Born Agustina Otero Iglesias on November 4, 1868, in the small Spanish town of Valga, Pontevedra, she would become known across the world as La Belle Otero. Her childhood gave little hint of the fame to come. Her mother, known as Carmencita, was left alone to raise her, earning a living as a dancer at hours and for pay that provided an unstable life for her daughter. The identity of Otero’s father was never certain; she claimed he was a Greek officer named Harrison, who had met her mother at a flamenco venue.
According to one story, Harrison was badly injured in a duel with one of Carmencita’s lovers and died of his wounds shortly afterward. When Agustina was about ten years old, her mother was locked away for a number of crimes. Other accounts say Carmencita was so desperately poor that she sent her daughter away to work as a maid, a common fate for the extremely poor at the time. With no one to care for her, the girl had to fend for herself.
Her childhood was extremely rough. She was sexually abused, and as a result, she became unable to bear children. Despite these hardships, she remained charismatic and upbeat, and she inherited her mother’s great ability to dance. During her early teens, she changed her name to Carolina.
Some accounts mention a sister who passed away, and it may have been that death which prompted the change. Working as a maid, Carolina was tasked with errands that included fetching water from a nearby well. On one such errand, she caught the attention of a young man named Paco. A few days later, she received a letter in which Paco declared his love for her.
Flattered, Carolina asked if he would take her to a tavern so they could meet in person. He accepted. When they arrived, the tavern’s owners were impressed by Carolina’s beauty. Believing her presence would attract more customers, they hired her as a dancer.
Her career began at the age of fourteen. After a short time, Carolina knew she could achieve far more. Hungry for success, she moved to Lisbon with Paco, now her boyfriend. Her reputation as a dancer slowly grew, though consistent work remained elusive.
While still in Lisbon, Paco left her, breaking her heart. She danced wherever she could find work, from cafes to theaters, attracting and discarding admirers to help her along the way. She stayed with them only as long as necessary, then moved on. By her mid-teens, the details of her life become unclear.
Some sources claim she left Lisbon for Barcelona hoping to find Paco, but without success. She later claimed that at fourteen she married a man named Guglielmo, though this seems unlikely, as she had nothing to show for it. By the time she was nineteen, she was living in Barcelona, working as a singer and a prostitute. At one of her shows, she attracted her first long-term patron, who took her to Marseille, where she showcased her singing and dancing.
While there, she also won money in the casinos of Monte Carlo, which likely sparked her passion for gambling. She cut off her patron once she no longer needed him. Eventually, Carolina reached Paris, where she became known as La Belle Otero, an Andalusian dancer with an exotic style. She was described as intelligent, confident, and pretty, with an attractive figure.
Her dark black eyes were said to be captivating, with such intensity that it was impossible not to be detained before them. By the early 1890s, she made it to the Folies-Bergère. After months of performances, her reputation spread across the continent. Crowds piled into the music hall to witness her captivating shows.
By 1895, she was the most desired courtesan in Europe. Many aristocrats tried to seduce her with invitations to fancy events, meals, and extravagant jewelry. Her career took her to capital cities around the world. She traveled to America and conquered the states with her dance just as she had in Europe, earning well and amassing a considerable sum.
She then performed in Germany, where she found great success and began a relationship with her banker, a man named Oldtreader, who spoiled her with fine jewelry, expensive cars, and luxurious properties. That relationship eventually ended, and La Belle Otero continued dancing. During a tour in Russia, the imperial family traveled to the Malinka Theater in St. Petersburg to see whether she lived up to her reputation for beauty and elegance.
After the show, Grand Duke Peter Nikolaevich went to her dressing room and asked if she would meet with him on a future occasion. She agreed, beginning a passionate romance. When she returned to Paris to fulfill a contract with the Folies-Bergère, the Grand Duke accompanied her without hesitation. But Tsar Nicholas II forced him back to Russia to fulfill the duties of his position.
According to one story, while La Belle Otero was staying at one of the Russian palaces, she had an argument with the Grand Duke, who locked her in a room and took both the key and her coat. Furious, she jumped out the window, landing in the snow. It was midwinter, with temperatures well below freezing. Fortunately, a peasant passing by on a sledge spotted her and took her to the mansion of another prince.
She contracted pneumonia from the cold and took three months to recover. Night after night, she performed to the highest standards, and the overwhelming workload kept her so busy that she soon forgot about the Grand Duke. La Belle Otero then had a liaison with the Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VII. Like many men before him, he fell in love with her and bought her properties.
As with most of her courtships, it was short-lived. Her list of lovers was long and included some of the richest men in the world and members of royalty. During a visit to London, she met Hugh Grosvenor, the Duke of Westminster, then among the wealthiest men in the world. They quickly developed an intimate friendship.
Other lovers included Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, Leopold II of Belgium, Prince Albert of Monaco, and King Alfonso XIII of Spain. Rumors floated about relationships with other kings and even emperors, though these were never confirmed. It was not only aristocrats who fell for her. Her admirers included painters, writers, poets, and politicians, as well as ordinary men who lusted after her.
According to some tales, a total of six men committed suicide after she ended love affairs with them. It was these love affairs that made her infamous, and many notable female personalities of the day envied her as a result. In August 1898, she starred in a one-minute film in which she performed a dance called “La Valse Brillante. ” The film was shown in music halls all over Europe, increasing her demand and fame.
The great courtesans of the Belle Époque were, in a way, the first modern-style celebrities. Reporters followed these famous women and reported on their trips to the opera, theaters, and restaurants, even commenting on their hobbies and rivalries. Some men profited by taking photographs of them and selling them as postcards, an early form of paparazzi. La Belle Otero remained sought-after even as she approached fifty.
Around the end of the First World War, she began thinking of retiring. After a car accident in the early 1920s, she knew it was time to change her way of life. She retired and moved to a large mansion in Nice, on the south coast of France. While living on the Mediterranean, she spent much of her time on charitable work, but what she enjoyed most was gambling.
The legendary dancer became a frequent face in the casinos of Monte Carlo, Nice, and Cannes, always standing out in her impeccable dresses and enchanting jewels. When she gambled, the stakes were always extremely high. Over years of dancing and through gifts from dozens of lovers, she had amassed a huge fortune, worth around 400 million euros in today’s money. But with time, her wealth began to deplete from the money she lost in France’s casinos.
After thirty years, she had lost almost everything. She went from living in a magnificent villa to a one-room apartment at the Hotel Novelty. Toward the end of her life, she had so little money that she depended almost entirely on a pension given to her by the Council of Nice. In her tiny room, she kept pictures on display to remind herself of her glory days.
On April 11, 1965, at the age of ninety-six, Carolina Otero died of a heart attack while resting in her tiny studio. When she died, she was living in poverty and totally forgotten. At her funeral, only a small group attended: a handful of acquaintances and some directors of the various casinos where she had spent decades. The newspapers reported on the story of the celebrity she once was, recalling her glory days at the Folies-Bergère and her numerous distinguished lovers.
In her heyday, she had once said, “Women have one mission in life: to be beautiful. When one gets old, one must learn how to break mirrors. I am very gently expecting to die.
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