Catherine the Great’s Etiquette

“Good rules all, but rules difficult for any but a Queen to hold before her friends. The penalty for breaking the rules was the drinking of a glass of cold water for every offense. The Queen was most severe with those who broke the tenth commandment; they were never again admitted to the Hermitage, after being once found guilty of tittle-tattle.”

The Russian Czar’s Grandest Palace

THE famed Winter Palace of the Russian Czar probably has seen more romantic history in the making than any other building in Europe...

There is a table hung on the walls of the palace, draped with a green curtain, which contains Queen Catherine the Great's by-laws for the Hermitage Societies. They were: 

1. Leave your rank outside, as well as your hat, and especially your sword. 
2. Leave your right of precedence, your pride, and any similar feeling outside the door. 
3. Be gay, but do not spoil anything; do not break or gnaw anything. 
4. Sit, stand, walk as you will, without reference to anybody. 
5. Talk moderately and not very loud, so as not to make the ears and heads of others ache. 
6. Argue without anger and without excitement. 
7. Neither sigh nor yawn, nor make anybody dull or heavy. 
8. In all innocent games, whatever one proposes, let all join. 
9. Eat whatever is sweet and savory, but drink with moderation, so that each may find his legs on leaving the room. 
10. Tell no tales out of school; whatever goes in at one ear must go out at the other before leaving the room. 

Good rules all, but rules difficult for any but a Queen to hold before her friends. The penalty for breaking the rules was the drinking of a glass of cold water for every offense. The Queen was most severe with those who broke the tenth commandment; they were never again admitted to the Hermitage, after being once found guilty of tittle-tattle. – Sausalito News, 1915

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