For instance, tattoos were popular in the Victorian era, both with criminals and royalty.Įdward VII had a Jerusalem Cross tattooed on his body, and George V boasted a red and blue dragon. While some women chased the temporary "wasp waist" look, others went with more permanent modifications. Victorians were also fans of body modification - which didn't just refer to corsets. At one point, it was estimated that 3,000 women died in crinoline-related fires. And they weren't the only ones to suffer this painful fate. Oscar Wilde's half-sisters died after a Halloween party when candlesticks set their gowns on fire. The airy fabrics of full-skirted 19th-century gowns were incredibly flammable. Victorian fashion was also a matter of life and death. And by the 1870s, the puffy bustle was all the rage. Women wore crinoline dresses that stretched as wide as 18 feet across in the 1850s. The Victorian era took fashion to new heights. Wikimedia Commons Victorian fashion evolved from the hoop skirt to the bustle. Eerily enough, some body snatchers didn't even wait until their targets died. High demand for cadavers in medical schools created an underground market for dead bodies. These so-called "railway madmen" were believed to be driven insane due to the train's sounds and motion.īut Victorians didn't always trust doctors - especially when body snatching was such a common problem. While the booming railroad business made it easier than ever to cross England, doctors blamed the technology for railway madness, which they defined as a sudden mental break that caused passengers to go mad just because they were riding a train. Population growth wasn't the only change that came at a high price. Diseases like cholera spread quickly, and the practice of dumping raw sewage into the River Thames left London foul and polluted. Unfortunately, the city's rapid growth led to some undesirable side effects. The Industrial Revolution transformed Britain into a technological powerhouse, and the population skyrocketed.īetween 18, London's population grew three-fold, counting more than 3 million residents. During the so-called Victorian era, Britain's empire became the biggest in the world. In 1837, Victoria became Queen of the United Kingdom and ruled for 63 years. The Victorian era facts in the gallery above paint a very different picture of the time period than the one usually seen in history books. Makeup was denounced as tacky but arsenic skincare products were advertised as "perfectly harmless." Men auctioned off their wives at the market one day and then insisted that women preserve their modesty at the beach by hiding in "bathing machines" on the next day. They surrounded themselves with death by adorning their outfits with bird corpses but tried to escape their own mortality with "safety coffins." Victorians cheered for the railroad boom but fretted about railway madness. The Victorian period was all about contradictions.
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