Do you know where the word etiquette comes from? Cindy Post Senning, Emily Post's great-granddaughter, shares how the word etiquette came to represent our so...
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19 May 2011 08:59:06AM @madame-desireme-fallen:
I found this amusing..and wondered if this was the start of the strict code of etiquette imposed upon the nobles?
19 May 2011 12:40:55PM @madame-desireme-fallen:
Oh thank you, Contessa Rezzonico! When I found it, asI have been researching the ettiquette, I had no idea it meant little cards and thatthat was the way he usedin training the courtiers, to a new behavior. I appreciate your explanation very much as it gives me more to reasearch as this is a hard subject to find out information about, as most of it is not online, but in archives in Paris.
Yes, 'etiquette' in French nowadays is more in use for a little label on garments in a shop, but etymologically, it derives from a french provincial and medieval word ' estiquier', which meant something like ' push in', or 'dig in', andconsequently described a post with a sign on it.
This being said, I doubt very much that the explanation given in this ' History for the noobs' video, telling us that Louis XIV had planted signs all over Versailles' Gardens to teach his Courtiers not to bathe in the fountains ( !!), nor to stomp the flowers ( !!!), is historically relevant.
I 'd rather follow the historical path designed by Her Excellency la Contessa Rezzonico, an expert in these matters, and believe that the French Ceremonial adapted and 'frenchified' the Spanish Ceremonial, borrowing it its name 'Etiqueta'. But it leaves me to wonder why and how the Spanish took the French name of etiquette to'spanish' it to Etiqueta, and if the Spanish court Etiqueta was inscribed on little leaflets, for instance, that the Courtiers could read , just in case...?
Maybesome of the Courtiers from the Spanish Court here could provide us with more information?
If so, I'd be grateful to them if they would do it in English:-)))
19 May 2011 03:35:26PM @madame-desireme-fallen:
Wow....is there any source either of you can direct me to online...as this gives it a total different direction that I could have ever imagined....THANK YOU both for this very intelligent insightful dialogue!
My doubts were not so much about the existence ofsigns or cards in the gardens of Versailles, than on their causal relation to Louis XIV Court Code, or Ceremonial, or 'etiquette'. I think they were rather informative, and aimed not at the Courtiers, but at the people: we should not forget that all of Versailles, except the Chapel -but even the King's bedroom in his absence-, was opened to public.
See for instance Edward Young's Travel in France- 1787 , when visiting Versailles, he noticed: " The whole place, except the Chapel,seems to be opened to all the world; we pushed through an amazing crowd of all sorts of people (...), many of them not very well dressed, whence it appears that no questions were asked."
I found this amusing..and wondered if this was the start of the strict code of etiquette imposed upon the nobles?
Oh thank you, Contessa Rezzonico! When I found it, asI have been researching the ettiquette, I had no idea it meant little cards and thatthat was the way he usedin training the courtiers, to a new behavior. I appreciate your explanation very much as it gives me more to reasearch as this is a hard subject to find out information about, as most of it is not online, but in archives in Paris.
Yes, 'etiquette' in French nowadays is more in use for a little label on garments in a shop, but etymologically, it derives from a french provincial and medieval word ' estiquier', which meant something like ' push in', or 'dig in', andconsequently described a post with a sign on it.
This being said, I doubt very much that the explanation given in this ' History for the noobs' video, telling us that Louis XIV had planted signs all over Versailles' Gardens to teach his Courtiers not to bathe in the fountains ( !!), nor to stomp the flowers ( !!!), is historically relevant.
I 'd rather follow the historical path designed by Her Excellency la Contessa Rezzonico, an expert in these matters, and believe that the French Ceremonial adapted and 'frenchified' the Spanish Ceremonial, borrowing it its name 'Etiqueta'. But it leaves me to wonder why and how the Spanish took the French name of etiquette to'spanish' it to Etiqueta, and if the Spanish court Etiqueta was inscribed on little leaflets, for instance, that the Courtiers could read , just in case...?
Maybesome of the Courtiers from the Spanish Court here could provide us with more information?
If so, I'd be grateful to them if they would do it in English:-)))
Wow....is there any source either of you can direct me to online...as this gives it a total different direction that I could have ever imagined....THANK YOU both for this very intelligent insightful dialogue!
My doubts were not so much about the existence ofsigns or cards in the gardens of Versailles, than on their causal relation to Louis XIV Court Code, or Ceremonial, or 'etiquette'. I think they were rather informative, and aimed not at the Courtiers, but at the people: we should not forget that all of Versailles, except the Chapel -but even the King's bedroom in his absence-, was opened to public.
See for instance Edward Young's Travel in France- 1787 , when visiting Versailles, he noticed: " The whole place, except the Chapel,seems to be opened to all the world; we pushed through an amazing crowd of all sorts of people (...), many of them not very well dressed, whence it appears that no questions were asked."