How Tuberculosis Shaped Victorian Fashion

Marie Duplessis, French courtesan and Parisian celebrity, was a striking Victorian beauty.
 In her best-known portrait, by Édouard Viénot, her glossy black hair frames a beautiful, oval face with sparkling eyes and ivory skin. But Duplessis’ fame was short-lived. Like Violetta, the protagonist in Giuseppe Verdi’s opera La Traviata whose tale Duplessis inspired, Duplessis was afflicted with tuberculosis, which killed her in 1847 at the age of 23. By the mid-1800s, tuberculosis had reached epidemic levels in Europe and the United States. The disease, now known to be highly infectious, attacks the lungs and damages other organs. Before the advent of antibiotics, its victims slowly wasted away, becoming pale and thin before finally dying of what was then known as consumption.
 The Victorians romanticized the disease and the effects it caused in the gradual build to death. For decades, many beauty standards emulated or highlighted these effects.
 And as scientists gained greater understanding of the disease and how it was spread, the disease continued to keep its hold on fashion.