Etiquette and a 1981 Astor Table Setting

“Before the Theater” by Mrs. Vincent Astor… Another setting from “The New Tiffany Table Settings” book of 1981 — In my opinion, this table is a mess. Clearly an “artistic” decision was made here as the Astor name was involved. Why else for a “table settings” book, was this “setting” allowed? Certainly it would have been much more appealing to show the table set for an anticipated coming meal. It was inappropriate to show a table after the meal had presumably been eaten, unless the goal was merely to show how the Astors dine and what it looks like prior to the table being cleared.

The days of Mrs. William Waldorf Astor, decked in diamond tiara and diamond stomacher, royally presiding over the Four Hundred at her Fifth Avenue and Sixty-fifth Street mansion have long faded into American social mythology. The more modest New York dinners of her granddaughter-in-law Mrs. Vincent Astor continue, however, to be as impeccably Astorian as followers of our great American dynasties could wish. 

For an intimate pre-Broadway theater dinner, Mrs. Astor has chosen a richly gilt and painted “Flora Danica” porcelain dessert service, and “Olympian” vermeil, already a popular Tiffany pattern by 1895 when Mrs. William Astor built her Fifth Avenue mansion. 

There are antique finger bowls that belonged to Mrs. William Astor, and a set of “Koskull” etched crystal stemware copied from models made in 1790 for Baron Anders Koskull, founder of Sweden's Kosta glassworks. These remarkable glasses, although they relate to Louis XVI style, are closely akin to George III English crystal and not unlike glass used in America at the time John Jacob Astor arrived from Walldorf in 1783.

To break the essential regularity of formal settings, Mrs. Astor favors multiple bouquets in miniature vases. Here she uses a dozen or so small crystal pears and apples holding roses and freesias irregularly grouped about a crystal “sweetmeat tree,” its hanging baskets brimming with flowers and crowned with strawberries.

Following the guests’ departure for the theater, the dining room’s set of four French Regency caned armchairs has been pushed back from the round Louis XVI table. An eighteenth century French pastoral panel attributed to Jean Pillement backs the candlelit scene. – From “The New Tiffany Table Settings” Book, 1981

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

Medieval Bread Etiquette and Use

The bread for the Lord of the house was fresh, that for guests one day old and that for the rest of the household three days old. Four-day-old bread was reserved for cutting the trenchers… —Three, late-19th century bread forks for serving bread, rolls and toast. 

At medieval banquets bread was served in the form of manchets, which were round loaves of the finest whole wheat, sliced using a tranchoir (from the French trancher, to slice) by a designated carver (q.v. Carving tools and accessories).

The bread for the Lord of the house was fresh, that for guests one day old and that for the rest of the household three days old. Four-day-old bread was reserved for cutting the trenchers, which were pieces of bread sliced approximately 6 inches square and 2-3 inches thick, placed directly on the table and used in lieu of plates. (Later these had an ‘under plate’ of pewter or wood which evolved into the modern dinner plate.)

The bread knife of today is the successor to the tranchoir of the Middle Ages. Along the way, it was Queen Victoria who made it acceptable to put a loaf (of bread) and knife on the dining table. — William P. Hood, Jr. in 1999’s “Tiffany Silver Flatware”

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

Egg Spoons and Egg Etiquette

Erasmus, in his treatise on manners, de civilitate morum puerilium (On the Civility of the Behavior of Boys), 1530, warned against cleaning out the shell's contents with the fingers or tongue.— Figure 74 from the Tiffany Silver Flatware book—A selection of egg spoons with gilded bowls in Tiffany full-line patterns. Left to right: Vine (iris), 4in.; Lap Over Edge, 4 in.; Persian, 4 in. The egg-shaped bowl of the Lap Over Edge specimen is standard. The shield-shaped bowl of the other two examples is unusual.

The soft-boiled egg has been a favorite food for a long time but before the appearance of egg cups and spoons presented problems as to how it should be eaten. Erasmus, in his treatise on manners, de civilitate morum puerilium (On the Civility of the Behavior of Boys), 1530, warned against cleaning out the shell's contents with the fingers or tongue. Apparently the use of a small knife was acceptable, as was dipping small pieces of bread into the egg. 

Italians at one time were given to drinking a barely heated egg right out of its shell. At first, egg spoons were used not to eat the egg directly but to transfer the semi-liquid contents to a plate, where it was mashed with butter, or to a glass, from which it was drunk.

Egg spoons have always been appropriately small, usually about 4 to 5in. in length, but the shape of the bowl has varied. Some bowls are very slightly oblong, others almost pear-shaped. Still others are shield shaped. 

The most commonly-observed Tiffany egg spoon bowl is egg-shaped, but the bowl of what we think is the egg spoon in some of the early patterns has a shield shape. Bowls of egg spoons are usually gilded to protect against discoloration from the sulfur in yolks. The handle on Tiffany's egg spoon is that of a large coffee spoon.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, egg spoons and cups were often part of an egg cruet, or egg stand, sometimes surmounted by a salt cellar. Tiffany made these, along with silver or silver-plated egg boilers, or coddlers.— Tiffany Silver Flatware- 1845-1905- When Dining Was an Art, 1999

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