People in ancient times were almost disfigured when they got smallpox. Are the pockmarks on the beauty Meng Yulou caused by freckles or smallpox?

In "The Plum in the Golden Vase", Meng Yulou, a third-bedroom woman, is tall and has first-rate beauty. An article originally written by Zhan Jun, "Why are all the women in Ximenqing short in stature? The only model, Meng Yulou, is so charming because of her freckles" analyzed the reasons for Meng Yulou's beauty, but some readers had questions about the pockmarks on Meng Yulou's face. I thought the author had confused pockmarks with "freckles". At first I didn't think so, but I also had doubts in my heart. Although I naturally think that freckles look shy and cute, and pockmarks left by smallpox are abominable, but after several days of research and analysis, it is very likely that the pockmarks on Meng Yulou's face are not freckles, but really scars left by smallpox.

Let’s look at the analysis,

1. “Frecks” and “pockmarks” had different names in ancient times

Among them, pockmarks are the most easily confused. In northern slang, There are two types of "pockmarked face" in China. One is the large and small uneven pits left after smallpox scabs, which are called pockmarked faces, which are very ugly; the other is freckles in the modern sense, which appear on the surface. It's very smooth, but there are brown deposits the size of sesame seeds. They are inherent and may be aggravated if you engage in outdoor activities.

The meaning of "freckles" is very clear. According to modern medicine, it is genetic freckles, which are caused by endocrine disorders and genetic factors. In serious cases, they are genetic skin diseases. There is a popular name among the people: "face-covering Sha", which sounds very beautiful. In fact, if the freckles and girly temperament are just right, there will indeed be a strange and pretty beauty, vivid and natural.

Therefore, judging from this point, "freckles" that can be classified as skin diseases and "pockmarks" that cause skin damage due to infectious diseases are indeed not the same thing.

2. The dynamic beauty of "face-covering Sha" can be felt intuitively. Is the beauty of "pockmarked face" really a smallpox?

Western aesthetics has maximized the beauty of face-covering Sha. You can find many well-known models and movie stars who are famous for their freckles, such as Alexis Bledel, Emmanuelle Béard, Megan Fox, and Rachel Bilson. But Chinese people always regard whiteness as beauty, and one whiteness covers three ugliness. Even if they have natural freckles, they will try their best to remove them. Therefore, theoretically, there are no women in China who regard freckles as beauty.

There is no such thing now. I wonder if people in ancient times had it. But after looking through the descriptions of women in historical novels, I found that there were thousands of words describing the beauty of women in ancient times, but there were very few descriptions of freckles. And little. The beauty of ancient women was indeed limited to the description of eyebrows, facial expressions, and body posture. It focused on cleanliness and whiteness, and showed very little about the beauty of stature, height, and even facial flaws. Pan Jinlian's beauty is well known to everyone, and Wang Liu'er is also breathtakingly beautiful, but in fact, most of the women Ximen Qing likes are "short" in the book, and the only tall one is the pockmarked Meng Yulou.

But if the pockmarked face is really caused by smallpox, what will happen to its beauty? Judging from the actual situation, the pockmarks on Meng Yulou's face are most likely traces of smallpox. There are two descriptions of her pockmarks in "Jin Ping Mei", both of which are viewed from a male perspective. The first one is when Ximen Qing first met Meng Yulou, "his forehead was slightly numb, and he was naturally beautiful"; the second one was Li Yanei, according to Xiao Zhang Xian's description, "the one with the slender figure and the white pockmarks was the third one" A lady, her surname is Meng and her name is Yulou."

From the specific use of vocabulary, "do a few spots of slight pockmarks" and "white pockmarks", it can be seen that they are undoubtedly the traces left by the scabs of smallpox, because the freckles are all "brown", the white pockmarks here are similar to The “tiao” with a sense of space clearly shows that it is traces of smallpox.

3. Smallpox disfigured the face, why is Meng Yulou so beautiful

According to medical description, those who have suffered from smallpox and have scabs will basically have pitted faces, which is more ugly than acne. Why It has no impact on Meng Yulou. There are two reasons: First, there are two types of smallpox virus: smallpox virus and smallpox-like virus. The first type of smallpox virus can cause serious complications in infected people, and there are more herpes and macules on the skin. After good treatment, Later, a large number of smallpox herpes scabs will form, resulting in large and small scars, which will basically cause facial disfigurement. However, smallpox-like viruses with relatively weak viruses will also have symptoms related to smallpox, but there will be fewer herpes, the traces of formation will be less obvious, and the impact on the face will be smaller.

Based on this analysis, the smallpox on Meng Yulou's face was caused by variola, and the impact was relatively small. There were only a few spots on his forehead, which did not affect his appearance.

Secondly, the beauty of imperfections. Even though traditional Chinese culture values ??fair skin and beauty of women and flawless white jade, in fact, as a result of various influences such as human pigments and genetics, the skin is more or less There will be some features such as scars and moles. These features will produce different effects in different positions on the face, so the few pockmarks on Meng Yulou's face are somewhat similar to the effect of "beauty moles", but will actually increase its natural and agile beauty.

In summary, the pockmarks on Meng Yulou’s face were caused by smallpox, not freckles.