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Photographs of 19th Century Japan

(cosmographia.substack.com)
444 points merothwell | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0.629s | source
1. gramie ◴[] No.43645268[source]
It's interesting that in the photo of three girls, they are smiling broadly. I had thought that traditional Japanese culture (and still, often, today) women tended to cover their mouths, and displaying teeth was considered somewhat vulgar or even obscene. At one point, women even blackened their teeth!

Maybe that wasn't universal, or the photographer convinced the women to show their smiles.

replies(1): >>43653670 #
2. layer8 ◴[] No.43653670[source]
I don’t think that was generally the case. Your comment reminds me of this 1937 footage I saw recently: https://youtu.be/o4xkucZ40Fw?t=1m50s