Portal:Prostitution

The word grisette (sometimes spelled grizette) has referred to a French working-class woman from the late 17th century and remained in common use through the Belle Époque era, albeit with some modifications to its meaning. It derives from gris (French for grey), and refers to the cheap grey fabric of the dresses these women originally wore. The 1694 edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française described a grisette as simply "a woman of lowly condition". By the 1835 edition of the dictionary, her status had risen somewhat. She was described as a young working woman who is coquettish and flirtatious.

The sexual connotations which had long accompanied the word are made explicit in Webster's Third New International Dictionary (1976) which lists one of its meanings as a young woman who combines part-time prostitution with another occupation.

Catherine "Kate" Eddowes (14 April 1842 – 30 September 1888) was one of the victims in the Whitechapel murders. She was the second person killed in the early hours of Sunday 30 September 1888, a night which already had seen the murder of Elizabeth Stride less than an hour earlier. These two murders are commonly referred to as the "double event" and have been attributed to an unidentified serial killer known as Jack the Ripper.

Eddowes, also known as "Kate Conway" and "Kate Kelly" after her two successive common-law husbands, was born in Graisley Green, Wolverhampton on 14 April 1842. Her parents, tinplate worker George Eddowes and his wife Catherine (née Evans), had 11 other children. The family moved to London a year after her birth, but she later returned to Wolverhampton to work as a tinplate stamper. (read more...)

• ...that renowned brothel-keeper Elizabeth Needham, depicted in William Hogarth's A Harlot's Progress (pictured), was pelted so severely in the pillory that she died 3 days later?
• ...that Tom Dennison got a mayor elected eight times, instigated a race riot and controlled all sale of liquor, gambling and prostitution during his 30+ year reign as Omaha's political boss?
• ...that the original name of Euphemia, empress consort of Justin I of the Byzantine Empire, was 'Lupicina', which led historian Alexander Vasiliev to associate her with she-wolves and prostitution?
• ...that in the days immediately following the revelation of her role in the Eliot Spitzer prostitution scandal, the MySpace page of Ashley Alexandra Dupré was viewed over 9 million times?

• 9th
  • 1914: Birth of Denham Fouts, an American male prostitute, socialite and literary muse. He served as the inspiration for characters by Truman Capote, Gore Vidal, Christopher Isherwood and Gavin Lambert.
• 14th
  • 1973: Death of Dorothy Baker, also known as Big Dorothy, an American madam in Helena, Montana.
• 26th
  • 1956: The Prostitution Prevention Law, which outlawed Prostitution in Japan, was passed by Japan's National Diet
• 27th
  • 1835: Birth of Anna Wilson, a pioneer madam in Omaha, Nebraska. When she died she bequeathed her life savings to the City of Omaha, along with her 25-room mansion brothel, which was used as a hospital.
  • 1951: Birth of Norma Jean Almodovar, American author and sex workers activist.
• 28th
  • 1905: Birth of Sada Abe, a Japanese geisha and prostitute, who erotically asphyxiated her lover and then cut off his penis and testicles and carried them around with her in her kimono.
• 30th
  • 1949: The government-run brothel, Campo Alegre, opened in the Dutch Caribbean island of Curaçao in an attempt to concentrate prostitution in one location on the island.

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