By BIRIDIANA LOPEZ- RODRIGUEZ
Staff Writer
Makeup has been around for a very long time. And as time goes on, makeup is used for all sorts of things, and there are more makeup businesses. But have you ever heard of a woman who turned her makeup business into a poison factory? No? Then let me tell you about the case of Giulia Tofana. She is the most successful serial killer that is never talked about. She killed hundreds of men in the seventeenth century in Italy. Guilia was selling a deadly product she called ‘aqua tofana’ which was speculated to have laced with arsenic, lead, and belladonna. Belladonna was historically used in Italy mainly for women to use just a drop of it in each of their eyes to dilate their pupils. During the time arsenic and lead would be used in face powder to lighten the skin, but since this happened during the renaissance era no one really knew how certain things could affect our body’s.
During this time, families would force women into arranged marriages and once they were married the man basically had full control over them. These women didn’t have any type of say, which often led to men beating their wives and not facing any type of consequence or punishments. It didn’t matter how wealthy or poor a woman was, they would just be treated as objects and auctioned off. Divorce during this time period was not a thing, so women couldn’t escape their marriages. When in these types of situations, many often thought that the only thing to do was murder. And this is how one of the most successful yet unknown serial killers came to be. Not much is known about her, there aren’t even any portraits of her. It was believed that Giulia Tofana was the daughter of a woman named Afonya D’Adamo, who was executed in July of 1633 for murdering her husband. Giulia was described as very beautiful and that she spent a lot of her time with apothecaries which were people who prepared and sold medicines and/or drugs. Since she spent a lot of time with them, she would learn how to make her own medicines as well as her own drugs.
She was very interested in this, and it was suspected that she learned how to make poisons herself. She made a liquid that would seem to look like a typical woman’s cosmetic product, and said that 4-6 drops would be enough to kill a man. She began to sell the product that she ended up calling ‘aqua tofana’, her daughter would also help make and sell the product. A lot of women would buy this product, and some men would as well but it was mostly women. This product was very discrete, slow, and hard to detect. The first dose could be mixed in with anything and cause cold-like symptoms and by the third dose the victim would feel very ill, dehydrated, diarrhea, a burning sensation in the stomach, and by the last dose it would kill the victim. Giulia’s clients would be very protective of her because if authorities found out about what she was selling, not only would she be executed but her client list would as well. This went on for 50 years, and she then moved to Rome and continued her business there. A lot of the time, the women wouldn’t be under suspicion due to how they acted (anxious, stressed, and sadness). Giulia coached them on what to do so they wouldn’t be a suspect and was very selective on who she sold aqua tofana to.
In the 1650s that’s when it would all stop. A lady goes over to Giulia and gets aqua tofana. One day she is making some food for her husband and puts in the aqua tofana, her husband asks for some wine. And she yells at her husband to not eat the soup feeling guilt, although she doesn’t tell him why. He beats her and she confesses, she’s dragged to the authorities and is put on a torutre device and she confesses to everything again. Word got out and rumors started going around, and many pointed the blame to Giulia. She was caught and tortured to spit out all information, and said that she killed what she believed to be around 600 men between 1633 and 1651. Many believed that she had killed more, but aren’t too sure. She was forced to give out some names of her clients, and she did give out some names. And in July 1659 Giulia was executed along with her daughter, and three employees. They were killed in Rome’s Campo de Fiori. Many clients played dumb saying that they thought it was only a cosmetic. To this day many don’t know if it’s a real crime or not since there isn’t much information on Giulia. Many think that she was an innocent woman as well. And that was the case of Giulia Tofana and her deadly product aqua tofana.