The Anatomy of Melancholy

“What is the purpose of this crowd of boxes?” asks Lucian. “What use are pins, pots, mirrors, ointments, curling irons, combs, bodkins and setting-sticks? Why do they spend their entire inheritances and their husbands’ yearly incomes on such follies?” “Two estates on each ear!” “Why do they wear dragons, wasps and snakes as chains and enamelled jewels on their necks and ears? Those hands would deserve better to be bound in iron; would that their necklaces really were snakes!” Some of them would have more need of iron chains in Bedlam, a whip instead of a fan, and haircloth next to their skin; instead of embroidered shifts, their cheeks branded with a hot iron. I mean some of our Jezebels: that would be their due, instead of face-paint.

But why all this labour, expense, preparation, riding and running about, all these goods brought from afar and bought so dearly? Why, because they want to be beautiful and fine, and to supply by art whatever nature lacks.

She who has no natural blush is rosy through art. (Ovid.)

To that end they anoint and paint their faces, making a Helen out of a Hecuba, and a Europa out of “a little, newly grown girl.” To that end they squeeze their feet and bodies, hurting and tormenting themselves: sometimes in loose clothes, with a hundred yards, I think, in a gown or a sleeve; then again so tight that “they reveal the naked limbs.” Now long tails and trains, then short; up, down, high, low, thick, thin, and so on. Now little collars or none, then collars as big as cartwheels; now loose bodices, then huge farthingales and tight girdling, and so on. What is it all for but to intoxicate someone, like the prostitute in Proverbs? One therefore calls it “a trap for the eyes and a sign of lust”—lust’s trap and a sure sign of it, as an ivy-bush marks a tavern.

Glycere, since you take your beauty from a box, And carefully arrange your hair; Since diamonds shine on your fingers, beryl in your ear— I am no prophet, but I know what you desire.

O Glycere, since you paint yourself so much, And deck your hair in such an ordered way, With rings on fingers, bracelets in your ear, Though no prophet, I can tell, I fear.

To be admired, to be gazed at, to ensnare some novice—as they often do, so that instead of a lady he loves a cap and feather; instead of a young woman with “a natural complexion, a firm body full of vitality,” as Chaerea describes his mistress in the poet, he loves a painted face, a ruff, fine white linen, a coronet, a flower—

(And thinks the craftsman’s work is nature’s.)

He dotes on an embroidered waistcoat or a many-coloured petticoat: a fine dye instead of a fine woman. For generally, as with richly furred rabbits, their coverings are far better than their bodies; and, like the bark of a cinnamon tree, worth more than its whole trunk, their outward equipment is far more precious than their inward qualities. It is all too commonly so.