It is a well-recognized fact that after the menopause women become more hirsute, the same being the case after removal of any of the functional generative apparatus.

Vicat saw a virgin who had a beard, and Joch speaks of "foeminis barbati." Leblond says that certain women of Ethiopia and South America have beards and little or no menstruation.
He also says that sterility and excessive chastity are causes of female beards, and cites the case of Schott of a young widow who secluded herself in a cloister, and soon had a beard.
Barbara Urster, who lived in the 16th century, had a beard to her girdle.

The most celebrated "bearded woman" was Rosine-Marguerite Muller, who died in a hospital in Dresden in 1732, with a thick beard and heavy mustache.

Julia Pastrana had her face covered with thick hair and had a full beard and mustache.

She exhibited defective dentition in both jaws, and the teeth present were arranged in an irregular fashion.
She had pronounced prognathism, which gave her a simian appearance.
Ecker examined in 1876 a woman who died at Fribourg, whose face contained a full beard and a luxuriant mustache.
Harris reports several cases of bearded women, inmates of the Coton Hill Lunatic Asylum.