Beauty tips for the face

Here are the last of the beauty tips from medieval physician, Trota (Trotula) of Salerno. To remove unsightly hair from the face, mix greek pitch with wax in a clay vessel, add a drop of galbanum and cook a long time. Mix in mastic, frankincense and gum arabic. Cover the face except for the eyebrows and leave in place for 1 hour. How would you like to get that stuff off your face? Is it any worse a combination than today's cosmetics? To whiten your face, place whole eggs in strong vinegar until the shells dissolve. Mix in white mustard and 4 ounces of ginger and anoint your face. Doesn't say how long to leave it on, and darn, I was going to try that one! To prevent sunburn, prepare a paste by grinding lilly root and mix with 1 ounce mastic powder, i ounce frankincense, two scruples each of camphor and white lead, s little pork fat and rose water. Anoint the skin in front of the fire. To help heal burns, chapped lips, and excoriations, leave the paste on overnight. This stuff was also supposed to cover the pustules of lepers and repair the tears after mourning the dead. The medieval lip balm sounds a little more feasible. Mix honey with white bryony, red bryony, cucumber, and rose water. Boil the mixture until it is reduced by half and anoint the lips. After you have removed your wrinkles by anointing your face with the juice of stinking iris and leaving it to work for a while, the lip balm preparation makes a great face cream. I think the by-word here is "don't try this at home."