How to Be a Renaissance Woman: The Untold History of Beauty & Female Creativity

by Jill Burke

He divides women into three grades of ‘coldness and dampness’, recognisable through five qualities – intellect, behaviour, voice, fatness or thinness, colour of the skin, hair and whether they are beautiful or ‘deformed’. The best women are ‘grade two’ – they are beautiful, soft, gentle and laugh easily. They are naturally almost completely free of body hair, and the hair they do have is golden. They are obedient by nature (a manifestation of fertility), and men are safe to marry them without regard to their own humoral temperament. ‘Grade three’ women are ‘foolish and ditzy’. They are fat, with very white skin, platinum blond hair, a completely hairless body, and are not very beautiful. They should only marry men who have hot and dry humours to mitigate their coldness and dampness. A ‘grade one’ woman has overly high levels of heat and dryness, and thus should be avoided as she is likely to be unfertile. She is of great intelligence and ability, has a good imagination, and never cedes an argument ‘no matter how small it is, and therefore become insupportable’. ‘Usually these types are good in conversation,’ he goes on, ‘and aren’t afraid to look men in the eye.’ They have coarse, deep voices, are thin, dark-skinned, and have a lot of body hair – even a bit of a beard. They are ugly and have lots of dark unruly hair.20