Vénus noire

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Paris 1817, enclosure of the Royal Academy of Medicine: I have never seen a human head more similar to that of the apes. Faced with the cast of Saartjie Baartman's body, the anatomist Georges Cuvier was categorical. An audience of scientists applauded the demonstration. 7 years earlier, Saartjie left South Africa with her master Caezar who delivered her body to the London public of the freak shows. A free and constrained woman, she was the icon of the underworld, the Hottentot Venus promised to the mirage of a golden ascension...

• Women’s rights, Slavery