Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4: Sexual Selection In ManEllis, Havelock
Science
Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 4: Sexual Selection In Man
Ellis, Havelock
Sex; Sex (Psychology)
mentions, and the thighs soft and white, the _meinel_ (mons)
brown. The legs must be straight and narrow, the calves full, the
feet small and narrow, with high instep. The color of the skin
generally must be clear and of a tempered rosiness. (A. Schultz,
_Quid de Perfecta Corporis Humani Pulchritudine Germani Soeculi
XII et XIII Senserint_, 1866.) A somewhat similar, but shorter,
account is given by K. Weinhold (_Die Deutschen Frauen im
Mittelalter_, 1882, bd. 1, pp. 219 et seq.). Weinhold considers
that, like the French, the Germans admired the mixed eye, _vair_
or gray.
Adam de la Halle, the Artois _trouvère_ of the thirteenth
century, in a piece ("Li Jus Adan ou de la feuillie") in which he
brings himself forward, thus describes his mistress: "Her hair
had the brilliance of gold, and was twisted into rebellious
curls. Her forehead was very regular, white, and smooth; her
eyebrows, delicate and even, were two brown arches, which seemed
traced with a brush. Her eyes, bright and well cut, seemed to me
_vairs_ and full of caresses; they were large beneath, and their
lids like little sickles, adorned by twin folds, veiled or
revealed at her will her loving gaze. Between her eyes descended
the pipe of her nose, straight and beautiful, mobile when she was
gay; on either side were her rounded, white cheeks, on which
laughter impressed two dimples, and which one could see blushing
beneath her veil. Beneath the nose opened a mouth with blossoming
lips; this mouth, fresh and vermilion as a rose, revealed the
white teeth, in regular array; beneath the chin sprang the white
neck, descending full and round to the shoulder. The powerful
nape, white and without any little wandering hairs, protruded a
little over the dress. To her sloping shoulders were attached
long arms, large or slender where they so should be. What shall I
say of her white hands, with their long fingers, and knuckles
without knots, delicately ending in rosy nails attached to the
flesh by a clear and single line? I come to her bosom with its
firm breasts, but short and high pointed, revealing the valley of
love between them, to her round belly, her arched flanks. Her
hips were flat, her legs round, her calf large; she had a slender
ankle, a lean and arched foot. Such she was as I saw her, and
that which her chemise hid was not of less worth." (Houdoy, _La
Beauté des Femmes_, p. 125, who quotes the original of this
passage, considers it the ideal model of the mediæval woman.)
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