Historical Selfies Taken Long Before Selfies Were Even A Thing

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American photographer Robert Cornelius in the first-ever photographic portrait of a human, self- or otherwise, 1839.Wikimedia Commons/Robert Cornelius

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Norwegian photographer and engineer Kristian Berge takes a mirror selfie, 1918. Wikimedia Commons/Kristian Berge

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Unidentified woman taking a mirror selfie with a box camera, 1900.Wikimedia Commons

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Astronaut Buzz Aldrin, pilot of the Gemini-12, takes a selfie in space, 1966. Wikimedia Commons/Buzz Aldrin

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Unknown woman takes a mirror selfie with a box camera, 1942.Wikimedia Commons

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American photographer Robert Cornelius in his second-ever selfie, 1843.Wikimedia Commons/Robert Cornelius

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American photographer and telescope manufacturer Henry Fitz, Jr. in a daguerreotype selfie, 1839. Wikimedia Commons/Henry Fitz, Jr.

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Daguerreotype selfie of Czech photographer M. V. Lobethal, 1846.Wikimedia Commons/M. V. Lobethal

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Australian modernist painter Albert Tucker takes a mirror selfie with wife and fellow artist Joy Hester, 1939. Wikimedia Commons/Albert Tucker

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Polish surrealist painter, photographer, and sculptor Zdzisław Beksiński takes a prism selfie, 1956-57.Wikimedia Commons/Zdzisław Beksiński

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American photographer Carol Highsmith takes a selfie in a broken mirror during the restoration of the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., between 1980 and 1990.Wikimedia Commons/Carol Highsmith

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Russian photographer Eleazar Langman takes a kettle selfie, 1935.Wikimedia Commons/Eleazar Langman

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Selfie of Basque author and biographer Juan San Martín, 1976.Wikimedia Commons/Juan San Martin

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Polish photographer Zbigniew Zugaj takes a mirror selfie, date unknown.Wikimedia Commons/Zbigniew Zugaj

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Selfie of American artist and arts patron Julia Christiansen Hoffman, co-founder of the Arts and Crafts Society of Portland, 1885.Wikimedia Commons/Julia Christiansen Hoffman

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Selfie of Polish photojournalist Julia Pirotte, best known for documenting World War II, date unknown.Wikimedia Commons/Julia Pirotte

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Finnish photographer Kari Hakli takes a mirror selfie, 1971.Wikimedia Commons/Kari Hakli

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Selfie of French photographer and stained-glass window artist Lucien Bégule, between 1915 and 1920.Wikimedia Commons/Lucien Bégule

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French painter and photographer Michel Saloff-Coste takes a mirror selfie, 1980s.Wikimedia Commons/Michel Saloff-Coste

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German photographer Roger Rössing takes a mirror selfie as an unknown man looks on, 1947.Wikimedia Commons/Roger Rössing

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Dutch painter, architect, designer, and writer Theo van Doesburg takes a selfie with his wife Nelly in the background, Paris, 1921.Wikimedia Commons/Theo van Doesburg

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Australian soldier and pilot Thomas Baker takes a dresser mirror selfie, 1917.Wikimedia Commons/Thomas Baker

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Unidentified woman takes a mirror selfie, 1938.Wikimedia Commons

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Armenian-Canadian photographer Yousuf Karsh, best known for his LIFE magazine covers, takes a selfie in Ottawa, 1938.Wikimedia Commons/Yousuf Karsh

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Historical Selfies Taken Long Before Selfies Were Even A Thing

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Selfies weren't pioneered by the MySpace generation, Generation X, the Greatest Generation -- or any generation, in fact -- this side of the Civil War.

Just over a decade after Joseph Nicéphore Niépce took history's first-ever photograph in 1826 or 1827, American photographer Robert Cornelius turned the lens upon himself, creating the first-ever selfie, long before the term had even been coined.

A deluge of selfies have followed in the ensuing centuries — but more of that sum was taken pre-2000 than you might think.

Unsurprisingly, many of these proto-selfies in the gallery above were taken not by amateur photographers pouting and posing in front of mirrors, but by professional photographers practicing their craft — and testing its boundaries — in their studios.

Still other early selfies were born out of necessity, such as astronaut Buzz Aldrin's from 1966, taken high above the blue marble of Earth, with co-pilot James A. Lovell the only other human within hundreds of miles.

That photo joins many others in the above gallery of proto-selfies ending in 1990 and starting with Cornelius all the way back in 1839. The inaugural year saw Cornelius taking the world's first portrait — self- or otherwise — of a human being, a monumental artistic and technical achievement.

Later, we're treated to decades of photographers using mirrors and other reflective surfaces to cleverly capture themselves capturing themselves — a necessity before handheld cameras made the casual self-portrait a simple and thus all-the-more tempting endeavor.

At the other end of the spectrum, you'll find an amateur self-snapshot of Basque author and biographer Juan San Martín from 1976 that is far closer to the selfies of the 21st century, taken seemingly on a whim, with little concern for the artistic merits of the end result.

Clicking through these images is proof that ease-of-use may have quickened the narcissistic impulse in photographers, both amateur and professional, but it certainly didn't create it.

Next, have a look at what may very well be the world's first selfie ever. Then, see how many selfie-related deaths have occurred since just 2014.