The Queen of debauchery: The 5 sexiest women in history

If you sometimes think that some women in our time have become too immoral, then you definitely think so. Because the mores of the changing times do not change at all.

The name of Valeria Messalina, the third wife of the Roman emperor Claudius, became a household name: it began to be used to denote unusually dissolute behavior. And there was a reason.

In her early years, Valeria was very popular at the court of Caligula and, probably, it was there that she became addicted to free connections. Ancient authors claim that Messalina began a rampant life at the age of 13. And when she was 18, Caligula married her to his uncle Claudius.

Claudius, oddly enough, turned out to be a champion of morality and, after becoming emperor, diligently eradicated the habit of debauchery in his subjects, but at the same time "did not know what was going on at home." Messalina had undivided power over her husband and virtually ruled Rome with him. No one dared to open the emperor's eyes to what was really happening.

And what happened next: Messalina, according to historians, did not miss a single handsome man. Once she fell in love with the main court actor Mnester, but he did not want to become a favorite of the empress. Then Valeria Messalina complained about him to her husband, saying that "some little actor" dared not obey her will. Claudius ordered Mnester to fulfill all the wishes of Messalina, effectively giving the actor his place in the marital bed.

Ancient authors, in particular Tacitus and Suetonius, often wrote about Messalina. They claimed that the emperor's wife secretly owned one of the Roman lupanarii (brothels), and also came there at night to satisfy her lust, pretending to be a prostitute. There was a joke in Rome that if the emperor didn't have enough money to equip his army, Valeria Messalina could easily earn it overnight.

In addition, Messalina once arranged a competition with the famous Roman prostitute Scylla: who can serve more men. Scylla started in the evening and left the race in the morning, stopping at the 25th client. Messalina continued until the number of men reached 50 per day.

At the same time, Messalina's marriage broke up not because of her infidelities, but because she planned to put her lover Gaius Silius on the imperial throne. Taking advantage of the departure of the Emperor Claudius, Messalina married her lover in front of witnesses.

The emperor was informed of this, but, being a gentle man, he did not even order the arrest of Messalina. However, he did not react to the news of the death of his wife, who was stabbed by the emperor's envoy shortly after her arrest.

The Chinese empress, who actually ruled the Middle Kingdom for 40 years, appeared at the court as a concubine of Emperor Tai-tsong of the Tang Dynasty. The emperor's harem was very extensive, so the young concubine never received his attention.

But the girl began to take care of the son of Emperor Li. After Tai-tsung's death, Wu was exiled to a Buddhist monastery, but Li, who ascended the throne under the name of Emperor Gao-tsung, returned her back, and then declared her a favorite concubine. Soon, Wu Zetian managed to remove the current Empress Wang and become the official consort of the emperor.

Wu Zetian gave birth to four sons and one daughter, but she was more interested in power than motherhood. In addition, Emperor Gao-zong was unwell, and for the last 23 years of his life, Wu Zetian actually ruled the country.

After the death of the emperor, she kept power to herself, replacing her sons on the throne, and then completely removed them from power and declared herself emperor. Formally, Wu Zetian is the only female ruler in the entire four-thousand-year history of China.

But that wasn't what made her famous. And not even the fact that during the years of her rule, China invaded the territories of Central Asia and Korea, conquering several new provinces. And not by the fact that the country's culture was rapidly developing, and Buddhism and Taoism came under the protection of the state. Wu Zetian became famous for inventing new rules of court etiquette.

Wu Zetian rightly believed that the women at court were oppressed, and found a very ingenious way to humiliate the men in return: since fellatio was considered a symbol of male superiority, Wu Zetian introduced a new custom for the courtiers — "licking the lotus stamens". Simply put, cunnilingus. Under her rule, this sexual technique was elevated to the level of a symbol of the era of female superiority. I suppose the ladies of the court were perfectly happy.

The Empress Elizabeth Petrovna, the founder of the Enlightenment in Russia, in her personal life was distinguished by free morals, and from early youth. The beginning of her reign was remembered by contemporaries as a period of luxury and excess.

The newly-made empress constantly arranged masquerade balls, and she especially liked the so — called "metamorphoses": men dressed in women's dresses, ladies-in men's suits. There is an opinion that in this way Elizabeth Petrovna just wanted to outshine the court ladies: she had legs of incredible beauty, but they could only be shown in a man's suit.

Elizabeth Petrovna was never married and had no recognized children, but the list of her official favorites is striking in its impressiveness: in 24 years – from 16 to 40 years – the empress changed seven men, but this list included only official favorites recognized at court. At the same time, some historians claim that even before the age of 20, Elizabeth Petrovna managed to have a dozen lovers.

But, however, something else is more interesting: at some point, four lovers lived constantly with the empress at once: a new favorite, twenty-year-old Nikita Afanasyevich Beketov, a former church singer Alexey Grigoryevich Razumovsky, the future founder of the University and the Academy of Arts Ivan Ivanovich Shuvalov, and a certain Kachenovsky, a favorite about whom historians have almost no information. Elizabeth Petrovna at this moment turned 41 years old.

Marie-Jeanne Becu, the wife of the Comte Du Barry, was the illegitimate daughter of a tax collector, which meant that she could not achieve success in life. But the girl managed not only to get to the court, but also to become the official favorite of the French King Louis XV.

Jeanne Becu spent her childhood in a monastery, but she did not learn piety there: as soon as she reached the age of independence, she got a job as a milliner in a fashionable Parisian atelier, where they did not pay a very large salary, but there was always the opportunity to work part-time… In the local police, a case was opened against Jeanne with the wording on the title page:

There, in the studio, Jeanne noticed the impoverished nobleman Jean Du Barry-and immediately offered her to move in with him. There was no question of any feeling, however: Jean found beautiful girls, taught them the art of love, and then offered them to his rich friends, receiving a certain percentage, that is, he was simply a court pimp.

Jeanne, in his opinion, turned out to be a real "diamond", and Du Barry decided to implement the most ambitious plan in his "career" – to make her a favorite of the king himself. Louis XV was already 58 years old at that time, and young mistresses, frankly speaking, did not really interest him. But after a night spent with Jeanne, the king said:

No one, except Marshal Richelieu, dared to tell the monarch that the reason for this was simple — before Jeanne, the king's favorites had never come across prostitutes. The king's mistresses had to come from a decent family and have the status of a respectable married lady. Louis simply did not believe his marshal, and when the truth was revealed, he immediately demanded... to marry Jeanne.

Jean Du Barry summoned his younger brother Guillaume from Toulouse and immediately arranged the wedding. At the same time, he took care of the bride: according to the marriage contract, Guillaume had no rights to his wife's fortune, or even to her society.

The happy bridegroom was paid a substantial sum and given the highest order to leave the capital immediately. And Jeanne remained at court. She was a favorite of the king until his death, which, however, did not prevent her from receiving other men in her spare time from her duties as a royal mistress.

During the revolution, Jeanne Du Barry was executed, and she went down in history as the last favorite of the king of the Bourbon dynasty, and not as the most depraved favorite. However, some sources claim that Jeanne even had an affair with the executioner Henri Sanson, by whose hand she died on the scaffold.

Elena Diakonova, the muse of the great surrealist Salvador Dali, was convinced that creativity is impossible without free love. At the age of 23, Elena married Paul Eluard, who gave her the nickname Gala, gave birth to a daughter and led a completely respectable family life.

Until in 1921, she met the artist Max Ernst, who invited Elena to become his model. The young woman agreed and became not only a model, but also the artist's mistress. The following year, the artist moved to the Eluard house in France. The love triangle was not hidden at all.

In 1929, Paul and Gala paid a visit to the young Catalan artist Dali. The owner wanted to meet the guests in an unusual way — Dali tore his shirt and rubbed his body with a mixture of fish glue, goat droppings and lavender. But when he saw the guest, he immediately ran to change. On the same evening, their stormy romance began.

Gala divorced Paul and married Salvador Dali. She took over all the household chores, Dali could create without being distracted by these "little things". Gala took over all of her husband's financial affairs, and Dali became rich. Until the end of his life, he considered his wife a living myth and a modern icon.

At the same time, Elena Diakonova did not keep her husband faithful at all: she still had affairs, and Dali gave her a personal castle, which, according to the contract, he himself could not visit without the written permission of his wife. In her old age, Gala Dali, no longer counting on her own charm and attractiveness, preferred to buy the intimate services of men. After the death of Gala, Dali fell into a deep depression and did not recover until the end of his life.