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The wording of the so‐called Hoops and Heels Act of 1770 ostensibly permitted the husbands of women who had used beauty aids to ‘betray [them] into matrimony’ to declare their marriages null and void, and for those wives to be punished as witches. A set form of words, this supposed Act of Parliament has been quoted and re‐quoted across the globe since the late eighteenth century, even though its provisions...