There were countless thousands of sex workers in Paris during the Belle Epoque (1871 – 1914) with the vast majority living miserable hand-to-mouth existences. At the very top of the profession were a select few courtesans, or démi mondaines, who had rich, powerful lovers and lived lives of material luxury. In a hypocritical society where family life was vaunted but extra-marital affairs were rampant, they used their wits and their looks to play the game to their advantage and gain a kind of independence.

Valtesse de la Bigne (1848 – 1910)

Valtesse – real name Émilie-Louise Delabigne – grew up dirt poor in Paris, the daughter of a washerwoman/prostitute and a violent alcoholic father. Her tough upbringing robbed her of any romantic illusions she had of life but it gave her a single mindedness with regards to her career that served her well. From turning tricks in doorways being the highest courtesan in the land, Valtesse bankrupted several men along the way. One man – a prince – built her a mansion in Paris. The bed alone cost the equivalent of half a million dollars! Edouard Manet painted her portrait and Emile Zola used her the inspiration for the titular hero in Nana. In her later years, Valtesse trained other women in the art of being a démi mondaine, including the magnificent Liane de Pougy, who was also her lover.

Liane de Pougy (1869 – 1950)

Liane was one of the most famous and beautiful courtesans of the Belle Epoque. She was married at 16 and had a child but, after suffering the brutality of her husband, she left both him and their son behind. In Paris, she supported herself through prostitution, eventually working her way up the ladder to become a top-level démimondaine with her pick of rich lovers. Liane was openly bisexual and had a series of lesbian relationships, notably with Mathilde de Morny and the writer Natalie Clifford Barney. Through her marriage to member of the Moldovian royal family, she became an actual Princess, though she finished her days living in a convent as a nun. Liane wrote several semi-autobiographical novels about her time as a courtesan.

Marguerite de Steinheil (1869 – 1954)

Unlike most courtesans, Marguerite was born into a wealthy family. She married a much older man, a painter, who owned a fancy home but didn’t have the money to give Marguerite the lifestyle she wanted. Marguerite had many famous and wealthy lovers during her marriage, whom she often met through her salons. While not a courtesan in the strictest sense, she accepted money and gifts from her lovers ranging from jewellery to a holiday home. She became notorious after President Félix Faure had a fit as she performed oral sex on him, dying shortly after. If that wasn’t scandalous enough, she also went on to be accused of the murder of both her husband and her mother. She was acquitted and went on to marry an English baron.

La Belle Otero / Carolina Otero (1868 – 1965)

Though born in Spain, Agustina Carolina del Carmen Otero Iglesias, moved to Marseille at 20 where she began her career as a dancer, eventually becoming a star of Folies Bèrgere in Paris under the name La Belle Otero. She was known for her risqué costumes, the most spectacular of which consisted, in part, of nothing more than jewels glued onto her breasts. Her stunning looks won her lots of admirers and it wasn’t long before she was the most in-demand courtesan in Paris, counting the kings and princes of a great many Europeans nations among her lovers. She made so much money she was able to buy a mansion costing the equivalent of 15 million USD. Otero gambled away most of her money in Monte Carlo and died in poverty aged 97 in Nice.

Émilienne d’Alençon (1870 – 1945)

Along with Liane de Pougy and La Belle Otero, Emilienne d’Alençon was one of the top three courtesans of the Belle Epoque, nicknamed the “Threee Graces”. Parisian by birth, she was a superb dancer who made it onto the stages of the Casino de Paris, la Scala and Folies Bergère where one of her most celebrated performances was as a snake dancer. She began as a courtesan aged 15. By 19, she was in a three-year relationship with a young duke who wished to marry her. However, his family disapproved and sent him to the Congo where he died a year later. There then followed relationships with King Leopold II of Belgian, King Edward VII of Great Britain and Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany. She also had affairs with women, including the famous Moulin Rouge dancer La Goulule and – again! – Liane de Pougy. Emilienne was a great lover of horse racing – she even married a jockey. Like La Belle Otero she lost her fortune through gambling.