Two woman wearing the saya attending mass
ca. 1848
Francisco 'Pancho' Fierro, the great chronicler of 19th-century Lima, captures a deliciously scandalous scene with these two tapadas. Dressed in the traditional saya y manto, these women are covered from head to toe in heavy black veils, revealing only a single, flirtatious eye. The handwritten caption '2 Tapadas en Misa' places them at mass, but this outfit was less about piety and more about anonymity. It allowed women to wander the streets and wink at lovers without being recognized, a freedom that the church and government hated and tried to ban multiple times.
- Technique
- Watercolor
- Material
- Paper