Etiquette of a Puritan Place Setting

Puritan place-setting, c.1670 — Photograph: Jeremy Phillips for Fairfax House, York

With England recovering from a long period of austere Puritanism, and the Crown reclaimed by a Monarch used to extravagance and ornament, it still took time for luxury to manifest itself again on the dining-room table.

The one exotic item in this particular assembly is the napkin, woven in Flanders with patterns of flowers, but folded in the shape of a fish, after instructions in Giles Rose's manual.

The knife and two-tine fork by Abraham Brock and spoon by Jacob Isaac could not be simpler, although there is some decoration on the Façon de Venise goblet. 

It is the monumental silver candlesticks by Jacob Bodendick, 1677, which stand out, however, resting on their spreading square base and cushion-shaped knop. Notice also how the baluster stem terminates in a square candle socket.— From “British Cutlery, An Illustrated History of Design, Evolution and Use”, York Civic Trust, 2001

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Frogs Divide England and France

“Now a terrapin, a turtle, a clam or an oyster is subject to all the same natural repulsion as a frog, and an oyster is particularly objectionable in appearance and slimy suggestiveness.” —  Eight “Delmonico” pattern oyster forks 

— Photo source, Etiquipedia private library  

 

Gilded Age Frog Legs...

Money Can Be Made by Raising Them —

If You Do Not Like a Frog Dinner There Are Plenty of Others That Do

Crispy frog legs are a delicacy in many countries ~ “... the bones of frogs’ legs may be eaten in part with the fingers when the legs... are so small as to defy all but the most expert trencherman.” Such small bones are held in the fingers by one end while the other end is placed directly in the mouth. The impression of gnawing the bone must be avoided. It is no shame, by the way, for a lady confronted with a squab or half a broiled chicken to ask assistance from the gentleman with her in dissecting it unless perhaps she’s at a formal dinner. This is better than running the risk of having the meat land in her lap or, on the other hand, going hungry, if she is really inept.- Amy Vanderbilt etiquette for eating small birds or frog’s legs

Did you ever eat a frog dinner? Never, you will say. Then you have missed something. “Nasty things! The idea!” may be the exclamation of a young housewife who would not shrink from a terrapin stew, a turtle steak, a clam fry or a half-dozen oysters raw on the half shell. Now a terrapin, a turtle, a clam or an oyster is subject to all the same natural repulsion as a frog, and an oyster is particularly objectionable in appearance and slimy suggestiveness. 

Frogs are supposed to divide England and France, gastronomically speaking, as sharply as the English Channel does geographically. One of the first things which sensible Americans did after the colonies had thrown off the yoke was to disembarrass themselves of all silly insular prejudices. They began eating frogs, French fashion. In many of the Eastern States, frogs are as common as chickens or chops in the windows of restaurants.

It takes quite a number of frogs to furnish a square meal, because only the hind legs are eaten. A frog dinner comes high. It is comparable in price only to reed birds on toast, or quail in the first of the season. Fried in batter a dozen frog’s legs would tempt any epicure. A very dainty spring chicken is the best suggestion, but the frog is tenderer than that. Yes, there is money in frogs if the work of raising them is set about in the right way.— San Francisco Call, 1893

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Edwardian Brits’ Etiquette Supremacy?

With the Continental eater, the knife enters into conversation. It is retained in the gesticulating hand, it is raised imploringly to the celling, and — heaven!— it is brought into strange circles of argument. It is used to point the conclusion at the very breast of the fellow diner. When you see a man waving his knife at table, you may be sure he is an alien. “We wear no swords here,” as Sir Lucius O'Trigger says, nor do we argue with knives at table. – London Chronicle, 1907

Good Table Manners are the Art in Which the English Claim to Be Supreme

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They Sneer at Other Nations Germany, France and America, Say the Britons, Cannot Compare With Them in Good Form at Meals — Use of the Knife, Fork, Spoon and Napkin

Let it be admitted that our army is a failure, has never won a victory and never will; admitted that our navy would have difficulty in sweeping six combined great powers off the sea; admitted that we cannot act up to the French standard or trade up to the German or hustle up to the American or cheat up to the Greek. But we cherish our little pride and prejudice. The Englishman regards himself and is generally regarded as the best dressed man in the world. He also plumes himself on having the best table manners. To the Frenchman may be conceded the supremacy in the preparation of food, while the production of it owing to the decay of our agriculture, may be left to such outlying places as Siberia and Chicago.

But when it comes to the eating of food the Englishman asserts his supremacy, for if the highest art be to conceal art the highest etiquette of eating should be the triumphant pretense that one is not eating at all. And here the Englishman wins. He can eat his way through a seven course meal quite unobtrusively. It was not always so.

Lord Chesterfield, as I have been reminded by Mr. Philip Wellby's edition of the “Advice to His Son,” sketches the awkward man who “holds his knife, fork and spoon differently from other people, eats with his knife to the great danger of his mouth, picks his teeth with his fork and puts his spoon, which has been in his throat twenty times, into the dishes again. If he is to carve, he never hits the joint, but in his vain efforts to cut through the bone scatters the sauce in everybody's face. He generally daubs himself with soup and grease, though his napkin is commonly stuck through a buttonhole.”

That napkin is a test of table manners, and the nice conduct of the napkin caught the attention recently of the German Emperor, who saw one of his guests tucking the napkin under a chin. “Do you want to be shaved?” was the Imperial question. England's supremacy— in the matter of soup— lies in the spoon. An Englishman is taught to take soup from the side of the spoon. And he is the only man on earth who emerges from soup with the white shirt front of a blameless dinner and without the aid of a tucked napkin. He lays the napkin across his knees and uses it when necessary without ostentation.

That discreet conduct of the knife is the Englishman's pride and prejudice at table. There is no nation which (in its upper middle classes) reaches the English standard of the nice conduct of the knife, though we are assured that in the highest circles— among ameers, shahs, sultans, dukes and millionaires—there is a beautiful uniformity of deportment. Our insular instinct is to make the knife as inconspicuous as possible, for there is some suggestion of brutality in the slicing of bits of corpses that are doomed to keep our rile bodies alive.

No such feeling restrains the German eater, and the French diner is scarcely less sensitive. The German who feeds in the average restaurant will shovel his food into his mouth with the blade of his knife and when in a difficulty, will cram it down with the handle, nor has he the least scruple about depositing the rejected residue upon the floor. Moreover, with the Continental eater, the knife enters into conversation. It is retained in the gesticulating hand, it is raised imploringly to the celling, and — heaven!— it is brought into strange circles of argument. It is used to point the conclusion at the very breast of the fellow diner.

When you see a man waving his knife at table, you may be sure he is an alien. “We wear no swords here,” as Sir Lucius O'Trigger says, nor do we argue with knives at table.

The English knife, with all its blood thirsty suggestions, is reduced to the lowest and least obtrusive office. It is not even dug into the salt cellar, for England has reached the delicacy of salt spoons, and only in a Soho restaurant will she give you the real savor of the continent by providing salt cellars without spoons. You shove your knife into the salt and dream of Paris, Bohemia, the gypsy life in which “you dip your fingers in the pot.”

England has suppressed the knife at table. The Englishman does not use it for argument or menace or persuasion or even for the taking of salt. His table manners enjoin that the knife shall never be raised. The properly conducted knife at table never reaches forty-five degrees above the horizontal.

Unfortunately the American goes a little too far in the desire to avoid the obtrusive use of the knife and takes refuge In obtrusive concealment. Many Americans will slice their meat with the knife, lay the knife by the sitle of the plate and put the pieces into the mouth with the fork held in the right hand. Now, this is injustice to the knife, which has its modest function.— London Chronicle, 1907

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Etiquette and People of the 5 Meals

Downton Abbey’s Mrs. Hughes, Mr. Carson and Anna Bates enjoying a Middle Age “beever” or “noonshine?”

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What 5 British meals was Signor Bergeret referring to?  —The terminology around eating in the UK is confusing. For some, “lunch” is “dinner” and vice versa. From the Roman times to the Middle Ages everyone ate in the middle of the day, but it was called dinner and was the main meal of the day. Lunch as we know it didn’t exist - not even the word. During the Middle Ages daylight shaped mealtimes, says food historian Ivan Day. With no electricity, people got up earlier to make use of daylight. Workers had often toiled in the fields from daybreak, so by midday they were hungry. “People got up much earlier and went to bed much earlier.” By midday workers had often worked for up to 6 hours. They would take a quick break and eat what was known as a “beever” or “noonshine,” usually bread and cheese. As artificial light developed, dinner started to shift later in the day for the wealthier, as a result a light meal during the day was needed. The origins of the word “lunch” are mysterious and complicated, says Day. “Lunch was a very rare word up until the 19th C.,” he says. One theory is that it's derived from the word “nuncheon,” an old Anglo-Saxon word which meant a quick snack between meals that you can hold in your hands. Others theorise that it comes from the word “nuch” which was used around in the 16th and 17th C. and means a big piece of bread. — from an article by Denise Winterman, BBC News Magazine

Signor Bergeret, the special traveling correspondent of the “Mattino,” Naples, has been much impressed with the wonderfully adaptive qualities of the British, who bend all things to their will. Writing from Colombo he says: “Only the English, the race of stone and iron, are able, in the midst of this high-pressure work of nature, to continue their physical and mental activity, and the over-feeding which has procured for them the name of  ‘people of the five meals.’ They demand that in the colonies, every Briton shall be ‘twice British.’ 

“They have transported to the torrid zone their fatiguing games, their rigid etiquette, the abuse of meat, and the use of whisky, and have got the better of the climate as of the land; of the hostility of commercial and official intrigues, as of the violence of nature. No human race has ever been so admirably tempered for colonial domination. Their nature, education and moral principles combine to render the British masters of men and things on the seas and in distant countries. “Seeing their work, one becomes reconciled to the English. These gentlemen of the porcelain shirt fronts, the impeccable cravats, are marvelously tenacious workers, but their incessant fatigue does not make them into so many machines as it does the Germans.” — 1904

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Etiquette of British Food–French Style

In England, a fish knife is always served with fish. You will take it for a butter knife, but as you will look in vain for the butter, you are safe in using it for fish. Bread is served as an article of food and is not used as a pusher. The fork is always kept in the left hand, not juggled from one hand to the other. Vegetables, including peas, are mashed on the back of it with a knife. Small knives and forks are served with all fruits. Under no circumstances is fruit desecrated by a touch of the fingers. A fork and dessert spoon are served with all desserts. You push the confection on the spoon with the fork and proceed as usual. - Above, an early 1900’s British-made, individual fish knife and fish fork. The fish knife blade is designed so that anyone unfamiliar with this set otherwise, would understand it is for eating fish.

To Be a Gentleman Abroad...

The Way One Must Eat in England and Dress in France 

In polite society in England, a fish knife is always served with fish. You will take it for a butter knife, but as you will look in vain for the butter, you are safe in using it for fish. Bread is served as an article of food and is not used as a pusher. The fork is always kept in the left hand, not juggled from one hand to the other. Vegetables, including peas, are mashed on the back of it with a knife. Small knives and forks are served with all fruits. Under no circumstances is fruit desecrated by a touch of the fingers. A fork and dessert spoon are served with all desserts. You push the confection on the spoon with the fork and proceed as usual. Tea, coffee and cocoa are not sipped with a spoon. A teaspoon is to stir with. After it has served that purpose, its little mission is over, and it reposes placidly on the saucer. When you have finished with them, the knife and fork are placed on the plate directly in front of you. While dining, under no circumstances allow them to rest half on the plate and half on the table. You may be called a ‘‘rower” if you do. 

Bread is broken with one hand only, the left one usually. All vegetables, excepting asparagus, are served on the dinner plate. You will look for the birds bath tubs in vain. You may break all the Ten Commandments, but by observing the above and taking a daily tub you will pass for a gentleman. By failure in any one of these details you will find yourself utterly déclassé. In England all social etiquette that is not English, is vulgar. When you reach France, however, you may relapse into all your little home comforts. You may pick your teeth and manicure your nails in a restaurant, and you can eat anything you like with your fingers. You may omit your daily tub and patronize the “parfumerie.” But if you wish to be a gentleman you must wear smart clothes, smart clothes consisting chiefly of gayly colored waistcoats, socks and ties. The most important man in France is the hotel concierge. He possesses the “open sesame” of all things. After you have paid your respects to him in due form, you may consider yourself one of the initiated. – New York Sun, 1913

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Etiquette and the Royal Breakfast

 The Prince of Wales’ set recently adopted the idea from the French and all London’s rapidly taking up the custom! – No doubt the Americans who have gone to England to help celebrate the Queen's Jubilee will return imbued with the idea that soup for breakfast is the only proper and polite thing. The custom has long been prevalent in France, and is now being introduced in London.

The Prince’s New Breakfast 

The Prince of Wales Has Recently Set the Fashion 

No doubt the Americans who have gone to England to help celebrate the Queen's Jubilee will return imbued with the idea that soup for breakfast is the only proper and polite thing. The custom has long been prevalent in France, and is now being introduced in London. “At all the first-class cafés in Paris,” says a gentleman recently returned from the other side, “the patrons can get soups of various kinds for breakfast, and a great many Parisians sip soup before putting anything more substantial in their stomachs. In London, two months ago, Henry White, the swell secretary of the American legation, invited me to breakfast, and the first thing on the menu was soup. He told me that the Prince of Wales’ set had recently adopted the idea from the French and that all London was rapidly taking up the custom.” 

Mr. White set the pace for Americans over there, and whether or not he entertains all of his countrymen who are flocking to the Queen’s Jubilee, he can introduce enough of them to this new fad to cause the whole outfit to come back home singing its praises. “It is really one of the most sensible gastronomic innovations I can imagine. Soup, when properly made, is both soothing and stimulating. The over-taxed stomach of the average American needs both to be soothed and stimulated the first thing in the morning. Therefore, I look for the soup idea to become immediately popular when it is brought over by our tourists. Doubtless they will invent a name for it, as the fashionable folk of this country are afraid to risk their standing among the gourmets by eating for breakfast a dish with so plain and vulgar a name as ‘soup’.” – Los Angeles Herald, 1897

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A Toothpick Etiquette Lesson

It is narrow and provincial to despise people for their disregard of certain small rules of etiquette. The things we despise them for, which may be glaring errors in Seattle or New York, may be again, as like as not, the correct thing in Paris and London

 A Visit to London and a Little Lesson In Etiquette

“I ran over for a short visit to London,” said a globe trotter. “On the boat was a pretty widow from Altona who disgusted and amused all hands one day by saying; 'I am surprised that a fast and expensive boat like this should fail to supply us with toothpicks."  She thought toothpicks indispensable, like napkins or forks. For thinking so, we set her down as a hecker. 

But wait. I dined during my visit in London at Prince's, in Piccadilly and at the Savoy, in the room that overlooks the embankment and the river, and at the Carlton, where I paid a dollar for a plate of soup, and at all of these restaurants, which are admittedly the finest, the smartest and the most fashionable in the world. At all of them there were toothpicks on the table, each toothpick done up in a sterilized envelope.' This taught me a lesson. It taught me that it is narrow and provincial to despise people for their disregard of certain small rules of etiquette. The things we despise them for, which may be glaring errors in Seattle or New York, may be again, as like as not, the correct thing in Paris and London.”— New York Press, 1906

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British Royal Etiquette History and Dining

ROYALTY OF OLD BIG EATERS 

Feast at Court of King Richard II Called for Vast Amount of Food

England in the Canterbury days ate much in the French style. Spoons and fingers were good manners and carving was new-fangled. If it was, in fact, practiced to any extent at all. 

Richard II and the Duke of Lancaster once dined in London with the Bishop of Durham. The King, the Duke and the Bishop and their retinues and guests called for 120 sheep, 14 salted oxen and 2 fresh, 1,240 pigs, 12 boars, 210 geese, 720 hens, 50 capons "of hie geze" and eight dozen other capons, 50 swans and 100 dozen pigeons; rabbits and curlews by the score, 11,000 eggs, 12 gallons of cream and 120 gallons of milk.

The usual forms of address for a King for much of the "Plantagenet era" in England were ‘your highness’ and ‘your Grace’. Richard II introduced the terms ‘your majesty’ and ‘your high majesty’ to the court vocabulary, having had a grander and more elaborate vision of kingship than his predecessors.
During the King's later reign, there are accounts of Richard II sitting in splendor on his throne after dinner, while glaring around the room at the courtiers assembled there. It is said that, whomever his gaze rested upon was to fall to their knees in humble appreciation of his royal awesomeness. Eventually wearing thin, in 1399 Richard was deposed by his cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, who took the throne as Henry IV, which abruptly ended an unbroken succession of Plantagenet kings since the 12th century.

Such was a royal feast, says the Detroit News, and every day, whether fast day or eating day, had four meals. Breakfast at seven, dinner at ten in the morning, supper at four and livery at eight. The hour of dinner is said to show the development of cooking in any given country. But there were Chaucerian refinements, nevertheless, aside from dishes of flowers; permissible foods imitating the form of meats on fast days, hen eggs being counterfeited and clever things such as making two capons out of one by skinning it and stuffing the skin. 

There were, besides, the points of etiquette; a pig for a lord should be endored. His cabbage thickened with egg, not crumbs; a pike served whole to a Lord, but cut for the commonality. And mint sauce has a pedigree reaching to Edward I. – From Detroit News as reprinted in Sausalito News, 1924

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British Dining Etiquette History

Etiquette of the Table

Elizabethan flagon ~ Elizabethans were seen as "more polite in eating than the French," by author, Paul Hentzner

     
Paul Hentzner, who was in England at the end of the reign of Elizabeth, remarks of the people whom he saw that "they are more polite in eating than the French, devouring less bread, but more meat, which they roast in perfection. They put a good deal of sugar in their drink."

In his "Court and Country," 1618, Nicholas Breton gives an instructive account of the strict rules which were drawn up for observance in great households at that time, and says that the gentlemen who attended on great lords and ladies had enough to do to carry these orders out. Not a trencher must be laid or a napkin folded awry; not a dish misplaced; not a capon carved or a rabbit unlaced contrary to the usual practice; not a glass filled or a cup uncovered save at the appointed moment: everybody must stand, speak, and look according to regulation.

The books of demeanour which have been collected by Mr. Furnivall for the Early English Text Society have their incidental value as illustrating the immediate theme, and are curious, from the growth in consecutive compilations of the code of instructions for behaviour at table, as evidences of an increasing cultivation both in manners and the variety of appliances for domestic use, including relays of knives for the successive courses.

Distinctions were gradually drawn between genteel and vulgar or coarse ways of eating, and facilities were provided for keeping the food from direct contact with the fingers, and other primitive offences against decorum. Many of the precepts in the late fifteenth century "Babies' Book," while they demonstrate the necessity for admonition, speak also to an advance in politeness and delicacy at table. There must be a beginning somewhere; and the authors of these guides to deportment had imbibed the feeling for something higher and better, before they undertook to communicate their views to the young generation.
                                 

There is no doubt that the "Babies' Book" and its existing congeners are the successors of anterior and still more imperfect attempts to introduce at table some degree of cleanliness and decency. When the "Babies' Book" made its appearance, the progress in this direction must have been immense. But the observance of such niceties was of course at first exceptional; and the ideas which we see here embodied were very sparingly carried into practice outside the verge of the Court itself and the homes of a few of the aristocracy.

There may be an inclination to revolt against the barbarous doggerel in which the instruction is, as a rule, conveyed, and against the tedious process of perusing a series of productions which follow mainly the same lines. But it is to be recollected that these manuals were necessarily renewed in the manuscript form from age to age, with variations and additions, and that the writers resorted to metre as a means of impressing the rules of conduct more forcibly on their pupils.
                   

Of all the works devoted to the management of the table and kitchen, the "Book of Nurture," by John Russell, usher of the chamber and marshal of the ball to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, is perhaps, on the whole, the most elaborate, most trustworthy, and most important. It leaves little connected with the cuisine of a noble establishment of the fifteenth century untouched and unexplained; and although it assumes the metrical form, and in a literary respect is a dreary performance, its value as a guide to almost every branch of the subject is indubitable. It lays bare to our eyes the entire machinery of the household, and we gain a clearer insight from it than from the rest of the group of treatises, not merely into what a great man of those days and his family and retainers ate and drank, and how they used to behave themselves at table, but into the process of making various drinks, the mystery of carving, and the division of duties among the members of the staff. It is, in fact, the earliest comprehensive book in our literature.

The functions of the squire at the table of a prince are, to a certain extent, shown in the "Squire of Low Degree," where the hero, having arrayed himself in scarlet, with a chaplet on his head and a belt round his waist, cast a horn about his neck, and went to perform his duty in the hall. He approaches the king, dish in hand, and kneels. When he has served his sovereign, he hands the meats to the others. We see a handsome assortment of victuals on this occasion, chiefly venison and birds, and some of the latter were baked in bread, probably a sort of paste. The majority of the names on the list are familiar, but a few—the teal, the curlew, the crane, the stork, and the snipe—appear to be new. It is, in all these cases, almost impossible to be sure how much we owe to the poet's imagination and how much to his rhythmical poverty. From another passage it is to be inferred that baked venison was a favourite mode of dressing the deer.

The precaution of coming to table with clean hands was inculcated perhaps first as a necessity, when neither forks nor knives were used, and subsequently as a mark of breeding. The knife preceded the spoon, and the fork, which had been introduced into Italy in the eleventh century, and which strikes one as a fortuitous development of the Oriental chopstick, came last. It was not in general use even in the seventeenth century here. Coryat the traveller saw it among the Italians, and deemed it a luxury and a notable fact.

The precepts delivered by Lydgate and others for demeanour at table were in advance of the age, and were probably as much honoured in the breach as otherwise. But the common folk did then much as many of them do now, and granted themselves a dispensation both from knife and fork, and soap and water. The country boor still eats his bacon or his herring with his fingers, just as Charles XII. of Sweden buttered his bread with his royal thumb.

A certain cleanliness of person, which, at the outset, was not considerably regarded, became customary, as manners softened and female influence asserted itself; and even Lydgate, in his "Stans Puer ad Mensam (an adaptation from Sulpitius)," enjoins on his page or serving-boy a resort to the lavatory before he proceeds to discharge his functions at the board—

"Pare clean thy nails; thy hands wash also

Before meat; and when thou dost arise."

       

Other precepts follow. He was not to speak with his mouth full. He was to wipe his lips after eating, and his spoon when he had finished, taking care not to leave it in his dish. He was to keep his napkin as clean and neat as possible, and he was not to pick his teeth with his knife. He was not to put too much on his trencher at once. He was not to drop his sauce or soup over his clothes, or to fill his spoon too full, or to bring dirty knives to the table. All these points of conduct are graphic enough; and their trite character is their virtue.
                                   

The country boor still eats his bacon or his herring with his fingers, just as Charles XII of Sweden buttered his bread with his royal thumb.

Boiled, and perhaps fried meats were served on silver; but roasts might be brought to table on the spit, which, after a while, was often of silver, and handed round for each person to cut what he pleased; and this was done not only with ordinary meat, but with game, and even with a delicacy like a roast peacock. Of smaller birds, several were broached on one spit. There is a mediaeval story of a husband being asked by his wife to help her to the several parts of a fowl in succession, till nothing was left but the implement on which it had come in, whereupon the man determined she should have that too, and belaboured her soundly with it. At more ceremonious banquets the servants were preceded by music, or their approach from the kitchen to the hall was proclaimed by sound of trumpets. Costly plate was gradually introduced, as well as linen and utensils, for the table; but the plate may be conjectured to have been an outcome from the primitive trencher, a large slice of bread on which meat was laid for the occupants of the high table, and which was cast aside after use.

Bread served at table was not to be bitten or broken off the loaf, but to be cut; and the loaf was sometimes divided before the meal, and skilfully pieced together again, so as to be ready for use.

From “Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine,” by W. Carew Hazlitt, 1902

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Early 16th C. Etiquette and Virtue

The Schoole of Vertue was a popular book on manners and morals for children, published in 1582.

First, say this prayer: “O God! enable us to follow virtue. Defend us this day. Let us abound with virtues, flee from vice, and go forward in good doing to our live’s end.”
Repeat the Lord’s Prayer night and morning. 

How to wash and dress yourself:

Don’t sleep too long.
Rise early; cast up your bed, and don’t let it lie.
Go down, salute your parents, wash your hands, comb your head, brush your cap and put it on.
Tie on your shirt-collar, fasten your girdle, rub your breeches, clean your shoes, wipe your nose on a napkin, pare your nails, clean your ears, wash your teeth.
Have your torn clothes mended, or new ones obtained.
Get your satchell and books, and haste to School, taking too pen, paper, and ink, which are necessary for use at school.
Then start off.

How to behave going to, and at, School:

Take off your cap to those you meet; give way to passers by.
Call your playmates on your road.
At School salute your master, and the scholars.
Go straight to your place, undo your satchell, take out your books and learn your lesson; stick well to your books.
If you don’t work, you’ll repent it when you grow up.
Who could now speak of famous deeds of old, had not Letters preserved them?
Work hard then, and you’ll be thought worthy to serve the state.
Men of low birth win honour by Learning, and then are doubly happy.
When you doubt, ask to be told.
Wish well to those who warn you.
On your way home walk two and two orderly (for which men will praise you); don’t run in heaps like a swarm of bees like boys do now.)
Don’t whoop or hallow as in fox-hunting don’t chatter, or stare at every new fangle, but walk soberly, taking your cap off to all, and being gentle.
Do no man harm; speak fair words.
On reaching home salute your parents reverently.

How to wait at table:

Look your parents in the face, hold up your hands, and say Grace before meate.
Grace before Meat.
Make a low curtesy; wish your parents’ food may do ’em good.
If you are big enough, bring the food to table.
Don’t fill dishes so full as to spill them on your parents’ dress, or they’ll be angry.
Have spare trenchers ready for guests.
See there’s plenty of everything wanted.
Empty the Voiders often.
Be at hand if any one calls. 

When the meat is over, clear the table:
1. cover the salt,
2. have a tray by you to carry things off on,
3. put the trenchers, &c., in one Voider,
4. sweep the crumbs into another,
5. set a clean trencher before every one,
6. put on Cheese, Fruit, Biscuits, and
7. serve Wine, Ale or Beer. 

When these are finished, clear the table, and fold up the cloth.
Then spread a clean towel, bring bason and jug, and when your parents are ready to wash, and when your parents are ready to wash, pour out the water.
Clear the table; make a low curtsey.

How to behave at your own dinner:

Let your betters sit above you.
See others served first, then wait a while before eating.
Take salt with your knife, cut your bread, don’t fill your spoon too full, or sup your pottage.
Have your knife sharp.
Don’t smack your lips or gnaw your bones: avoid such beastliness.
Keep your fingers clean, wipe your mouth before drinking.
Don’t jabber or stuff.
Silence hurts no one, and is fitted for a child at table.
Don’t pick your teeth, or spit too much.
Behave properly.
Don’t laugh too much.
Learn all the good manners you can.
They are better than playing the fiddle, though that’s no harm, but necessary; yet manners are more important. 

How to behave at Church:

Pray kneeling or standing.Confess your sins to God.
He knows your disease.
Ask in faith, and what you ask you shall have; He is more merciful than pen can tell.
Behave nicely in church, and don’t talk or chatter.
Behave reverently; the House of Prayer is not to be made a fair.
Avoid dicing and carding.
Delight in Knowledge, Virtue, and Learning.
Happy is he who cultivates Virtue.
Cursed is he who forsakes it.
Let reason rule you, and subdue your lusts.
These ills come from gambling: strife, murder, theft, cursing and swearing. 

How to behave when conversing:

Understand a question before you answer it; let a man tell all his tale.
Then bow to him, look him in the face, and answer sensibly, not staring about or laughing, but audibly and distinctly, your words in due order, or you’ll straggle off, or stutter, or stammer, which is a foul crime.
Always keep your head uncovered.
Better unfed than untaught. 

How to take a Message:

Listen to it well; don’t go away not knowing it.
Then hurry away, give the message; get the answer, return home, and tell it to your master exactly as it was told to you.

Against Anger, etc...

The slave of Anger must fall.
Anger’s deeds are strange to wise men.
A hasty man is always in trouble.
Take no revenge, but forgive.
Envy no one.
An ill body breeds debate.

The Fruits of Charity, etc...

Charity seeketh not her own, but bears patiently.
Love incites to Mercy.
Patience teaches forbearance.
Pray God to give thee Charity and Patience, to lead thee to Virtue’s School, and thence to Eternal Bliss.

Against Swearing:

Take not God’s name in vain, or He will plague thee.
Beware of His wrath, and live well in thy vocation.
What is the good of swearing?
It kindles God’s wrath against thee.
God’s law forbids swearing, and so does the counsel of Philosophers.

Against filthy talking:

Never talk dirt.
For every word we shall give account at the Day of Doom, and be judged according to our deeds.
Let lewd livers then fear.
Keep your tongue from vain talking.

Against Lying:

To speak the truth needs no study, therefore always practise it and speak it.
Shame is the reward of lying.
Always speak the truth.
Who can trust a liar?
If a lie saves you once, it deceives you thrice.

                       
                              From Francis Segar, 1582

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Past Dining Etiquette, Foods and Customs of the British Royal Meals

What makes a dish fit for a Queen? If past royal delicacies are anything to go by then pretty much anything, including seagull, marigolds or peacock - with the skin and feathers put back on after cooking, of course.

Lavish banquets and feasts have always been part of royal celebrations and as part of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, schoolchildren in the UK were asked to create a special menu for Her Majesty. The winning school saw its recipes served to the Queen at a special reception.

But what was on the menu in times gone by and would serving a canape directly to the monarch have resulted in you losing your head?

There was a very well established etiquette. Victoria's famous line “we are not amused” was uttered when someone told her a joke at the dinner table, breaking strict rules.  Ironically, Queen Victoria had fairly poor dining manners by today's standards, but many of today's rules about manners were formalised in the "Victorian era" named for her reign.

Queen Victoria 1837-1901

There were big changes in service style through Queen Victoria's 63-year reign, says food historian Annie Gray. Towards the end food was served to guests at the table sequentially, known as “a la russe.” It's silver service as we now know it.

There were four to six courses, with seven to nine dishes in each. For big occasions dishes often included cod with oyster sauce, ballotines of duck in Cumberland sauce and roast lamb. There would be a dessert course, with dishes like chocolate profiteroles. A buffet of hot and cold meats was also kept on a sideboard during the meal, just in case you got hungry between courses.

What was unusual about Victoria was the speed with which she ate. Usually a banquet would last for hours, but she could put away seven courses in 30 minutes, says Gray.

The Victorian Era is regarded as one of gentility and graceful manners, though Queen Victoria herself was known to have very poor table manners.  A speedy-eater, Queen Victoria could eat seven courses in 30 minutes, while a number of dinner guests of hers were left hungry.  Royal protocol was that Queen Victoria was served each course first.  Her numerous guests were then served as well.  Protocol dictated that after Queen Victoria finished eating each course, all guests' plates were to be cleared for the next course.  As Victoria didn't wait for guests to be served before eating, her guests were barely served before their plates were taken.  Many guests of Queen Victoria's considered invites to dine at the palace, onerous honors; Dining, yet not really dining at all with the Queen.

"For many people eating with her was purgatory. Everyone was served after the Queen and when she had finished all the plates were cleared for the next course. If you were the last person served often you wouldn't get a chance to eat anything before your plate was taken. She also insisted on all the windows being open whatever the time of year because she got hot."

Like all monarchs Victoria had a master chef, but on big occasions help was bought in. For her Diamond Jubilee banquet 24 chefs were brought over from Paris to help, according to the Royal Collection.

There was a very well established etiquette. Victoria's famous line “we are not amused” was uttered when someone told her a joke at the dinner table, breaking strict rules, says Gray. Many of today's rules about manners were formalised in the Victorian era.

Top table: For the most important guests, with the most favoured at the Queen's direct right.

Other guests: Seated in order of importance, highest ranking closest to top table.

Food: At start of Victoria's reign food would be placed on table and guests would serve themselves.
 
Flowers: After self-service went out of fashion and dishes were not left on table, elaborate flower displays were used as decoration.
 
Drinks: Fine wine and Madeira would be served, but Victoria often had whiskey with her meal.
 
Minor guests: Furthest away from the Queen and served last, they often hadn't even eaten by the time plates were cleared for the next course.
 
Public gallery: On big occasions members of the public were allowed to watch the banquet from viewing galleries.

By Charles II's reign, a dessert course had developed. Charles loved fruit and was one of the first people in the country to eat a pineapple.  This painting depicts Charles II being presented with a pineapple, a rare and exotic fruit for the time period.

Charles II 1660-1685

For Charles II dining was extremely important, it was one of the things that defined him as a king.

At a banquet he would sit at a top table, under a canopy. The table would be raised so he could be seen by everyone and to show his status. Only a very select group of people could sit with him, a maximum of just six.

The King would always be served on bended knee. He had three "officers" to attend to him - a carver, a server and a cup bearer. Cleanliness was extremely important and Charles would have someone whose sole job was to dab his mouth during the meal.

“At that time dining was one of the things that absolutely defined royalty,” says English Heritage's Dr Anna Keay. "Even when Charles was in exile and living in poverty in Germany, he followed the royal form of dining and was served on bended knee."

At state banquets no table decorations were needed as elaborate dishes did the job. They included a 2ft-high, silver salt cellar, made in the shape of a castle and encrusted with jewels. Often there were also silver fountains on the table flowing with wine or water.

There were not courses as we know them, more stages of service. Each could involve hundreds of plates. At one banquet in 1671, guests were served 145 dishes alone during the first course, says Kathryn Jones, curator at the Royal Collection and author of For the Royal Table: Dining at the Palace.

By his reign a dessert course had developed. Charles loved fruit and was one of the first people in the country to eat a pineapple.

Charles II

Seating: Only people who could sit with the King were his own family, royalty from another country and high-ranking officials.

Table: Fine linen, gold and silver plates and crystal glasses. No decoration due to amount of food and ornate serving dishes. 

Dishes:  First recorded mention of ice cream is on a banquet menu for Charles II. Root vegetables were considered common. 

Customs: Dinner would start at about 3pm. It was someone's job to design exactly how food would be laid out in front of the King.

"We have a lot of mistaken ideas about how the Tudors ate. They didn't gnaw chicken greedily and throw bones on the floor, and there were no dogs fighting over scraps under trestle tables.  In a well-conducted house, the dogs - except for little spaniels - were exiled to kennels. Table manners were strict and refined.  Knowing how to cut your bread and what to do with your napkin was an infallible social signal that separated a gentleman from an oik, and every young noble learned to serve at table and to carve." Writer, Hilary Mantel

Henry VIII 1509-1547

Food in the Tudor era was very exciting, say historians. Big feasts could include venison, swan, peacock, heron, porpoise and seagull.

"Sometimes the skin of a peacock would be carefully removed along with the feathers," says Peter Hammond, author of Life In A Medieval Town. "Once cooked they were replaced, as if it were still alive. They did this to show wealth."

While a lot of meat was served, there were also vegetables. Whatever could be grown was served, including cabbage, peas and lettuce. Flowers were also eaten, such as marigolds. They were used in salads and as a garnish.

There was a top table and the highest ranking and most highly favoured guests would sit on the right of King Henry VIII. Everything was about hierarchy, even the way you walked into the room. Gold and silver dishes were also displayed on sideboards to show wealth.

Food was served in stages called "removes". These consisted or up to 20 dishes. They were not all served together, individual dishes would be served in procession. Only the King's table was offered all the dishes.

It's a misconception that banquets were raucous and messy. "The way banquets are portrayed in many films is ridiculous," says Hammond. "They were extremely civilised, with a very firm code of etiquette."

Dining with Henry VIII ~ If you were wealthy, your cakes would be decorated with marzipan, and after dinner there would be nuts, thin and delicate wafers, and sweets made with aniseed and ginger to help digestion.

Henry and his guests would have eaten with a knife and fingers, as forks hadn't been introduced. This would have been very delicately done and again involved very complicated rules about what could be touched with fingers. 

Henry VIII

Seating: Top table including King and the most important guests, the most favoured to the King's direct right.

Table: Fine linen tablecloths, laid with gold and silver plates, dishes and crystal glasses. No forks.

Dishes:  Sweet dishes were served throughout the meal, not at end. Fruit and nuts were eaten at the end.

Customs:  Definitely no bone throwing or feeding dogs from the table. That would have been the height of bad manners.

A medieval banquet

Edward IV 1461-1470 and 1471-1483

Royal banquets got a lot more elaborate under Edward IV and the whole notion of behaviour more complex, says Chris Woolgar, professor of history and archival studies at Southampton University. Courtesy books were produced to explain the etiquette.
 
Edward would have "servants of honour" to tend to his needs at banquets. These were people senior in rank. Often their tasks were menial, but it was still considered a great honour.

A very important servant was the carver, who would cut the King's meat at the top table. Guests would have their meat carved in the kitchen and brought up to them.

One of the "servants of honour" would test the King's food using a "unicorn's horn", basically a fossil shell. In an elaborate performance they would use the "horn" to touch the food, then deem it safe.
 
Elaborate silver salt cellars would be on the table. Often shaped like a ship, they would be encrusted with jewels. Fine wines were served for the higher ranking guests and ale for others.
 
In between the stages of services there would be dramatic performances, usually with a political message. Some were more entertaining, like someone jumping out of a cake, says Prof Woolgar.

Edward IV

Seating : A top table seating the King and important guests, most favoured to the King's right.

Table : Fine linen tablecloth, with gold, silver and silver-gilt plates and cups. No glass or forks.

Dishes : The finest meats and fish. Sweet dishes were served with meat and fish, not separately.

Customs: The King and guests would sit for a banquet from 11am and it could last for up to four hours.

William the Conqueror traveled with a very large household .  If they stayed a long time, it could nearly bankrupt the lord who was their host.

William the Conqueror 1066-1087

During William the Conqueror's reign a trestle table was used and it would only be set up after the King was seated. It would then be laid with a linen table cloth and the finest gold and silver. Lower ranking guests would have eaten out of a trencher, this was a piece of stale bread cut into a square shape and used as a plate. At the end of the meal, having soaked up all the juices from the food, they were frequently given as alms to the poor.

The top table would seat high-ranking guests, with a cleric seated directly to the right of William. Sometimes it was his almoner, an official who gave out alms to the poor on the King's behalf.

All of the King's food would be cooked separately from everyone else. He would often give out food from his plate to guests, this was considered a great honour and a sign of favour.

There were several stages of service, with many dishes. Food would get more elaborate as each dish was served. Only the top table would have roast meat, those of junior ranks would be served boiled meat.

Banquets in Norman times were very dignified affairs, with strict etiquette rules. Noise and mess were not acceptable, neither was burping.

William the Conqueror

Seating: King would sit at a top table with senior guests, including important religious figures 

Table: Elaborately embroidered linen, gold and silver plates and cups. No glass or forks 

Dishes: The finest meat, including venison and game birds, and fish, including turbot, were served

Customs: Would sit from 11am. The King would often give out alms to the poor from the banquet . –Originally printed January 2012, By Denise Winterman BBC News Magazine

 🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

2009 State of British Table Manners

British table manners in a plate of crisis as fewer households fork out for knives  

USING a knife and fork at the table was regarded as an essential component of dining etiquette – as crucial as not eating with your mouth open. But research suggests the cutlery double act is being split up as sales figures show forks outselling matching knives by almost two to one. It seems using a knife and fork is rapidly becoming a thing of the past, as British families emulate the American “fork-only” dining habit, according to a new report.

“What do you mean you won't be using your knife and fork together?  And what do the Yanks have to do with it anyway!?”

British dining etiquette is disappearing thanks to the soaring popularity of the US-style eating habits, a slump in dining out and supermarket ready meals.  The report says that the increasing popularity of pre-cut pizzas, chips, burgers and pasta – all dishes where a knife is not required – is to blame. 

Read Tanya Thompson's analysis here: 

The US-style trend emerged after Debenhams' sale figures revealed that large, main meal forks were outselling their matching knives by almost two to one across the retailer's 155 UK stores.  Further investigation revealed that London stores were spearheading the trend, with customers buying almost three forks to every knife.

So great is the trend that the department store chain Debenhams has decided to launch a Civilised Dining campaign to protect the traditional British way of eating.  Debenhams' spokesman Ed Watson said the store's research revealed that the popularity of fast food is the biggest culprit for abandoning traditional etiquette.

“Bad table manners can turn an enjoyable meal into an embarrassment.”

“Bad table manners can turn an enjoyable meal into an embarrassment. Using both a knife and a fork to eat has held this country in good stead for centuries – it's one of the mainstays of being British. It's all about maintaining standards, so we want to act now before the single fork habit becomes ingrained in the next generation.”

Further research showed that almost 32 per cent of customers bought fewer knives because they now preferred to use forks on their own.

An additional 24 per cent were baffled by place settings and almost 28 per cent did not possess fish knives, and could see no reason for buying them.

“I'm sorry. You mean there is a difference between spoons?”

Nineteen per cent could not tell the difference between soup spoons and dessert spoons and 41 per cent did not realise that the safest and most well-mannered way to eat soup was to push the spoon away from you as you ate.

Debrett's etiquette adviser Jo Bryant said good table manners should be second nature – or should appear to be. “When dining, it is essential to remember your manners and to use cutlery correctly. Bad table manners may offend your fellow diners and cause embarrassment.”

The research suggested the popularity of eating food in front of the television may also be having an impact.  “Burgers seldom require the use of a knife, and ready meals are presented using pre-cut, bite-size portions, which slip easily on to a fork,” Mr Watson added. “Good table etiquette may seem like a trivial matter, but many people in Britain still regard it as an essential life skill.”

As part of the campaign, experts will be on hand from next month to offer advice on the correct form of dining etiquette to help customers at stores throughout the UK. 

From The Scotsman

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia