Carry on, Cleo (Collage: K. Brazier. Photographs: 20th Century Fox/The Kobal Collection/Universal History Archive/UIG/Bridgeman)
Ancient cosmetic recipes often claimed the endorsement of celebrities such as Cleopatra. But could they really have made her complexion so famously milky?
Peer pressure led to try to recreate a beauty regime as Cleopatra might have known it. A classicist at Cardiff University, UK, specialising in the history of medicine, she often gave talks on ancient cosmetic recipes. Some, like modern-day beauty products, claimed to have a celebrity endorsement 鈥� often of Egypt鈥檚 famously milky-skinned queen.
Advertisement
鈥淧eople would always say, have you tried what you are talking about?鈥� Totelin says. 鈥淚 would give convoluted explanations like, it鈥檚 very difficult to get the ingredients, we can鈥檛 judge the efficacy, is it safe, and so on. I could tell that wasn鈥檛 cutting it.鈥�
A period of maternity leave finally gave her the opportunity she needed. After much tinkering, she has managed to recreate ancient soaps, skin creams and sunscreen. Among her favourites is a soap which 鈥渢he Patrician Pelagia used to make her face shine鈥�, according to the sixth-century writer . One of the more detailed recipes she tried, it calls for white lead and deer marrow, among other things (see 鈥淐elebrity soft soap鈥�, below). Out of a mixture of squeamishness and common sense, Totelin replaced these with zinc oxide and cocoa butter.
Ancient hair gel
Such liberties might dismay purists, but for Totelin the aim is not to reconstruct the past exactly. 鈥淚 get a sense of how things look and how they work, whether it is possible to make things,鈥� she says. Up until recently, she points out, even culinary recipes did not include much detail, relying instead on tacit knowledge every reader was assumed to have. By following the recipes and seeing what does and doesn鈥檛 work, she hopes to gain a better idea of what counted as common knowledge when the recipes were set down.
It wasn鈥檛 just Cleopatra who set great store by her appearance. Archaeologists have found in ancient Egyptian tombs, and even uncovered traces of in reed containers found alongside bodies. Analysis of this shows the presence of lead palmitate and stearate, and also a lead salt called phosgenite. Were these compounds an intended by-product of manufacture, or did they form as the soap degraded over thousands of years? By recreating ancient recipes, we may begin to find answers to such questions.
The patrician Pelagia鈥檚 soap turned out to be more like a white, unscented cold cream. It did feel rather good 鈥� even though Totelin opted to test it first on her hands, not her face. Totelin鈥檚 ancient cosmetics certainly make a talking point on the conference circuit. 鈥淣ow I have things to show to people,鈥� she says.
Read more: 鈥�Reliving five eureka moments lost in history鈥�
Celebrity soft soap
Soap the patrician Pelagia used to make her face shine:
Gallic soap, 6 ounces; starch, 1陆 ounce; white lead, 1陆 ounce; mastic, 陆 ounce; deer marrow, 1 ounce; white native sodium carbonate, 4 pastilles; white wax, 3 ounces. Soak the soap beforehand in water in a small jar for five days, changing the rain water every day and filtering the soap. After that, on the sixth day, put the soap in a new cooking pot with the rain water; place on coals, on a low heat, until the soap has melted. Then sprinkle with the wax and the marrow, and when they are dissolved, take the frying pan and stir well with a spittle and sprinkle the mastic and the starch, ground beforehand. Then add the white lead (ground beforehand in some water) in a small dish and beat up with the hand vigorously. Then place in a new jar and use generously.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淲ash like an Egyptian鈥�
