Did women paint their nails during the renaissance?

by bigbadbub

I'm aware women painted their nails in ancient Egypt and China, but I'm not sure about Europe during the renaissance. I'd like to paint my nails but I have a renaissance fair coming up and if it isn't period appropriate, our guild leader will scold us.

cecikierk

It's hard to definitely say "No this never happened" because we can't rule out certain individuals who decides to be edgy and doing things out of the ordinary. However there is no evidence that women in Renaissance Europe paint their nails. If you look at well-known contemporary portraits of women you will notice none of them have painted nails. Nail painting in Ancient Egypt and China were done with henna or similar plant derived products so they were more of a stain than a lacquer (the solvent-based paint we use today did not exist until a few hundred years later), and henna was not used for cosmetics in Europe until the Pre-Raphaelite movement that idolized red hair in the 19th century (even then it was a niche product). I guess if you really want to stretch history a bit you could use a transparent nail polish like OPI Sheer Tints, but IMO it would make more sense if you are portraying a Spaniard than English.