Tea at Trianon: Beauty According to Marie-Antoinette

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, November 11, 2017

Beauty According to Marie-Antoinette

From the Trianon Health and Beauty Blog:

Marie-Antoinette was renowned for her beautiful skin, in spite of the fact that she had faint pock marks near her mouth. She had survived a childhood bout with smallpox which had taken the lives of several of her family members. When Marie-Antoinette was Queen of France it became fashionable to have a healthy and radiant complexion. While some of her beauty treatments, such as the famous pigeon-water, are not those we would care to imitate, many others are. Drinking lots of water, eating fresh fruits and enjoying the outdoors are things we can do. I try to use as many of her favored ingredients as possible in my beauty creams, such as rose, lavender, and orange blossom essential oils, as well as grapeseed oil and sweet almond oil. (Read more.)