Historical Beauty Update: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

 

Even when sources state that someone was attractive, this was of course according to the standards of their contemporaries. Certain characteristics, such as clear skin, shiny hair and a certain evenness of the face are universally liked, as they show health. The assessment of all the rest (body type, skin color, facial features) though, varies with the vogue of the time and place. While some of the clothing people used to wear is seen as [[Gorgeous Period Dress]], other fashion and hairstyle choices were also not exactly in line with current tastes.

 

Compare [[Historical Hero Upgrade]], [[Beauty Equals Goodness]], [[Adaptational Attractiveness]], [[Hollywood Homely]], and [[Hotter and Sexier]].

 

== Several Media ==

* [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/Kleopatra-VII.-Altes-Museum-Berlin1.jpg/452px-Kleopatra-VII.-Altes-Museum-Berlin1.jpg Cleopatra] was subject to this even in her own day. The legend of her beauty comes partially from Octavian's propaganda that Marc Antony had been bewitched by her. Over the years, Cleopatra is typically portrayed as each generation's version of their ideal beauty. She's sometimes even given a [[Race Lift]], despite the fact that she was of Macedonian descent. However, portraits of her give her a noticeably large nose. Plutarch describes her as not particularly attractive, but with a beautiful voice and charming personality. Cicero also downplays her appearance, though he is a biased source.

* Robespierre, though this definitely influenced by the sympathies of the artist or casting director. Portraits during his rise to power show him as quite attractive, while he gets less attractive during his downfall. When he's given the [[Historical Villain Upgrade]], he's often shown as quite ugly. In the interest of [[Anvilicious|making its point]], the ''[[Sandman]]'' chapter titled "Thermidor" makes him appear decidedly overweight as well.

** For a recent edition of one of her books, one of the very few existing pictures finally made it to its traditional place over the back cover blurb. The picture is a pencil drawing, showing her with a somewhat critical/thoughtful expression and a cap, which was usually out-of-doors daywear in her period. On the "improved" one, she's barely recognizable, has the standard perfectly smooth face and no cap.

** In ''Becoming Jane'', she is portrayed by, of all people, Anne Hathaway.

* Mary Queen of Scots - at least, if her early portraits are to be believed, was quite beautiful when she first entered Scotland, but most depictions of her that are even halfway sympathetic portray her as still being pretty up until her execution, when in real life she had started to wear a wig and no doubt suffered from the lead-based makeup popular at the time.

* Anne Boleyn also tends to get some judicious upgrading. While the famous reports of her gigantic mole and extra finger are now considered mostly disreputable, more reliable contemporary descriptions suggest that she was, at best, a mildly attractive woman with striking eyes. Her powerful personality seems to have been the real attraction.

* Richard III

** Inverted with ''[[Richard III]]'' by [[William Shakespeare]] where the handsome Richard was turned into a palsied foul hunchback. But Shakespeare was writing the play for the royalty descended from those who defeated Richard.

** Sharon Kay Penman's revisionist novel ''[[The Sunne in Splendour]]'' takes this route straight, with a rather [[Bishonen]] Richard. The truth is somewhere in between: Richard in real life was short, rather large-nosed, and had an odd little mouth, but he generally resembled, of all people, [http://i50.tinypic.com/xmom5k.jpg Stuart Townsend.]

* Boudica, the British queen who rebelled against Roman rule, was noted for her imposing height and bearing, and, of course, her iconic red hair, but later depictions tend to place her very definitely in [[Hot Amazon]] territory. A rare exception is the eponymous 2003 British production (known as "Warrior Queen" in the United States), which starred the attractive but believable Alex Kingston.

* Vronsky, the romantic hero of ''Anna Karenina'', is depicted in the text as balding and with a mouthful of rotten teeth. Don't expect either of these characteristics to make it into any dramatization. Bad dental hygiene was commonplace in Russia (and most of Europe) at that time, so contemporary audiences would not have seen any Narm in this depiction of an accomplished seducer.

* [[Jesus]] is probably one of best examples of this trope (though definitely not the oldest). Ignoring controversy over a historic Jesus , most Western depictions tend to favor a tall, slender borderline-[[Bishonen]] man with pale skin, long brown hair, deep soulful eyes (blue being surprisingly common), and a neat beard. Many other cultures and ethnic groups have likewise developed their own depictions (e.g. Hispanic Jesus, Black Jesus, Raptor Jesus)that tend to fit their own ideas of beauty and ethnicity. Hardly surprising when the person in question is ''literally'' worshiped as a deity. Any historic figure, however, would have had features more appropriate to a first century Middle Eastern Jew, e.g. swarthy skin, dark hair and eyes, and a beard would almost certainly be present. Assuming that biblical sources can be trusted the Gospel of Matthew states that when Jesus was arrested in the garden of Gethsemane the soldiers were unable to tell Jesus apart from his disciples indicating that he probably had roughly average features and height (about 5'1"). Likewise in 1 Corinthians Paul both claims to have seen Jesus and states that long hair on a man is a disgrace. Short hair was likewise more typical of men in his particular place and time and given his ethnicity it was most likely tightly curled (though only his hairdresser knows for sure).

* [[Amelia Earhart]] wasn't ugly, but she wasn't exactly ideal. She even had the nickname "Lady Lindy," partially because she looked like Charles Lindbergh. Expect her to be played only by stunningly beautiful actresses. After all, what's the point of being an accomplished female pilot [[Broken Aesop|if you aren't pretty?]]

 

== Anime & Manga ==

* In a similar vein, ''[[Rurouni Kenshin]]'' was known to portray historical figures in more flattering means. Observe:

** Although it should be noted that these were not intended to make them look more flattering. The author at least blames it on lack of reference pictures most of the time.

 

 

* You don't really think the mother of Alexander the Great, Queen Olympias, really looked like [[Angelina Jolie]], do you? In any case, historical record has her as a very pale redhead.

* Debbie Reynolds as ''The Unsinkable Molly Brown''. [[Kathy Bates]] in ''[[Titanic]]'' was much closer to [http://s3.amazonaws.com/findagrave/photos/2002/304/1707_1036162732.jpg the genuine article], but still prettied up a bit.

* ''[[Red Cliff]]'' does this for several figures of the Three Kingdoms era in China. Both Takeshi Kaneshiro (Zhuge Liang) and Chang Chen (Sun Quan) have been "spokesmodels" in addition to their careers as actors. On the other hand, Zhou Yu (Tony Leung) and Xiao Qiao (Lin Chiling) ''are'' remembered as being attractive.

* Valerie Plame isn't a bad-looking woman by any means but compared to [[Naomi Watts]], well there just is no comparison.

* In the German movie ''Jew Suss: Rise and Fall'', not really ugly actor Moritz Bleibtreu plays Joseph Goebbels, of all people! It's possibly a case of the casting subverting [[Beauty Equals Goodness]], since the real Goebbels was not that ugly-looking, it is just that many of the photographs of him show him either frowning or with distorted features while delivering one of his hate-filled speeches. Note that the actor who played his expy Garbitsch in ''The Great Dictator'' looked quite a bit more handsome than Hynkel (Hitler) or Herring (Goering).

* [[The Runaways]]. Compare [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMDn6V7ZLhE this] to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNNp5GyzlKc this].

** ''Blow'' does something that could be described as unintentional [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshading]] of this trope: after Depp has played George Jung for two hours, the movie ends with a photo of the real Jung, who doesn't look like Johnny Depp and isn't conventionally attractive at all. Since most viewers probably didn't know what the real George Jung looked like before seeing the movie, this moment of contrast can be pretty jarring.

* ''[[Amazing Grace]]'', In which we have the short-even-by-the-standards-of-the-time, very near-sighted [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/eb/William_wilberforce.jpg William Wilberforce], portrayed by [http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Film/Pix/gallery/2007/03/05/WilliamWilberforce3.jpg Ioan Gruffudd].

** Lincoln himself will be portrayed by [http://www.google.nl/search?tbm=isch&hl=nl&source=hp&biw=1680&bih=900&q=benjamin+walker&gbv=2&oq=benjamin+walker&aq=f&aqi=g1g-S3&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=1828l3972l0l4091l15l10l0l2l2l0l170l840l4.4l8l0 Benjamin Walker].

** His wife [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Mary_Todd_Lincoln2crop.jpg Mary Todd] will be portrayed by [[Mary Elizabeth Winstead]].

** His mother<ref>Of whom no known portrait exists, but by written accounts isn't nearly that pretty</ref> wil be played by [http://www.google.nl/search?tbm=isch&hl=nl&source=hp&biw=1680&bih=900&q=robin+mcleavy&btnG=Afbeeldingen+zoeken&gbv=2&oq=robin+mcleavy&aq=f&aqi=g-L2&aql=&gs_sm=s&gs_upl=2300l2300l0l2872l1l1l0l0l0l0l133l133l0.1l1l0 Robin McLeavy].

 

 

== Literature ==

* In-story example in ''[[The Wheel of Time]]'': Nyneve is rather taken aback upon meeting Gaidal Cain, who, unlike his reincarnation partner Birgitte, is quite a bit uglier than the legends say.

* [[Michael Crichton]]'s novel ''[[Timeline]]'' nicely plays with this trope in one chapter, in which the inventors of the time-traveling device present film footage of historical events, which they recorded in secret while being there. The first film shows [[Abraham Lincoln]] delivering the Gettysburg Address in a nasal voice, which he is actually said to have had. The second film shows [[George Washington]] crossing the Delaware in the rain, sitting in a corner and wrapped in his mantle, rather than striking the painting's iconic pose.

* A Soviet Sci-Fi novel ''Kovrigin’s chronicles'' ("A girl near a steep", "Девушка у обрыва") by Vadim Shefner contains an in-universe example. A man remarks how all the depictions of a famous scientist's girlfriend follow that trope (the scientist asked that his name not be honored through memorials and such, so the people resort to honoring her instead).

** This trope also applies to Edson's version of the outlaw Belle Starr.

 

 

== Live-Action TV ==

** Of course, Prince George is arguably an example himself; in real life (and once in the show) he's described as being fat, while in ''Blackadder'' he's played by [[Hugh Laurie]], who's anything but.

* The ''[[John Adams]]'' miniseries slightly averts this trope. While many of the actors are all very good-looking by today's standards, their characters all eventually fall prey to disadvantages that many people had to deal with in the 18th century, such as lack of dental hygiene, skin care and modern medicine.

** Justified in Henry's case: gaining the weight required or wearing a fat suit large enough to be even close to realistic would have been rather detrimental to Jonathan Rhys Meyers' health.

* [[Spiritual Successor]] ''[[The Borgias]]'' does a bit better averting this: most of the characters, if painted by Renaissance artists, wouldn't look too dissimilar from their real counterparts' portraits. There's a major offense, however, in the case of [[Jeremy Irons]] as Rodrigo Borgia: regardless of how attractive Irons himself is, he's still tall and slender and with a full head of hair where the real Rodrigo resembled a short, fat, bald bulldog of a man.

** For the most part, that's chalked up to the fact that it's ''Jeremy'' freakin' ''Irons''. If he wanted to play ''Lucrezia'' Borgia, they'd find a way to make it work.

** Highly debatable. Since it can't be known if any of these characters even existed at all, we can't be sure what they might have looked like.

** The legendary Merlin was normally depicted as a shape-shifter with no true, stable form. He usually kept the frail old man's appearance while serving Arthur, but became a handsome youth to seduce maidens and at times isolated himself from humanity entirely by turning into a tree.

** And then, of course, there's your friend and mine Mark Antony. He's been portrayed as everything from drop-dead gorgeous (I'm looking at you, James Purefoy) to a distinctly ugly man with... [[Biggus Dickus|other attractions]].

* Even the actors aren't immune: [[Robin Williams]] himself got this treatment in ''[http://www.youtube.com/user/capital33333#grid/user/424F2EA974DB93AB Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Mork & Mindy]''. In real life, [[Robin Williams]] is, shall we say, an acquired taste due to his unique appearance. However, in this [[Made for TV Movie]], he's played by Chris Diamantopoulos, [http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v482/80sFreakLurker/chris_diamantopoulos20.jpg who makes a generically attractive Robin... and is] [[Estrogen Brigade Bait]] in [[Real Life]].

* ''[[Forever Knight]]'': justified that the vampires look good in their flashbacks, but human Nick gets into this trope before he is turned in the first episode flashback.

 

 

== Theatre ==

 

 

== Video Games ==

* Frederic Francois Chopin in ''[[Eternal Sonata]]''. While he may have been handsome in real life, the game designers decided to make him full blown [[Bishonen]].

** Liu Bei in ''Dynasty Warriors 6'' and ''7'' is probably the most overt example of this trope coming into effect though, since he didn't rock the ''[[Biseinen]]'' look until those games.

** Special note goes to Akechi Mitsuhide. Both ''[[Sengoku Basara]]'' and ''[[Samurai Warriors]]'' portrayed him as a [[Bishonen]] (morality is another story), whereas... do you know one of the reasons that caused him to betray [[Oda Nobunaga]]? Because he's insulted as 'kumquat head'.

 

 

== Webcomics ==

 

 

== Web Original ==

 

 

== Western Animation ==

*** Not to mention that according to a contemporary depiction, she looked like [http://xroads.virginia.edu/~CAP/PIX/pocahontas.gif this]. Not bad, but not stunning.

 

 

* This trope is by no means new. Paintings, statues, busts, etc. of royal and rich people were known to improve a person's appearance. One instance where it was especially common was during an arranged marriage. Many times, the betrothed wouldn't see each other until the day of the wedding, especially if there was great distance between them (like the children of two different kingdoms). The only way they would know what their future spouse would look like is through paintings, and artists were known to smooth out pockmarks and add and subtract a few inches.

** [[The Virgin Queen|Queen Elizabeth I]] used this to her advantage to make people think she was young, healthy and attractive even when she had smallpox scars, grew old and lost her hair and wore a wig.

* The Physics building of Chalmers University of Technology (Göteborg, Sweden) is decorated with a dozen sculptures, depicting famous Swedish scientists from Celsius onward. All are shown as idealistically beautiful - except Svante Arrhenius, who was still alive when the building was erected. His statue looks like he actually looked. Reportedly, he was none too pleased with this.

** For example, Ramesses II lived to be a very old man (for the time) and was not in perfect health. Tutankhamun had an overbite, a slight cleft palate, and a club foot, and was probably not what we'd call handsome. Hatshepsut was, ''gasp!!'', a woman. Don't expect contemporary artwork to depict them that way.

** In an inversion Akhenaten, Tutankhamun's father who tried unsuccessfully to replace the entire Egyptian religion with a new one, always had himself and his family depicted as pot-bellied androgyns with elongated, weird-looking faces. For years, Egyptologists wondered if it was artistic convention or hereditary deformity, until they identified his mummy and learned that no, he looked pretty average.

[[Category:Alternate History Tropes]]

[[Category:Improbable Appearance Tropes]]