The_Face_of_Boo
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17 May 2013, 6:17 am
Darwin was of the opinion that sexual selection was possibly even more of an influence guiding our evolution that natural selection. People are attracted to what is considered sexually appealing in their time. This is fluid and explains why fat people were considered hot in the middle ages and repulsive today. It has little to do with strong and weak genes and more to do with what is accepted to be attractive.
That's the Darwinian answer, my friend.
I keep hearing this a lot but if you check the Egyptian statuettes/paints and Medieval European paintings you find it's not quite true, in most eras the ideal body for a woman was slim to curvy, not fat.
Same for the ideal male body (Ancient Greek arts, Egyptian art...).
Mmmm... it all depends in what is considered "fat" I guess, but the above mentioned theory applies if rather then looking at paints we consider the medieval cultural aspect reported in many books that a rounded shape in a woman was considered sign of wealth both phisiologically and economically.
By fat, I meant the medical description of "Obese" (a term which is newly offensive but it's the used medical description.
Few women in the old painting fit in the Obese medical description.
Here some paints from that era.
http://indesignartandcraft.com/wp-conte ... -women.jpg
http://www.femininebeauty.info/f/venus.botticelli.s.jpg
I can't post full nude paintings here but you got the picture.
The "fattest" ones would be considered chubby today, but I didn't find obese.
In Ancient Egypt, princess Nefertiti was considered the most beautiful queen and she wasn't fat at all according to the statuettes.
http://shangri-la.0catch.com/img/97-nof ... berlin.jpg
It was probably a figurative one, exaggerating boobs and hips for representing fertility, hence probably why it is faceless. That doesn't mean that men back then liked such physique on women.
17 May 2013, 6:36 am
17 May 2013, 7:41 am
Okay ^_^ the statuette thing was meant to exaggerate the concept and I agree with your definition which respects antropological concepts 
The question about what we mean with fat was intended to point out the matter of fact that both Prosepina and Venus in the paintings you link and we could add Tiziano's Venus, have rounded shapes in comparison to what nowadays is considered "beauty". Think of the beautiful Botticelli Venus you just linked (by the way thank you for the list of artistical beauties) with Angelina Jolie's body shape, some people could consider Botticelli's Venus fat although noone would view her as obese. I think Tiziano's Venus is even more adapt to the comparison. The cocacola bottle shape is yet another proof of the theory, and if we jump forward in western culture up to earlier days, it was until the advent of Twiggie that curvy, soft and rounded female shapes were considered the beauty clichée. Size 46 in clothing has been representing such clichée until very recently, think of pin ups. Nowadays such size would be 38......
As to egipt, I admit my ignorance about it, and I would be overly happy to hear more about it, if you feel like sharing
17 May 2013, 7:45 am
17 May 2013, 7:51 am
Oh well, the Greeks had their own ideas about anything
17 May 2013, 8:32 am
PsychoSarah
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17 May 2013, 11:16 am
17 May 2013, 11:59 am
PsychoSarah
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17 May 2013, 12:02 pm
17 May 2013, 12:05 pm
PsychoSarah
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17 May 2013, 12:09 pm
17 May 2013, 1:07 pm
Just to be pedantic, how about the prehistoric statuette of fertility?
In the Middle Ages, the ideal woman had to have tiny waist, big hips and small breasts. If you see paintings in books from the Middle Ages, women there are usually "pear-shaped".
The "round" shape on a woman body was more popular after the Middle Ages, in the 16th-17th-18th centuries. They were not technically round because in the paintings you can see that they keep their silhouettes.
About the fertility statuettes... I think it's just an exaggerated representation of the sexual attributes of the woman. That happens with the fertility statuettes of men too.
The_Face_of_Boo
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17 May 2013, 1:59 pm
The question about what we mean with fat was intended to point out the matter of fact that both Prosepina and Venus in the paintings you link and we could add Tiziano's Venus, have rounded shapes in comparison to what nowadays is considered "beauty". Think of the beautiful Botticelli Venus you just linked (by the way thank you for the list of artistical beauties) with Angelina Jolie's body shape, some people could consider Botticelli's Venus fat although noone would view her as obese. I think Tiziano's Venus is even more adapt to the comparison. The cocacola bottle shape is yet another proof of the theory, and if we jump forward in western culture up to earlier days, it was until the advent of Twiggie that curvy, soft and rounded female shapes were considered the beauty clichée. Size 46 in clothing has been representing such clichée until very recently, think of pin ups. Nowadays such size would be 38......
As to egipt, I admit my ignorance about it, and I would be overly happy to hear more about it, if you feel like sharing
There's an obvious push toward slimmer in the media, but i personally know many women with similar body of Venus whom all males in my surrounded find sexy (almost a consensus) - I think our male instinct is still little l behind media's expectations but we're going there (the media's expectations) , I think media and preferences go in cycle, media seeks what (in OUR instincts) arouses most for men (ie. big boobs) and women (ie. six packs) and put too much emphasis on it, this emphasis influences in return on the younger generations, therefore we get a new generation with bit modified preferences.
Just not to talk only about female body, the ideal male body was also always varied from slim to ripped:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WcsNBj6Fnao/U ... statue.jpg
http://theoldgiftshop.com/images/replica/E053SP2.jpg
An article about male body throughout the centuries: http://historicromance.wordpress.com/20 ... -the-ages/
17 May 2013, 2:28 pm
Tyri0n
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17 May 2013, 2:42 pm
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