18th-Century Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 38

[cahn]

Gonna go ahead and make this post even though Yuletide is coming...

But in the meantime, there has been some fic in the fandom posted!

Holding His Space (2503 words) by felisnocturna
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF, 18th Century CE Frederician RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf/Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Characters: Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf, Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Additional Tags: Protectiveness, Domestic, Character Study
Summary:

Five times Fredersdorf has to stay behind - and one time Friedrich doesn't leave.

Using People (3392 words) by prinzsorgenfrei
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great/Hans Hermann von Katte
Characters: Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great, Hans Hermann von Katte
Additional Tags: Fluff, Idiots in Love, reading plays aloud while gazing into each others eyes
Summary:

Friedrich had started to talk to him because he had thought of him as a bit of a ditz.
And now here he was. Here he was months later, bundled up in this very same man’s blankets with a cup of hot coffee in front of him, its scent mixing with that of Katte’s French perfume.
_
Fluffy One Shot about one traitorous Crown Prince and the sycophant he accidentally fell for.

Comments

Re: More Peter Keith findings

[mildred_of_midgard]

Of possible interest to fanfic writers:

Münchow says when he was page, he had to sleep in the antechamber next to Fritz's room, and acts like this is a normal thing.

Nicolai has Glasow (valet) sleeping in the antechamber next to Fritz.

Scharfenort, author of the detailed 19th century book on pages that we turned up a while back, says in the section on FW and pages, "Whether the latter [body pages] slept in the monarch's antechamber, has not been ascertained, but it doesn't seem plausible."

Huh! I assumed Peter had to sleep next to FW. *revises phrasing in essay*

Also, Scharfenort told me why Peter was still a page at almost 20 when I always thought pages were much younger: there were regular pages, of which there might be one or two dozen at a time, who were generally 12-16 years old, and whose job was mainly to be educated in the ways of piety and the military and to furnish future officers. And then there were body pages, of which there were maybe two, who followed the king around at all times, and who were 18-20 (presumably because they had greater responsibilities). Peter was a body page, a Leibpage. Mystery solved (by dint of font-wrestling)!

Re: More Peter Keith findings

[mildred_of_midgard]

What 19 regular pages got to eat on July 27, 1735:

Midday: 14 bowls of green pods (Schoten--Google's translation) with bacon, 2 bowls of beef with parsnip. The 4 sick pages got rice soup.

Breakfast: 1 1/2 pounds horstsche (?) butter.

Evening: 4 bowls of buckwheat groats with butter, and 4 bowls of beef with tubers.

Scharfenort: This food was simple but abundant, and Wilhelmine's uncharitable depictions must be given a very limited belief.

Mildred: I don't know, for 19 people, it depends on how big the bowls are. And hopefully they got something to put the butter *on* for breakfast?

ETA: German speakers feel free to help out with better translations:

14 Schüsseln grüne Schoten mit Speck, 2 Schüsseln Rindfleisch mit Pastinack. Reissuppe.

1 1/2 Pfund Horstsche Butter.

4 Schüsseln Buchweizengrütze mit Butter, sowie 4 Schüsseln Rindfleisch mit Knollen.