTORS. When one reads that, in the neverending quest in Paris for something new each season, in fashions, the head of one of the smartest houses there is requiring his models to colour their finger nails green, and the tips of growing hair pink, one is almose carried back to the days of Cleopatra, and the haughty and beautiful sisters of an even more ancient Egypt, states a London writer.

For those Egyptian beauties of that old Empire of something like two thousand years before the birth of Christ would seem, according to old historians, to have also gone to such extremes in the pursuit of beauty and vanity, decorating faces and bodies—eyes, eyelashes and eyelids, hair and finger nails, with oils, paints, perfumes and tattoo designs, which, to them, was the perfection of bodily beauty and attraction.

Rouge, perhaps, was unknown to them, the deeper and richer, more brilliant red dye being favoured for the cheeks, while the blfbck-haired lady who resented the natural whitening of her locks restored its colour by applying the blood of a black calf boiled in oil!

Even then, milady of ancient Egypt recognised that attributes of beauty and fashion were beautiful eyes and luxuriant hair, and devoted special attention to them.

Those eyes of hers could be made so much more brilliant, so much larger than a hated rival's by covering both eyelids and eyebrows with black

“kohl,” while underneath the eyes a deep band of malachite was painted. That women’s hair in those days must have fallen out much more so than to-day seems to be pretty evident, when reading in old annals of the dread these ancient beauties had of baldness! So, all sorts of tonics, pomades, dyfes and strengthened were known to them; some of the concoctions, to us, reading as must ridiculous.

And woe betide her rival whose dewitching eyes and fragrant, luxuriant tresses aroused the admiration and homage of my lord! Anger gave way to cunning, and at the command of his wealthy client the trembling “beauty doctor” prepared a certain mixture which would bring about utter devastation to the beautiful locks of the offending rival. An ancient remedy quoted in an old and authentic book on early Egypt reads thus:—“To cause the hair of a hated rival to fall out, take the worm

‘anart’ or the flower ‘sepet.’ Boil the worm or flower in oil, and put it on the head of the rival.” There was an antidote, of course—a tortoiseshell boiled, pounded and mixed in the fat of a hippopotamus—only to be effective it must be applied very often.

Oiling the body instead of bathing was the practice of the wealthier ladies; the oils being rare and difficult to obtain. A lotion called “Kyphi,” compounded from myrrh, broon frankincense, buckshom and other fragrant ingredients ensured a particularly lasting and delightful body odour.