Hetaerae,Cleopatra , Louise de Vilmorin,Gloria

I can't picture them DFK'ing....
but DATY and RCG...its a shoe in!


Boinnggg!

A courtesan would have a courtly, wealthy, or upper-class clientele. With Elle's pricing and location, that seems to fit.

IMHO, in contemporary terms, a GFE is just that -- an experience.  Lasts an hour, then it's over.  Courtesan implies an on-going "relationship."  Historically, courtesans were "taken care of" by their patrons; their relationships were not unlike the relationships between artists and their patrons.  Think Michelangelo and the Medicis.

Courtesan, a woman who cohabits with an important man. A concubine, doxy, odalisque, paramour.

GFE only spend a short time and fulfill the fantasy of a girlfriend, steady or fiancee.

You see courtesans in the old world mostly where the social mores are less strict with respect to women openly living with a married man who is important.In the USA you really don't have courtesans doing so openly. French President Mitterand had one.  

And of course in the USA we always turn such things into acronyms to somehow disguise it from the rest of scoiety because of the shame attached to sex in this country.

I don't think Steinham would consider herself a courtesan.

Also the difference is about 10,000 USD per month!  

TET

and her contemporaries in Venice are among those women most associated with the word "courtesan", and often had short-term liaisons.

To me a courtesan is a GFE who engages me intellectually as well as physically.  This is something I often enjoy.

Just a quick history lesson... a courtesan of older times used her brains and her body to enjoy the benefits of marriage -- companionship, property and financial stability -- without the stifling social constraints. She often replaced a man's wife in social scenes, since "proper" married women were to be locked away to keep from being tainted. Courtesans were companions for high society men. Known for their wit, charm and elegance, they palled around with the most important and powerful men of their day. They wrote novels, published poems and influenced politics by delivering political messages during pillow talk with different thier clients. Some did take it upon themselves to change the messages slightly, and turn things towards thier own personal views.  They also used sex, and they flaunted it in ways that married women could not for fear of being outcast. The courtesans were not mere women and were allowed almost all the freedoms of men in the day. They could drink, smoke, cuss, read, write, fight, walk around the city naked or whatever they wished providing of course that their sponsors were kind enough or rich enough and to ensure thier safety from the law and the church if they were not the law or the church themselves... LOL