This is a list of famous prostitutes:

Contents

1 Real-life and historical 2 Fictional 3 Alleged prostitutes 4 Symbolic or allegorical prostitutes

Real-life and historical

• Aspasia, hetaera companion of Pericles
• Laura Bell , the "Queen of London whoredom"
• Theresa Berkeley, 19th-century dominatrix
• Divine Brown , caught in a compromising situation with Hugh Grant
• Sydney Biddle Barrows, the Mayflower Madam
• Claudia Drexelius, German prostitute exposed through national TV
• Heidi Fleiss, the Hollywood Madam
• Nell Gwynne, courtesan to Charles II of England
• Christine Keeler, involved in the Profumo Affair
• Margaret MacDonald
• Madame Alex , the Beverly Hills Madam
• Madame Claude
• Mata Hari (born Margaretha Geertruida Zelle)
• Gerda Munsinger, Soviet spy
• Cynthia Payne
• Cora Pearl
• Phryne, Greek hetaera
• Rahab, Biblical prostitute who assisted the Hebrews in capturing Jericho
• Tamar (Bible, Genesis 38) posed as a prostitute
• Thais, Greek hetaera who lived during the time of Alexander the Great
• Thaïs, Greek hetaera who became a saint

Fictional

• Belle Watling , Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• Fanny Hill, Fanny Hill by John Cleland
• Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote (more of a kept woman than a prostitute proper)
• Tra La La , Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby
• Tamara Sperling in Robert A. Heinlein's Time Enough For Love.
• Sonya Marmeladova , "Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• Mrs Rosemary Palm, head of the Guild of Seamstresses in Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels
• Tilt, from The Monolith

See also Hooker with a heart of gold.

Alleged prostitutes

• Elizabeth Short (The Black Dahlia)
• Mary Magdalene
• Yoko Ono - according to Albert Goldman 's "The Lives of John Lennon"

Symbolic or allegorical prostitutes

• The Whore of Babylon
• Oholah and Oholibah
• The prostitute in The Harlot's Progress by William Hogarth