>Circassian beauty is a stereotype and a belief referring to the women of the Circassian people.
>A fairly extensive literary history suggests that Circassian women were thought to be unusually beautiful and attractive, spirited, smart and elegant, and as such were desirable
>There are folks songs in various languages all around the Middle East and Balkans describing the unusual beauty of Circassian women, the reputation of Circassian women dates back to the Late Middle Ages when the Circassian coast was frequented by traders from Genoa, and the founder of the Medici dynasty, Cosimo de' Medici, had an illegitimate son from a Circassian slave.
>During the Ottoman Empire and Persian Safavid and Qajar dynasties, Circassian women living as slaves in the Sultan's Imperial Harem and Shah's harems started to build their reputation as extremely beautiful, which then became a common trope in Western Orientalism.
>In consequence, most wives and mothers of several Ottoman Sultans were ethnic Circassians
>There were also several classical Turkish music pieces and poems that praise the beauty of the Circassian ethnic group like "Lepiska Saçlı Çerkes"
> As a foreign group, they were always praised in Turkey for what they labeled as distinct and pure European features.
>It is also understood from the memoirs of Princess Emily Ruete, a half-Circassian and half-Omani herself, that Circassian women, who were captured in Constantinople and brought to Africa for the harem of Zanzibari Said bin Sultan, Sultan of Muscat and Oman, were envied by their rivals who considered Circassians to be of the "hateful race of blue-eyed cats".
