Milk bath

A milk bath is a bath taken in milk instead of water. Scented ingredients, such as honey, rose, daisies and essential oils are often added. Milk baths use lactic acid, an alpha hydroxy acid, to dissolve the proteins which hold together dead skin cells.^[1]

A milk and rose-petal bath at a spa resort in Thailand

History

There are legends that Cleopatra bathed in donkey milk daily for her complexion. These legends have not been confirmed. Historian Adrian Goldsworthy, author of Antony and Cleopatra, believes that Roman Empress Poppaea (wife of Nero) set this bathing fashion 80 years after Cleopatra's death.^[2]

Queens Catherine Parr and later Elizabeth I of England bathed in milk in the belief that it would make their skin appear more youthful and pale.^[3][4]

Tincture of benzoin was also referred to as a 'milk bath' in the United States in the 1800s, which could in some cases be confused for baths of cow milk, also popular at the time.^[5]

There are references to cows milk as a bath technique found in India in the 1800s in "Fifty-one years of Victorian life" by Margaret Elizabeth Child Villiers, Countess of Jersey.^[6]

In the early 1900s, singer and Broadway star Anna Held was reported to bathe in milk daily. She was later quoted as having bathed in milk two times a week when living in Paris, finding it difficult to do so while traveling. Her husband Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. later reported to the press that she bathed in milk daily and set up photo shoots so that reporters could photograph the milk being delivered to her.^[7]

A buttermilk bath was also a common historical bathing technique for show animals and remains in practice today (such as for pigs and dogs).^[8]

In folklore

According to scholars, milk baths were used "as a recipe for beauty", as well as for healing, rejuvenation and disenchantment.^[9]

In film and media

• A milk bath for supposed medicinal purposes for a dying child can be seen in the 1931 film Night Nurse.
• Poppaea (Claudette Colbert) bathes in milk in the 1932 film The Sign of the Cross.
• In Gigi, Aunt Alicia is seen taking a milk bath with lace lining the bathtub.
• In Carry On Cleo (1964), Mark Antony first encounters Cleopatra while she is taking a milk bath.
• In the 1973 film Charlotte's Web, Edith Zuckerman, Homer's wife, suggests giving Wilbur a buttermilk bath in preparation for the fair.
• Queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron) is depicted bathing in a milk bath while wearing her crown in the 2012 film Snow White and the Huntsman^[10]
• A milk bath can be observed in season 1, episode 9 of the Spartacus television series, performed by Lucretia (Lucy Lawless).
• Ran Jutul (Synnøve Macody Lund) is seen taking a milk bath in the Norwegian television series Ragnarok, season 1 episode 4.

A man relaxes in a milk bath

References

1. "Milk Bath Recipe". health.learninginfo.org.
2. Carpenter, Julie (August 7, 2010). "The Real Antony and Cleopatra". Express.co.uk.
3. Tallis, Nicola (2016-12-06). Crown of Blood: The Deadly Inheritance of Lady Jane Grey. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-68177-287-5.
4. Drew-Bear, Annette (1994). Painted Faces on the Renaissance Stage: The Moral Significance of Face-painting Conventions. Bucknell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8387-5230-2.
5. "Saturday Evening Mail 18 November 1893 — Hoosier State Chronicles: Indiana's Digital Historic Newspaper Program". newspapers.library.in.gov.
6. Fifty-one years of Victorian life, by the Dowager Countess of Jersey.
7. Blume, Lesley M. M. (2013-04-09). Let's Bring Back: An Encyclopedia of Forgotten-Yet-Delightful, Chic, Useful, Curious, and Otherwise Commendable Things from Times Gone by. Chronicle Books. ISBN 978-1-4521-0350-1.
8. "13.5 oz Organic Buttermilk and Oatmeal Shampoo". RoyalPetClub.com.
9. Schmidt, Sigrid, "Snow White in Africa". In: Fabula 49, no. 3-4 (2008): 275. https://doi.org/10.1515/FABL.2008.021
10. "Symbolic Riches: A Review of 'Snow White and the Huntsman' – Journeys in Alterity".