Yesterday evening, when I marched into the bedroom, tape measure in hand, my husband looked decidedly alarmed. “You’ve been reading those women’s mags again, haven’t you?” he said accusingly. “No I haven’t” I replied indignantly. What I have been reading is one of my Christmas presents, a book called ‘taking the proverbial’ by Geoff Rolls. The book explores the psychology of proverbs and sayings, to see whether they truly provide useful and reliable advice and explanation.

The expression ‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ has always puzzled me. It seems so self-evident given that no one person is the same, so their perception of beauty must differ. (Having said that, I’ve yet to come across a woman that thinks Johnny Depp is ugly.) However, it has always seemed to me that it is society that determines our definition of beauty, such as Chinese once considered extremely small feet to be so beautiful that women had their feet broken and bound.

Even in British society, you only have to look at portraits and photos to see how the perception of beauty changes with the times. Portraits of the Gunning sisters, renowned beauties in the 1750s, make it difficult to understand how these two women were considered so beautiful that they were mobbed when they appeared in public so that people could take a look at them. But fast forward to the film stars of the 50s and 60s, such as Elizabeth Taylor, Ava Gardner, Audrey Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor, and it is easier to see why they were considered so beautiful. Beauty today, however, now seems less obvious to define when top models and celebrities often follow the pneumatic-chested, scrawny-everything else, unwashed look.

The answer, according to Geoff Rolls, apparently lies in geometry. Research has proven that best underlying indicator of beauty is symmetrical features, a finding that is consistent across cultures. The Ancient Greeks too believed that beauty could be calculated by mathematical principles. A famous beauty, such as Helen of Troy, would have had a face of ‘golden proportion’ – in which the width of the face should be two-thirds of its length, preferably accompanied by a nose no longer than the distance between the eyes.

Hence the tape measure experiment in our bedroom. And I am extremely sorry to have to report that far from launching a 1,000 ships, my husband and I would be extremely lucky if we could persuade a leaky dinghy to take to the water for us.