The story of L'Inconnue de la Seine (English: The Unknown Woman of the Seine) begins in the 1880s. According to legend, the body of a young woman was pulled from the River Seine in Paris. As was customary at the time, her body was displayed for a period at the Paris Morgue, but ultimately no one claimed her, so her identity remained a mystery.

One morgue employee, however, was so struck by her beauty that he made a plaster cast of this drowned woman’s face. Soon his serene, enigmatic and haunting death mask started catching attention. Numerous copies were made, and his depiction of a beautiful woman at peace became a morbid furnishing accessory among fashionable Parisian bohemians.

Before long, L'Inconnue's alluring, deathly likeness was reproduced in facsimiles sold in souvenir shops across Paris, then Germany and the rest of Europe. The mask of this wistful young woman – described by philosopher and author Albert Camus as the "drowned Mona Lisa" – became a coveted cultural icon that hung in drawing rooms all over the continent.

L'Inconnue also turned into a kind of "death meme" for early 20th century writers, who contrived countless dramatic backstories for this heartbroken heroine. "The facts were so scarce that every writer could project what they wanted on to that smooth face," museum archivist Hélène Pinet told The Guardian in 2007.

As the years passed, her notoriety grew. Nabokov wrote about her, a generation of German girls modelled their hair like hers, Man Ray photographed her.

Fast forward to the late 1950s, when Bjorn Lind, a Norwegian anaesthesiologist, learned of American physician Dr Peter Safar and his team’s recent discoveries in the fields of mouth to mouth ventilation and CPR (Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation). Their techniques were proving highly effective but they faced one huge problem: how could they train as many people as possible, globally, as quickly as possible?

Lind knew of a local doll and toymaker, Åsmund Lærdal who, having previously saved the life of his own nearly-drowned two-year-old son, Tore, Lind felt sure would want to help. Especially because Lærdal had already successfully created soft plastic imitation wounds for the Norwegian Civil Defence. After teaming up and soon deciding plastic masks would not be effective enough training aids, Lind and Lærdal then embarked upon a history-making project: to make a life-sized mannikin to train people in life-saving techniques.

Lærdal made several crucial decisions, including that the mannikin should be female. He judged that men would be loath to practice mouth to mouth ventilation on a male figure. But a mannikin in a dress would be disastrous, and a corpse would be scary … so she was designed wearing a track suit, cleverly making her appear fit and active. Now she gained a name: “Resusci Anne”, based on his most popular selling, soft plastic series of “Anne” dolls. But what should her face look like?

While fretting over this question, one night at his parents-in-law, Lærdal “sees” something he’s already seen for years – a Paris souvenir death mask they’ve had hanging on their wall: L’Inconnue de la Seine. With a few adjustments from Danish sculptor Emma Mathiassen, and the addition of stitched-in hair to make her more life-like, the peaceful face of a drowned Parisian woman from the 1880s, becomes the face of Resusci Anne, the mannikin whose face has now been "kissed" over 350 million times, by those learning a CPR technique that has helped save over two million lives.

The face of death has become the face of life.

PS: The idea for this story, and much of the writing, was contributed by Matthew Curlewis, Creator of Bright Side Writings, and Director of Amsterdam Writers. As it happens, Matthew’s grandfather Sir Adrian Curlewis, during his 42-year tenure as President of Surf Life Saving Australia, was instrumental in bringing CPR training to Australia.
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References

wikipedia.org/wiki/L'Inconnue_de_la_Seine
bbc.com/news/magazine-24534069
sciencealert.com/how-dead-girl-paris-ended-up-most-kissed-lips-in-history-l-inconnue-de-la-seine-resusci-anne-cpr-annie-death-mask
theguardian.com/world/2007/dec/01/france.art

Images

1. L'Inconnue de la Seine. Credit: Albert Rudomine, "Vierge_inconnue", 1927, gelatin silver print.
2. Paris in 1890. Credit: Ilbusca for Getty Images.
3. L'Inconnue de la Seine death mask
4. An artist sketching L'Inconnue, 1890
5. Man Ray image of l'inconnue de la Seine, 1966
6. Åsmund S. Lærdal practising resuscitation on an early Resusci Anne
7 & 8. Resusci Anne
9. Sir Adrian Curlewis with surfboard