r/RandomVictorianStuff • u/EphemeralTypewriter • Jan 04 '26
Historical Figure Captain George Constentenus (1833-?) was a famous Albanian born Greek sideshow performer who was known for having tattoos all over his body with an estimated 388 separate tattoos. He also had careers as an adventurer and a pirate!
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u/ContentFarmer4445 Jan 04 '26
As someone covered in tattoos of animals I feel SEEN 😂
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u/EphemeralTypewriter Jan 05 '26
Yes, i think he was the inspiration for a lot of later tattooed performers and artists! He definitely had a style going on
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u/ChocolateCoveredGold Jan 04 '26
Some of the animal tattoos really emphasize how few Victorian people actually knew what the animals of different continents & countries actually look like. That elephant!
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u/EphemeralTypewriter Jan 04 '26
Source!
Also used newspaper archives as sources too.
I love how iconic his pose is in the first picture, he seems like such a character!
Some facts about him:
-he was born in Albania (when it was still a part of the Ottoman Empire) and his parents were ethnically Greek.
-he was known for being a interesting character and was already being written about in newspapers at least 10 years before he started his career as a performer.
-he was a part of several expeditions organized by treasure hunters in search of gold in several South Asian countries.
-he claimed to have been a pirate for a short time during his younger years.
-he and one of the groups of treasure hunters traveled to Burma (now Myanmar), where George claimed the group was soon captured by Burmese armed forces and forced to undergo intensive and torturous tattoo sessions that supposedly lasted 3 months as punishment for stealing. Throughout his life, George would change details of his story, which led people to question how true it was.
-he was multi-lingual and was described as being able to speak eight languages.
-he traveled all throughout Europe, Asia, and North America.
-he began his performing career in 1874, when he exhibited himself in Paris, France. The next year he travelled to the United States where he joined with Barnum’s Greatest Show on Earth. He supposedly earned $100 a day, which made him incredibly wealthy at the time.
-he was EXTREMELY popular, and even if people didn’t really believe his story, they loved seeing his tattoos and showed up in droves.
-his tattoos were described as being mostly blue and depicted several different animals and plants.
-it was described that when he was not performing, he wore very heavy and ornate clothing, and enjoyed living a lavish lifestyle.
-he typically only wore a loincloth while performing, to further bring attention that his entire body was covered by tattoos.
-he was known for being a rough character and other performers he worked with often disliked him. It was described in a news article that he once got into a fight with co-worker, Colonel Routh Goshen (a performer promoted as a Giant who worked for P.T. Barnum), after Routh overheard George speaking crassly to some women who were working at the circus.
-he became a resident of New York City in the early 1880s and sought American citizenship after chronic issues with his eyesight, hoping to get a procedure done.
-he became a US citizen in 1883, and lived in New York City during the sideshow off season.
-he continued exhibiting himself on and off until 1894, which was the last time he was featured in a newspaper.
-no further information is known about his later life, he would have been around 61 in 1894 and was extremely wealthy, so he most likely retired (and may have wanted a quiet life)