The Mona Lisa has no visible eyebrows or eyelashes.

Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, painted in the early 1500s, is famously missing eyebrows and eyelashes when viewed up close. Some art historians argue this reflects the fashion of the period, when Florentine women plucked their brows and hairlines to achieve a high, smooth forehead considered elegant at the time. Others suggest the fine, wispy strokes Leonardo would have used to paint them were simply worn away by centuries of aggressive cleaning and restoration.

Infrared and high-resolution scans of the painting have found faint traces of brushwork in the eyebrow area, lending some support to the restoration theory. Either way, the missing detail has become one of the most discussed quirks of the world’s most famous portrait, alongside the elusive nature of her smile.