Frederick the Great, discussion post 16

[cahn]

We have slowed down a lot, but are still (sporadically) going! And somehow filled up the last post while I wasn't looking!

...I was asked to start a new thread so that STDs could be discussed. Really! :D

Comments

Re: AW readthrough

[mildred_of_midgard]

Hmm, interesting. I could very well be mis-extrapolating! However, I would point out that even in the 19th century and well into the 20th centuries, I would fully expect Fritz of Wales, who was 21 when he went to England, to be treated like an adult at the dinner table, not a child! But Heinrich was like 6 in 1732, and that's what I was thinking of--not the adult or nearly-adult children. In which case, maybe I'm wrong and the 6-year-old could pipe up with his opinions whenever he wanted to, but "the adults are talking about things of interest to them while expecting the 6-year-old to be quiet" wouldn't necessarily strike me as a red flag for abuse.

"The adults and nearly-adults are talking about the future queen's alleged fistulas at dinner" does strike me as a very very dysfunctional family at best. :P

And the Tobacco Parliament was explicitly supposed to be etiquette-free, right? I doubt anyone for a moment forgot that FW was their monarch in terms of *what* they said, but as they drank and smoked and played practical jokes, I imagine he got spontaneously interrupted in the middle of a sentence during a lively discussion and was pleased rather than otherwise by the casualness.

But maybe even the little kids did always get to pipe up at will this century. I will keep that in mind, thank you. (When doing the servant research, I did initially project late 18th and early 19th century mores back in time, only to find out that the 18th century was a transitional period, with the early part of the century looking different than the latter, and the transition happening at different rates in different regions, so that travelers to other countries were shocked by the local customs. So that's when I started pulling my hair out at "I don't know what expectations of servants were like in 1732 Prussia, much less the weirdo court where FW wants to be a German burgher and SD wants to be a French queen! It was probably different on different days, depending on whether he was in residence or not.")