Jewish Invention Myths: Lipstick
Sometimes when I dig into ‘jewish invention’ I have the pleasure to find detailed research debunking the jewish claim which in no way deals with the jewishness of the claimed inventor (hence is not open to the charge of being partisan) and being who I am very happy to quote them and give them the credit for busting the myth right open.
This is true with the claim that jews invented lipstick as Kathyrn Bernheimer at ‘Boulder Jewish News’ claims. (1)
This is almost certainly based on the common enough claim that a jew named Maurice Levy invented lipstick in 1915, but the actual assertion is that Maurice Levy invented the first metal lipstick container in 1915 which is often falsely transliterated to be ‘he invented lipstick’. (2)
The truth is that lipstick is first encountered as early the ancient Sumerians and the Indus Valley Civilization (3) right through European history to the present. (4) So Levy certainly didn’t ‘invent it’ but the fact is that he didn’t even invent the metal tube lipstick comes in as a writer who goes by the name of ‘Collecting Vintage Compacts’ has documented in extreme detail.
I will reproduce her whole article in a separate post – as I’d like to save it for posterity and give her full credit for the outstanding research while also showing why the idea that Maurice Levy invented the metal tube for lipstick claim is utterly wrong – but here I’ll just quote the conclusion to her more than 4,000-word article on the subject:
‘Maurice Levy did not invent the first metal cosmetics containers in 1915 and especially did not invent the first metal lipstick tubes. But for the sake of completeness and accuracy he did file for a patent on a bullet-shaped lipstick container in 1929.’ (5)
So no Maurice Levy didn’t invent lipstick or the metal tube that lipstick is frequently held and sold in!
References
(1) https://boulderjewishnews.org/2009/an-informal-list-of-jewish-inventions-innovations-and-radical-ideas/
(2) For example: http://www.edubilla.com/invention/lipstick/ and explained by https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-lipstick-1992082
(3) Sarah Schaffer, 2006, ‘Reading Our Lips: The History of Lipstick Regulation in Western Seats of Power’, Food and Drug Law Journal, Vol. 62, No. 1, pp. 165–169
(4) https://www.bustle.com/articles/190243-the-history-of-red-lipstick-from-ancient-egypt-to-taylor-swift-everything-in-between
(5) https://collectingvintagecompacts.blogspot.com/2015/12/maurice-levy-man-who-never-invented.html