Edmond Perrier's Victorian Museum

In the 19th century, the woman status was very bad, because of a widespread conception of the «idealized woman». This conception proved the contradiction between the middle class and the working class. Concerning the legal rights, those of women were similar to those of childrens, so they couldn’t vote, make a complaint, or own something. Also, they couldn’t wear makeup, because women embodied purity and innocence, so their « souls » had to be clean.

In the 19th century, a woman had to take care of the house, and to do all of the domestic chores. She couldn’t have a job or a bank account.

In the Victorian time, a woman who became a prostitute was becoming impure, she had not respected the living code of women.

If the husband claimed his wife had done something impure, he could throw her out of the house, so she was homeless. And as a consequence, she had to sell her body to survive. That's why there were so many prostitutes in the 19th century.