Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 45

[cahn]

Unfortunately, there was then at Berlin a King who pursued one policy only, who deceived his enemies, but not his servants, and who lied without scruple, but never without necessity.

(from The King's Secret - by Duke de Broglie, grand-nephew of the subject of the book, Comte de Broglie, and grandfather of the physicist) )

Comments

Re: Poniatowski: Hot or Not

[mildred_of_midgard]

It's also worth mentioning that Elizaveta and Catherine the Great both liked cross-dressing, as men's clothes showed off their well-formed legs and women's did not.

From the bio of the Chevalier d'Eon, some commentary on the differences between their cross-dressing balls that I hadn't been aware of:

Masquerade balls were in vogue throughout Europe, and it was not uncommon at these events for men to dress as women and vice versa. But for the monarch to decree that every participant crossdress was unprecedented. Moreover, according to Catherine, the Empress also ordered every guest to appear without a mask, a practice that was completely different from other masquerades, where aristocrats of both sexes wore masks until the end of the evening. By eliminating the masks, Elizabeth was significantly altering the meaning of the masquerade. Ordinarily, a person who came to such a party posed as someone (s) he was not. The implicit deceit made the evening fun and exciting, as guests played at guessing one another's true identities. By making men and women crossdress without masks, Elizabeth put everyone in a kind of ambivalent status. Noblemen would masquerade as a female version of themselves: they might crossdress, but their identity was never in question...

The extent to which gender lines were blurred here becomes especially clear when we look at the behavior of the Empress Elizabeth herself. Catherine recalled: "The only woman who looked really well and completely a man was the Empress herself. As she was tall and powerful, male attire suited her. She had the handsomest leg I have ever seen on any man and her feet were admirably proportioned. She dressed to perfection and everything she did had the same special grace whether she dressed as a man or a woman...

Catherine also recalled that many of the noblemen resented these balls, and even she grew tired of them. Nonetheless, Catherine did not do away with them completely after she became empress in 1762. She continued to hold many masquerade balls, but unlike those during Elizabeth's reign, Catherine's were conventional masked affairs where participants posed as other people. Catherine herself derived much pleasure from dressing as a man and keeping her true identity a secret.

BTW, the Chevalier d'Eon's bio is WILD, y'all. I am looking forward to giving you the next update(s) on the secret diplomacy!