Which of American Horror Story's Freaks Are Based on Real Circus Acts?

Fortune tellers, gypsies, mediums . . . whatever you call them, these performers, like this woman in this 1930s portrait, would have their own tents for palm readings, tarot cards, and crystal ball inspection.

Perhaps one of the more commonly known "freaks" in the circus, bearded ladies, like the one featured here in 1924, have appeared many times in pop culture, in many iterations. (See: Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant.)

Conjoined twins have been a constant source of fascination, both in real life and pop culture. It's easy to see why two heads on one body, seen in this 1970 photo of these twins, might generate curiosity. They've appeared in other fantastical ventures, like Big Fish, as well as more true-to-life situations, like on Grey's Anatomy.

There's just something about watching someone bend themselves in half that makes it impossible to look away. In circus performances, they might squeeze themselves into tiny boxes or perform death-defying feats of balance. This Cirque Medrano performer posed for this picture in 1938, and you can still find acts like this in the modern day, performing in venues like Cirque du Soleil.

There's another type of conjoined twin, where only one sibling is actually living. The result is fully formed limbs from the other half, but no actual person, like this three-legged boy from 1901. Also, this is something that still occurs; in 2005, a girl in India was born with four arms and four legs.

Anita, the woman in this 1912 photograph, was referred to as a "human doll," feeding into the trope that individuals affected by dwarfism have long been lumped in with the circus culture.

Meet Jyoti Amge, who is actually the world's smallest woman.

Another widely known talent in the circus industry involved sliding the length of a sharp blade down one's throat while somehow managing not to cause any internal damage. This man, pictured in 1945, did it on the streets of Paris.

We've already talked about the frequent inclusion of those below-average in height, but veritable giants, those affected by gigantism, were just as common. Think again of Big Fish. And, well, putting them together, like this 1912 photograph, seems like kind of an inevitability.

Come on, you can't have a circus or freak show without some kind of nightmare-inducing clowns, and these guys from the 1930s are a pretty unsettling example.