You forgot to mention that it was common to name children after their godfathers, especially if you hoped that the godfather (who was usually a relative or close family friend of higher social standing or better finances) would step in and take an interest in the child. That's part of why Darcy's first name is Fitzwilliam; he is named after his godfather, the earl, not just to announce the family connection but to try to endear him to the earl. That's also why George Wickham is named George. Presumably, George Wickham and Georgiana Darcy were both named after Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy's father, Mr. George Darcy.
@@bookmouse2719 Oh, I'm absolutely certain that Wickham named one of theirs after Darcy just to really grate on dear old Uncle Fitz and to drive home that advantageous family connection. lol.
@@EllieDashwood Another point of interest in the names in P&P is that they would have had political and social connotations for period readers. For instance, the 18th century seat of the Earls Fitzwilliam was Wentworth Woodhouse (ring any Austen-y bells?), still one of England's largest private homes. The Fitzwilliams were powerful Whig party leaders and their fortune was enormous. Not only was theirs the largest home in England (it still may be; I'm not sure if anyone has yet overtaken it), but their fortune, at the time, would have been the roughly equivalent to the sixth largest economy in the world if their estates and holdings had been a country. I will have to check on that source, but I know I found that tid-bit when I was researching. I could be off a little, but my point is that the Fitzwilliams were ridiculously wealthy. Naming Darcy after a powerful, left-leaning, ridiculously rich political family was likely no accident. It's like giving someone in a contemporary American book the name "Kennedy Clinton" and then comparing their private wealth to the economy of California. Interestingly, the name Wickham also carries political connotations. The man who basically invented British spycraft (he founded the British secret service) was named William Wickham. He was extremely active during the French Revolutionary period. He was now and then embroiled in scandals owing to the cost of his secretive activities, but he later recovered and became an MP. These connections are lost to modern readers, especially to modern readers who live outside of Great Britain, but they would have been very much present in the minds of Jane Austen's contemporaries -- all because of the names that Jane Austen chose to give her characters!
There's definitely a really well known pop culture usage of Master- Proper Englishman Alfred Pennyworth calls Bruce Wayne "Master Bruce," it's a cool dichotomy because as a parental figure he still sees Bruce as a boy, but as a servant he uses a title to address his employer.
I was fascinated by the scene in P&P when Lydia and Mr. Wickham return to Longbourn, now married and Lydia says to Jane that she now has a higher rank that Jane because she is a married woman! Not an exact quote, but pretty much.
If I recall correctly, in that scene they are going in to dinner and her comment implies that a married woman would have precedence over the unmarried women of the party when it comes to the order for entering the dining room and for the seating arrangements. Lydia's full social standing would be based on the status of her husband. Since Mr. Wickam was the son of the former estate manager at Pemberly and her father is landed gentry, I don't believe her social position has actually increased. (This is my interpretation as a fan of Regency & Victorian romances, not based on actual research)
Yeah you're talking about the whole making Jane sit lower because she didn't get married first thing. Yeah that's just the rank of how daughter sit when there are no sons in a family. But here's the funny thing once Jane and Mr Bingley get married in the fabulous double wedding where Darcy and Elizabeth also get married. Then they take their birth order ranks back and then it would be Jane and her husband and then Mr Darcy and Elizabeth and then Lydia would be knocked into third place and Mary would go lower until she gets married. Daughters are seated at the table from their mother's right hand. And Sons are seated at the table from their father's right hand at opposite ends of the table when it's just a family dinner. When they are dining in company the husband would sit by the wife. At the wife's right hand. And then the daughters would proceed from the mother's left hand on the what is essentially the female side of the table. And depending on how formal the setting is the son-in-law's would then take up their wife's birth order position at the right hand of their father-in-law if their father was not present at the dinner. If the father-in-law is alive and at the dinner then the bride and her husband sit in their appropriate order based on husband's father starting from the bottom of the table. My great-grandmother insisted that I learn all of the Victorian era etiquette things when I was little because I was the only female great-grandchild born before she passed away. Formal dinner at the Bennett's after the end of the book with everyone there which (I don't imagine happened very often especially the Wickham part) but anyway here's the hypothetical setup. Mrs Bennett & Mr. Bennett Jane. Mr. Bingley Elizabeth. Mr. Darcy Lydia. Mr. Wickham Mary. Unmarried male guest2 Unmarried male1-miss guest1 Kitty. Male guest 3 Married male guest and wife This is why Mr Collins taking up his seat at the bottom of Lady Catherine's table is such an honor for him and why he feels like life could give him nothing better.
@@EllieDashwood isn't also the case that the use of surname alone was a thing men did to each other and women didn't, so Mrs Elton is also being inappropriate as she is behaving doubly in an unladylike way; firstly by being too familiar and secondly by behaving unlike a lady
Women did not called men by their surnames without a title. It was very unladylike of her. Calling a man by his surname along was something that generally signified familiarity, or perhaps even disrespect. Darcy would probably have called his friend Charles, but when a person's Christian name was as pompous as Fitzwilliam, his friends would have called him Darcy and his sister would have called him "Brother". The name FItzwilliam signifies that the family is descended from the son (illegitimate) of one of the Stuart Kings. Boys at school were generally referred to by their surnames alone. If there was more than one boy in the family, they would be known as Wilkinson Major and Wilkinson Minor. If there were more they could be Howerd Primus, Howerd Secundus and Howerd Tertius. atc
oh i'm reminded of when mrs crowley asks "what should we called each other" and lady grantham replies "we could always start with mrs crowley and lady grantham" i guess it must have seemed very obvious to her :-)
It probably was, although it came out a well 30 years later than P&P, so I don't think things changed that much. In any case, Mr. Rochester always conducted himself as if he was above the laws of men (and certainly those pompous society rules), so it does make sence that he would choose to call her by her first name. Although, I'm can't remember right now at which point he starts doing so, and if they were alone or in company. 🤔
During a reading Jane Austen added that Kitty married a clergyman in Derbyshire (near her sisters I guess), while Mary married one of her uncle's law clerks and stayed in Meryton. So Kitty did do better.
It depends on what you consider "better." I always thought that Mary's marriage to one of her uncle's clerks was the equivalent of marrying the boss's daughter. The Philipses have no children, so a clerk who married their niece would be in a good position to eventually take over Mr. Philip's law practice, which seems to be a good one and will probably be even better in the future because of the marriages of the two eldest Bennet girls. I would say their fortunes were about equal.
@@dorothywillis1 Totally agree with you; although a clergyman might have the dubious distinction of being accorded a gentleman, clerical stipends varied hugely throughout the dioceses, and some certainly had no hope of maintaining a "gentleman's" status in society. Anthony Trollope's mid C19th novels are full of impoverished parish clergyman with not a chance of being accorded any semblance of social rank.
@@christopherseton-smith7404 Trollope's novels are also full of clergymen who have very comfortable livings and close ties to the local Big Wheels. Somehow I don't see Kitty as a Mrs. Quiverful, let alone a Mrs. Crawley. (BTW, I wrote this comment once before and thought I had posted it, but I can't find it. So if I am repeating myself, please forgive me.)
@@dorothywillis1 Good point. I wonder if the clergyman in Derbyshire had the living in Kympton? The clerical position there was probably in Darcy's gift, with clerical positions being popular postings for second sons, so it is entirely likely that Kitty's clergyman husband was either a distant relation or a favored Darcy family friend. Kitty and her husband and any children would likely have benefited from such a connection. As for Mary, I entirely agree that her husband likely inherited the Phillips' law practice, as that would have been the only method the Phillips had of keeping it in the family. I imagine it could have been a lucrative and thriving business. The Phillips family may not have been quite genteel, but do recall that they hosted lottery parties and events for the officers in Meryton. The officers attended eagerly, so the Phillips family were not looked down upon so very greatly. Any children that Mary had could have depended on some assistance from rich uncles and could likely have been launched into the gentry by way of education and profession - and would have been better provided for than, say, Lydia's children.
I think it also shows a lot in the relationships between female characters. Isabella Thorpe encourages Catherine to be on first name terms with her at an early stage, and this gives the illusion that they are close friends, but it's Miss Tilney and Miss Morland up to the night when she gets kicked out of Northanger Abbey, and the switch to first names then shows the genuine friendship that they have.
The naming conventions also give credence to why Marianne (and Mrs. Dashwood) assumed she and Willoughby were engaged in S&S. Combined with the lock of hair, gifting her a horse, and his taking her to Allenham.
The first name thing is highlighted in Sense And Sensibility when Elinor is startled when she overhears Willoughby call Marianne by her first name and Elinor wonders to herself that they are such terms with each other and yet have not made their engagement known to the family. I kind of wondered about that before. It all makes sense now... Although Emma is probably my least favorite Austen heroine, Mr. Knightley is my favorite Austen hero. And obviously, as a Miss (Ellie) Dashwood you need to marry a Mr Ferrars. Just saying! 😆 God Bless, Tahlia
@@EllieDashwood I think Edward is more relatable than amazing. He's not a dream fantasy fulfillment guy to get, but at least for me with my mild autism, strong introversion, past social anxiety and repeated depressions he's actually a point-of-view character to root for, and getting together with the wonderful girl that is Elinor is his Austenian karmic happy ending for making the right moral choices.
His real name was Fred Bloggs and he ran a whelk stall darn the Mile End Road, but the publishers said, "Nah Jane, no one is gonna Adam an Eve that sweet'art, you'll 'ave to posh 'im up a bit".
I get the impression that Austen really was poshing the language up a lot. The private conversations were conducted in a very stilted and proper form. It seemed unnatural to me.
@@AdrianColley I think that Austen was spot on when it came to people from "the Shires". My ancestors lived in the slums just to the north of St. Clement Danes, not her territory at all, know wat I mean Ade me old cock sparra?.
@@AdrianColley The concept of a fictional novel and what a novel ought to be like have evolved over time. She wrote hers over two hundred years ago, and back then the expectations for a novel were very different. Only later people started to think the dialogue in a novel should imitate the way people actually speak. And even still today too, the way real speech and real discussions happen is markedly different from how we write and deliver dialogue. Modern dialogue tries to give off the impression of realism without truly being realistic.
Several respondents here have incorrectly asserted that anyone with a surname that begins with Fitz is descended from someone given that surname because they were born out of wedlock. The very first use of a surname, in English, was FITZGERALD, circa 1177, if I am not mistaken. Inheritable surnames only started to be used in the 12th century. William the Conqueror's native language was Norman French. The language of the English court remained Norman French, for well over one hundred years. As others have written, the prefix Fitz merely means "son of". The tiny grain of truth is that some English kings gave some of their bastard children the surname FITROY.
Fun fact: my great-grandmother was alive until I was 20, and she and my brother used to write letters to each other and she would address his as “Master First-Last Name” it was CUTE 🥰
An ex-colleague was once surprised to see his infant son addressed as "Master So-and-so" on a plane ticket. I had to tell him that that was how young boys were addressed in English back in the day.
That was standard when I was growing up. If you wrote a letter or a holiday card to a family you put Mr. & Mrs.---- ---- on the first line of the mailing address on the envelope, and Master --- ----- and Miss -- --- on the next line before the street number.
You have a very niche channel and I am SO here for it. This helps me a great deal in my reading b/c I am enjoying her works but also feel a bit lost at times with some of the social customs. Thank you! I found Lucy Worsley's doc on Jane Austen, and also the Regency Era accessible, too. Can't wait to read more Austen.
That was so interesting!! I knew his first name from the novel but liked that you dove deeper into the details on what types of relationships may actually use first names
If you’re interested in the rules of comportment and general laws and customs of the early 1800s I highly recommend the book What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew by Daniel Pool. It gives a full breakdown of forms of address, order of precedence, servants hierarchy, how many shillings in a pound, why upper class people didn’t care for plumbing, and much more, all in quite a fun tongue-in-cheek tone.
1. I certainly did not know he had a First Name! Thank you! :D 2. Me, reading chinese novels where you have to learn 3 NAMES because everybody has a Birth Name, a Courtesy Name and an Honorary Title: Yeah, this makes sense! 3. You're frigging adorable.
Your reference to the term "Master" brought back the recollection that in the 1960s in the UK as a child receving post, for birthdays cards for instance, older relatives almost always addressed the envelopes to Master Christopher Seton-Smith.
Back in 1986-1988 in Toronto, my grade 2 and 3 teacher, Miss Bailey, was English and had quite a bit of the old country about her. One day, she gave us the assignment to write a letter to a former classmate. I was instructed to write to the boy I knew from grade 1 as "Master Craig Banks".
Exactly so in Dunedin NZ about the same time... letters I might receive...it seemed to die out by the mid 60s. In the teaching world, respect is clearly shown by the way one addresses either the students, or they you. Growing up in the late 50s>> mid 60s, boys were quite often addressed by their surname..just the custom. In the past 3 years, making use of my experience in retirement, the two schools I have been at allow the children ( we are talking primary age here ) to use either Mr or first name as the adult allows. It is always done respectfully so I just go with way it is done. But I always refer to Mr, Miss or Mrs in front of pupils. In Japan, my daughter was always "Heather sensei".
Fitz- Son of, from the French Fils, therefore Fitzwilliam means Son of William. The term Fitzroy, was used by English Kings to denote illegitimate offspring Fitz - Roi (French for King).
I've got a Fitzroy in my tree! She was one of several of King Henry's (illegitimate in this case) daughters named Matilda/Maude. I think he had three, the Empress Maude/Matilda, and at least two illegitimate ones. He must have really liked the name Matilda 🤷🏼♀️
That whole tittle/Last name thing has always been such an interesting topic for me! Here in Spain we don't use the last name as often, I don't even know the last name of some of my friends, as you just don't hear them on a daily basis, maybe only as a way to differenciate two people with the same first name
People have only addressed others by their first names extremely recently and in many non-English speaking countries they are still formal. If you think about it, everyone in France is still addressed as (in translation) Sir and Madam when they enter a shop and in languages where there is a formal and familiar form of ‘you’, that is still usually observed (we dropped the familiar ‘thee/thy/thou’ in the 19th century). When I was a child in Great Britain in the 1960s my parents were always addressed as Mr or Mrs except by friends or family, even by neighbours with whom they were friendly but with whom they were not close enough to have entered each other’s houses. My grandmother who was born in the 1890s had a casual friend for decades called Miss Adam and when I asked what her first name was, my grandmother said it began with J as she’d seen it on an envelope but didn’t know what it was! It was a sign of respect for the age and status this unmarried lady who’d been a businesswoman before the war, and therefore a bit of a trailblazer.
That is so interesting! And it’s very true! I think in different parts of the US kids still call adults Mr or Mrs Last Name meanwhile in the area where I live they call nearly everyone by their first name. It’s such a complex topic!
@@EllieDashwood In Germany it depends on the circumstances. Students at university or the members of a sports club or a volunteer service one calls each other by the first name. In a more formal setting and in business, one does only use the last name. The equivalent of "Miss" was abolished, because it shows the marital status.
Ellie Dashwood we have a similar title/name convention where I grew up, where small children called adults by Mrs/Miss/Mr + Last Name and as we were 12-ish, we transitioned to Miss + Last Name for adults that we knew as children, and that’s how we still refer to them even once we’re adults. At least to their face. Weirdly I think we actually keep the Mr Last Name for older men... or we just say screw it and refer to them by their first names.
In my father's family adult friends of the family were called aunt or uncle by the next generation. One can see it a lot more in Hawaii to show warm respect to adults.
In Chinese culture, siblings addressed each other as Elder/Younger Sister/Brother until pretty recently! Aunts and uncles have different titles depending on the side of the family as well as birth order compared to the parent as well as whether they’re a spouse. Grandparents on different sides have different titles as well.
I was raised in the rural South of the USA in the 1940's. Even then male children were occasionally referred to as 'Master', especially in correspondence. I remember getting maybe three letters addressed to 'Master' First, Last, when I was a teenager.
Hahahah. Loved this one! My regency name would be Miss Brito, but I also hope I can be Mrs Tilney someday. He's my favorite too. And I love when Emma gets so mad at Mrs Elton calling "Knightley" after the first meeting with him... Who does she think she is??
I know! That Mrs Elton is unbelievable. lol. Also, I love it that you love Tilney too! I think he's often underrated among the Austen heroes, but he's so awesome!
I'm surprised you didn't bring up the most famous example of friends using last names. Watson and Holmes refer to each other as in fact the only person to simply call him Sherlock is Mycroft. I'm just a touch surprise because it's one of the most widely cited examples
There is a BBC program titled "Endeavor" about an English police dept.in the '60's. Everyone is addressed by their titles and last names. The main character is never called anything but "Morris", even when in an informal setting. His first/given name is Endeavor. He never tells anybody that because it is a giveaway that his parents were Quakers. Apparently not a popular thing to be and he left that religion when he left home.
Also Miss is the title used for a married woman who has kept her own name after marriage. Elizabeth Taylor was always referred to as Miss Taylor, as were all actresses who made their names before they married.
Dear Miss Dashwood, I really enjoyed your video about this topic. I really appreciate the first mentioned reason for adressing someone with the title and last name as a sign of respect and honor, but I am also used to it. In Germany we call our bosses and persons with whom we are not very familiar by their title and last name. Except we agree to call us with our first name which (at least in my experience) has to be inniciated by the elder person. Above that there is a difference in address with a formal "Sie" (you) and a familiar "du" (you). So if you are talking to an older person or someone in higher rank (i.e. your boss), you call him or her "Herr [last name]" or "Frau [last name]. We had an equivalent for "Miss" - "Fräulein" (which literally means little woman) but that was removed from the official/ formal german in 1971 because all the women were angered by the degradation that came with this title and wanted equality with the men who were even unmarried called "Herr". I never heard of an equivalent to the english term "Master" but that doesn't mean that there is none... When I went to school I was always called by my first name by my teachers but when we turned 18, we had the right to be addressed with our title and last name and be called "Sie" instead of "du". Most times we did not ponder on that but my economics teacher in my last school year insisted on calling us with our title and last name so we get used to it for our time outside of the school. Funny enough he still addressed us with the informal "du" while in comparison my other teachers called me/ us with our first names but then addressed us formally with "Sie". I really enjoyed this mindgame of what we are familiar with and what is done the same way as in Austen's regency England and all the other reasons you mentioned in your video. Have a wonderful day, Frau Nielsen
I recently had your channel recommended to me by the algorithm, and I'm loving it. Came back to the beginning of your videos to watch them all, and it gave me a craving for some Austen films, so I have been watching a few of those, too. I noticed that in the BBC *Emma*, there is one point at which Emma does refer to Mr. Knightley as simply Knightley: when she is worried that Mrs. Weston is about to reveal bad news of someone she loves. It's a beautiful little extra character touch, and had Mrs. Weston not been so agitated about Frank's engagement to Jane, perhaps she would have picked up on Emma's attachment to her friend from that slip alone!
I bet she still called him Mr Darcy even in bed. I recall that Mrs Bennet called her husband Mr Bennet. Did he have a first name? I think he said his name in the apocryphal Lost in Austen miniseries. But I forgot it already.
On use of undecorated surnames: it's common for schoolchildren to address each other by their surnames, for instance, I was universally addressed as "Colley" by my classmates in the 1980s. This didn't apply between friends interacting outside of school. One odd exception: the name _Mary_ is so incredibly common in some places (here in Ireland) that some friends address each other on a surname-only basis just to reduce confusion.
funny... I just commented a few comments up on exactly this in '70s and '80s irish schools. I feel (slightly) less freakish now for still thinking of childhood friends as Dunne and Doyle and Kennedy... still kinda weird tho when you think about it.
My brain: Ooh I would have moved up to Miss "last name" since my older sister is m... Oh wait! She's not actually married, she just lives as if she is...oh dear! The scandal! I would be doomed to become a spinster due to our family's ruined reputation. Also, I'm already in my thirties and single...I would already be firmly labeled an OLD spinster 😓 And old spinster from a scandalous family no less. Thank godness for modern times where I am just a person living MY life 😅
Every time I read the book, I change all the young mens’ names to their first names in my head (Mr. Bingley becomes Charlie, Mr. Darcy becomes Fitz, Mr Wickham becomes George, etc) it makes it’s always more fun for me that way
I see lots of comments about "master" still being used in the South or by their grandmother. Just adding that I definitely knew the "master = young boy" concept growing up, and I was growing up in the 2000s in the Midwest with lots of close ties to the northeast. So, it's not just the South or grandmothers. I always thought of master as a formal term, not an outdated one. I've probably mostly encountered it on formal invitations.
@@dorothywillis1 The fitz- prefix is one of those words that mean "son of", like Irish Ó, Danish -sson, German von, etc. So "William" would be much more appropriate than "Fitzy".
@@AdrianColley I wasn't the one who called him "Fitzy"! :-) It would be interesting to know what his sister calls him. "Fitzwilliam" is a difficult name to shorten, which may have been one reason his mother and aunt chose it. (Dignity, always Dignity!) It is the sort of name that leads to strange nicknames being given at school, such as P. G. Wodehouse's Darcy "Stilton" Cheesewright or Zenobia "Nobby" Hopwood, or Harold "Stinker" Pinker.
Austen shared with her nephew (James Austen-Leigh), who shared in the Memoir of Jane Austen, that Kitty Bennett did in fact make a better match than Mary. Kitty married a clergyman from near Pemberly, and Mary one of her uncle's Phillips's clerks. I hope the clergyman Kitty married was the one who got the living Wickham was supposed to get.
Six years late-but I note that Dad’s paternal grandfather was from Northern Ireland, a minister born in the 19th century. I once saw a letter the reverend wrote to Dad sometime in the early 1940s and the envelope was addressed to “Master David Gilmore.” The formality stuck around longer than one might think.
It was pretty common in the 1800's and 1900's in the Netherlands as well for women to address their husbands by either their last name, or sometimes their profession if it was a highly respected one.
I was addressed as “Master” a few times - my aunt and I think the local library did… it helped distinguish me from my dad who had the same initial, so “Master J Baldwin” was me. You missed off “esquire”, or “esq” as a postnomial which I got a few times and really needs to make a comeback. You lose that at 21. Also unusually for Britain, I don’t have a middle name. Some families still carry on the tradition of passing a name down the family but skipping its use. So Paul McCartney is actually James Paul McCartney but as his dad was James, the some was called Paul. I’ve only had my academic postnomials (BA or MA) added to my name a few times, and today I only really use “Dr” in a professional context. Students attempt to call me “professor” sometimes but in the UK, that is a specific title that’s bestowed on you as a rank - unlike in other countries where ‘professor’ is standard for what we would call a lecturer. In British universities it’s normal for students to call you by your first name rather than your title. We’ve become much more casual than a lot of places where to do so would be a high crime…
Got my nickname at age 5 weeks when someone wrote a wedding invitation to my parents and added “Master Jack” to it but she wrote a backhand and the a looked like an o and I’ve been Jock ever since. I’m not the Jock Ellis who played horn for the Grateful Dead.
Esquire.... no. You don't lose that at 21. Esquire signifies that you are a landholder. If you use Esq. after your name, then you do not use Mr before your name., so you can be Mr Jonathan Baldwin or Jonathan Baldwin, Esq. signifying you are a man of property.
Your point about Professor is an excellent one & is why Rowling drives me mad with her Professor This, Professor That for what are in fact secondary school teachers. There are no British schools that I know of, not even public ones like Eton &c, in which teachers would be referred to in such a way. We call teachers Sir or Miss (regardless of marital status) to their faces & when referring to them it would be Mr X, Miss or Mrs Y (depending) or very occasionally Dr (I had a maths teacher once with a PhD in astronomy). Professorships are I believe given out a little more frequently than they were "in my day", but certainly at one time it denoted that you were the head of the department as much as anything else. So Professor Z is almost certainly the top banana of the History dept, for example. Given that further education in the WW appears to involve something called a "mastery", it would surely make more sense to call the teachers Master or Mistress, to denote their expertise. If I had been a boy, I was to have been called James Adam & referred to as Adam, because my Dad was James but (as I was told this by my Mother) she thought the two names sounded better in the J A order. To another commenter's point about addressing older adults as Aunt/Uncle, I did this too but am quite glad it wasn't done to me, as the alliterative Aunt (or inevitably, Auntie) followed by a name beginning with A sounds dreadful to my ears!
I have been really enjoying this channel!!! In New Zealand, we still use master in a few formal places, for example, a letter from the doctor or the bank- this stops when you turn 13- and become a mister.
from Levin....in my 99 years teaching, I can't really remember a time when I used "Master" unless I was being ironic........growing up in early 60's Dunedin it was very common. The old couple down the street still called each other Mr/Mrs Cameron in front of non-family.
My gran still addresses birthday cards etc to my sons ‘Master Firstname Lastname’ when posting them, but not if giving it to them in person. She also had the most beautiful penmanship, like so perfectly beautiful it’s almost unreadable to my children who don’t encounter that writing anymore. I think the master thing is the cutest thing, but I just love my gran soooo much. She’s 88 years old and still fit as a fiddle. She drives from Scotland to England to visit me every year. Honestly she’s the best.
I forgot to say, my gran also has two really ‘odd’ middle names, Holland and Schofield. One of them is her mums maiden name and one after an aunts middle name. She wasn’t born in the regency era, she was born in 1933, but it’s cool that those traditions can still be seen in Britain today, albeit more rarely.
This reminded me of some things I've been observing about forms of address in Japan, as reflected in anime. Even if you don't speak Japanese, if you watch the subtitled versions you start to notice patterns reflecting relationships that don't always get reflected in the translation. Two do: [Name]-san = Mr/Ms. [Name], and [Name]-sama = Lord/Lady [Name]. But the familiar titles are often omitted, and I think that's a shame because they give important clues to relationships. [Name]-kun is diminuitive-but-respectful-of-masculinity, I guess sort of like calling a male child "sport" or "bud" or "tiger". It's usually used toward a male character by a familiar friend of either gender. [Name]-chan is purely cutesy and affectionate, and seems to be used in situations where English speakers would find it not-weird to call someone "sweetie" or "honey": from adult to adorable child, between female friends, or between partners when being all lovey-dovey. Leaving out such titles can hide important information. For instance, some viewers will loudly argue that the central relationship in "Seraph of the End" isn't gay, but even without any other evidence...Mika consistently calls Yuichiro "Yu-chan" (something no other character does, and which I've never heard between male friends in any other story) and Yu does not object or think that's weird. Also, kind of like the "Mr. Darcy" thing, female characters often refer to male characters they like with more respectful titles than they technically have to. The girl who has a (totally ignored) crush on Yu calls him "Yu-san" even though she out-ranks him and the other members of the squad call him either Yu, Yu-kun, or "idiot-Yu". In "Inuyasha", Sango often calls Miroku by a title roughly translating to "Lord monk"...but I'm not surprised the subtitles leave that out because when they've been traveling together for a couple of years and these two clearly have a crush on each other, it would seem weird to modern English speakers to be so formal.
Thank you for clarifying san/sama! I was wondering about that. Inuyasha was one of my favorites, the subtitles made it so much clearer than the dubbed but still fun either way!
In P&P, we never come to know what Mr. and Mrs. Bennet's first names are either. They still call each other 'Mr. Bennet' and 'Mrs. Bennet'. Maybe they did call each other affectionately by their first names during the early years of marriage, and later adopted more formal forms of address as that affection waned? Or that Mr. Bennet had a first name that was a bit mouthful for Mrs. Bennet to pronounce and she kept calling him Mr. Bennet, and he did likewise? We do not know. 😄 For a similar reason I suspect Lizzy would keep calling Mr. Darcy just that, unless she were to call him 'Fitzy' or something of that kind. 'Fitzwilliam' just sounds too formal, complicated and unendearing unlike Henry, George or John. 😉 But there is a suggestion in many places that the first name of Mrs. Bennet might have been _'Jane'_ as it was a usual practice during the period to name the eldest son after the father and eldest daughter after the mother. (Of course, old Mr. Darcy never got to name his son after himself, but then 'Fitzwilliam' was a cool, noble-sounding name!) In one particular scene in P&P 1995, Mr. Gardiner calls Mrs. Bennet (his sister) as 'Fanny'. Must have been a random pick by the film makers, I think. As for Mr. Bennet, since he never had a son, there is no way to guess what his first name might have been. And this thing about who gets to be called ' Miss _surname_ ' seems a bit complex too. Besides the case you have mentioned (of the eldest unmarried daughter keeping that name and passing it on to her next sister when she got married), you could address someone by that name when her elder sister wasn't around. Thus Mr. Darcy could call Elizabeth as 'Miss Bennet' as long as Jane wasn't immediately present. That makes me wonder. What if Mr. Darcy was talking to Elizabeth addressing her as 'Miss Bennet' all the time and suddenly Jane were to come to them? He would switch that name to Jane and call Lizzy as 'Miss Elizabeth Bennet'? A bit tricky, I think. Did the same rule apply to men too? Could Mr. John Knightley be called 'Mr. Knightley' as long as his elder brother wasn't around? I need to take another look at _Emma._ On a lighter side, Emma _did_ call Mr. Knightley by his first name 'George' at one time. But she did that as a child and merely to irritate Mr. Knightley. Since he didn't take offense at it like she hoped he would, she was disappointed and dropped it. 😀
Those are all great points! And yes, this was endlessly complex and I think personalized to each situation, feelings of the parties and relationships between them. And now I’m just imaging Elizabeth going around calling him “Fitz” 😂
I don’t think you really need to use a name if you are just talking to one person, unless you really want to like affectionately when engaged like Darcy uses Elizabeth. I feel a name would be more important when you announce someone or refer to someone who isn’t there.
Jane, as the eldest daughter would be addressed and referred to as Miss Bennett, and Elizabeth would be Miss Elizabeth. Elizabeth would be Miss Bennett once her sister got married. This was a subtle way of letting people know that Jane was was number 1 in the marriage market. Usually the second daughter wouldn’t get engaged before her elder sister had married.
The TV show house does this and it drives me crazy. It's always Chase or Cameron and for years I thought those were their first names. Also Bones does this between the 2 leads. I think even after she's knocked and married he still calls her Bones.
Thank you for this clear and interesting video !! About naming the servants, I thought Donwnton Abbey did a fantastic job. For example, Thomas Barrow is called "Thomas" when he is a footman, "Barrow" when is is a valet and underbutler, and finally "Mister Barrow" when he becomes the butler. We could also note that only the other servants call him "Mister Barrow", the family sticks to "Barrow" because he is still their inferior. Anna Bates is called Anna as a maid, and the ladies complain about having to call her "Bates" when she marries and becomes a lady's maid (eventually they don't !). Maybe she'll be called "Mrs Bates" by the staff when she succeeds to Mrs Hughes, the governess ? But I believe lady Mary will always call her Anna... What do you think ?
Fun fact: I grew up in Georgia in the Deep South. I have a younger brother who had a different father from me. His grandparents wrote us letters and they always addressed them to “Master [brother’s name].” So as late as the 90s it was a title still used in some parts for a young man, not yet mature. (And of course mine was addressed as “Miss.”)
I mentioned some other traditions from the video that still kinda exist today in another comment. But if you think about it, even the friends using surnames is super common today, especially for men. They obviously don’t put ‘Mister’ in front of it but most nicknames are just surnames or some variation of it. It’s also seen as quite a familiar way to refer to someone. I think it’s the mister part that throws us off today. Saying that, it could also be a hangover from schools using last names only in the past, and in more posh public schools (in Britain a public school is an independent fee paying school, usually for the elite, such as Eton or Harrow). I’m sure we’ve all seen in Harry Potter when Snape or McGonagall refers to Harry as just Potter. So while Britain is obviously a very modern country, and we almost never use ‘Mr’ except in the case of teachers, it is interesting that it has influenced so many things.
The formal levels of address lasted for quite a long time in some places. My mum told me quite recently, that her dad (and his brothers and their wives) used the formal you (the equivalent of Vous in French or Sie in German) when addressing their mother. Mum and her cousins, on the other hand, were allowed to use the informal you (Tu in French) when speaking to their grandmother.
We had letter writing after home work hour at school to write home. Envelopes were addressed MR & MRS (Parent), MISS (sister) & MASTER (brother). 🙂 (1980's - So long ago)
Fun fact: my dad, who’s in his 80s now, went to a very traditional English school where the boys were all called by their surnames. The only person there who called him by his first name was his brother; his friends shortened ‘Whitfield’ to ‘Whitters.’ So even when giving him a nickname, it was based on his surname!
What I found interesting, after having just listened to the audio book, is that the Bennet girls' aunts have no first names given. They're known as "Aunt Phillips" and "Aunt Gardiner." Why is that? Does that mean Jane would be known as "Aunt Bingley" to Elizabeth and Darcy's children?
Before Miss to Mrs denoted marital state, they were honorifics to specify women's social status. After 1900 it was more closely identified with a woman who was married or unmarried. At times in the 18th century, an adult woman addressed as "Miss" was a recognition that she was a prostitute. So it's relatively recently that these titles were exclusively used to signal a woman's marital status.
My maiden name was Shannon, and the younger branches are full of children named "Shannon." My great-grandmother's maiden name was Norman, and one of her sons and a few grandsons are named "Norman."
Gosh, you are just adorable. I am so happy to have stumbled over the channel. So that means there are moments when Mrs Dashwood calls her husband by his first name? Interesting, I thought they'd just always be on a last name basis. Oh, and I am the oldest sister and the only unmarried one, so I'd be Miss MyLastName.
Aw! Welcome to the channel! And it is interesting because Jane Austen never really wrote married couples behind closed doors we don't really get to see their first names!
The transfer from Master to Mister upon adulthood wasn't always the case. The younger son, the 'heir' of a peerage was also Master as a title. Even when in adulthood. Don't mind me as i swoon over my favourite book boyfriend: Dorothy Dunnett's; Francis Crawford, Master of Culter ❤
I have always wondered why Fanny Price has to call Tom Mr Bertram and Marina Miss Bertram in spite of their being first cousins and of the fact that she is allowed to call the other two by their first names as opposed to Miss Julia or Mr Edmund.
My aunt always addressed my birthday cards with "Master" when I was a kid and it always weirded me out. Didn't find out until I was an adult what that meant.
I'm sure someone else already pointed this out, but you've misspelled "multiple" and "marriage." Perhaps it's because I grew up in a different era than you (I was born in the mid-60s) or because I live in the South, but, in my part of the world, we still use the terms Master for boys under 21 (or 18 depending on how mature they are) and Miss for unmarried girls and women.
If either version induced even 1 person to read the novel and discover Jane Austen, then I'm overjoyed. It's like how my daughter loves graphic novels. I can get her to read a graphic novel retell of a classic, but she'd never pick up the novel. Someday she will, and then she'll discover even more of the stories. I love breaking down and dissecting like this video did. However, some comments were just snobby. We should celebrate that both of these movies introduced Jane Austen to the masses.
Pardon me if I am wrong. Wasn't Lady DeBurgh's maiden name Fitzwilliam? Which means her sister (Darcy's mom) was a Fitzwilliam, which became his first name. The person who accompanied him to his aunts estate was a Fitzwilliam.
I'm my dad's first daughter, so I would have been Miss Lunn. I guess my older half-sister would have had her father's first name? How did it work with blended families, as rare as they might have been in Regency era? (we have the same mother, if that makes any difference?)
I am pretty sure the Earls of Matlock carry the surname Fitzwilliam (in universe), that's why Darcy's cousin was Col. Fitzwilliam, and Darcy was named after his mother's maiden name (she was Lady Anne Fitzwilliam). And I like headcanon that the old Mr Darcy was named George, hence GEORGiana and his godson George Wickham. I wouldn't be surprised if one of the girls had a son named Bennet. Jane could name a daughter Charlotte, which is a version of Charles, kind of like Caroline, but we're not naming anyone after her 😅
Some upper servants would simply be referred to by their surname and the lowest would have been called by their first name. Or, in some households, by whatever first name the employer chose for them. Also, in the 17th/early 18th century calling a woman 'Miss', was not polite
I was thinking about which Austen hero I like the most just yesterday. At first I thought it was a toss-up between Knightley and Henry Tilney. Then I thought harder n I'd like Henry Tilney for a boyfriend but Knightley for a friend. But the two of them are my faves. You have no idea how excited I got when you said you'd like to marry him as well 😄 "Someone else loves him too!" I thought. But then of course people love him 🤷🏻♀️ What's not to like? I'd be Miss Rahim since my older sister got married and I'm the next and last of this family
When the oldest son of a noble family inherits the title, it appears to be standard to refer to him as [name of title] instead of Mr. [Surname]. Does the second oldest son become Mr. [Surname], or is the brother still addressed with his full name?
No idea, but my guess is this would be comparable to marriage for women, so it would make the Mr [Surname only] title pass along, the way the Miss [Surname only] would. I does make me wonder if age made a difference. Upon the death of the father, would the oldest son immediately receive the title, even if he was a minor of maybe 8 or 9? He wouldn't yet get the power, of course, but maybe the formal title? Hmm...
In Harry Potter characters often call peers they don’t know too well or aren’t friends with by their last name, like Malfoy is barely ever called Draco. And we hear Crabbe and Goyle’s name about once. So is this common in England these days or more wizard quirk?
It used to be more common in private schools, which is probably what Rowling was channeling. It's quite common for boys in school to be referred to as their surname (or a nickname of their surname) due to the tradition of calling people in football by their surname. For example, I know people with the surname Boots, Smith and Gabica who went by Bootsy, Smithy and Bica. These are often used by the boys in their team, and through usage may also spread to other people in the school.
Wasn't it also the case that you only could adress a person with their first name when everybody around had the same privilege (well, maybe apart from the servants, they were not thought to be "persons" sadly)?
Wait is this where to whole “call people by their last name” thing comes from in Harry Potter? Because that always confused me because I’ve basically never heard people irl do that.
Love your video! Have a question though - could you share any sources discussing the forms of address in Regency England? might wanna explore this topic further
You made me think how Alfred calling Bruce Wayne "Master Bruce" is both out of endearment and a jab because he wears a children's costume to fight crime haha I'd be Miss Souza, I'm the oldest and do not have sisters. Would my younger brothers both be Master Souza? They are twins, and I think it would be very silly if Victor got do be called Master Souza and Vinicius by his first name lmao. I loved your explanation about Darcy's first name been his mother's maiden name, that was always weird to me, but then I found out the reason my full name has the "de Oliveira Souza" (It's Juliana Dantas de Oliveira Souza, no middle name, but three last names just because) part was because my great-grandfather his first name was "Oliveira", but now I'm thinking he was named that after his mother's maiden name because "Oliveira" is a last name, and we have all been carrying it for generations for some reason.
1:13 my dad and his siblings all had former familial last names as middle names. And my cousin has my last name as his first name. Of course, my last name is at least a common first name (Ryan). My parents keep asking if I'm going to use my last name as a middle name for a future kid. That would be weird because I hyphenated and my kid won't be hypenating, so it will definitely sound weird.
If my husband and I were around during recency times, I would be known as Mrs. Feigner because that is what I am known as now after being married to him for almost nine years.
You forgot to mention that it was common to name children after their godfathers, especially if you hoped that the godfather (who was usually a relative or close family friend of higher social standing or better finances) would step in and take an interest in the child. That's part of why Darcy's first name is Fitzwilliam; he is named after his godfather, the earl, not just to announce the family connection but to try to endear him to the earl. That's also why George Wickham is named George. Presumably, George Wickham and Georgiana Darcy were both named after Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy's father, Mr. George Darcy.
Wow! I never thought about George and Georgiana sharing a common name source!
The Bennet sisters upon marriage will probably have lots of boys with the name Fitzwilliam and Charles(Bingley) and Elizabeth and Jane.
@@bookmouse2719 Oh, I'm absolutely certain that Wickham named one of theirs after Darcy just to really grate on dear old Uncle Fitz and to drive home that advantageous family connection. lol.
@@EllieDashwood Another point of interest in the names in P&P is that they would have had political and social connotations for period readers. For instance, the 18th century seat of the Earls Fitzwilliam was Wentworth Woodhouse (ring any Austen-y bells?), still one of England's largest private homes. The Fitzwilliams were powerful Whig party leaders and their fortune was enormous. Not only was theirs the largest home in England (it still may be; I'm not sure if anyone has yet overtaken it), but their fortune, at the time, would have been the roughly equivalent to the sixth largest economy in the world if their estates and holdings had been a country. I will have to check on that source, but I know I found that tid-bit when I was researching. I could be off a little, but my point is that the Fitzwilliams were ridiculously wealthy. Naming Darcy after a powerful, left-leaning, ridiculously rich political family was likely no accident. It's like giving someone in a contemporary American book the name "Kennedy Clinton"
and then comparing their private wealth to the economy of California.
Interestingly, the name Wickham also carries political connotations. The man who basically invented British spycraft (he founded the British secret service) was named William Wickham. He was extremely active during the French Revolutionary period. He was now and then embroiled in scandals owing to the cost of his secretive activities, but he later recovered and became an MP.
These connections are lost to modern readers, especially to modern readers who live outside of Great Britain, but they would have been very much present in the minds of Jane Austen's contemporaries -- all because of the names that Jane Austen chose to give her characters!
I had an Uncle Tunis (died in car wreck before I was born) - his mother's maiden name was Tunis.
First name = Fitzwilliam.
Thanks haha
@Elizabeth Rivera It is clearly mentioned 50 seconds into the video...
I knew it 🤪😂
@@Sefficaif they're that impatient they could've googled it 😭
- Sherlock, what's Watson's first name?
- Why, isn't it Doctor?
😂😂😂
😂😂😂
He certainly signed his letter to Elizabeth by both names: Fitzwilliam Darcy.
There's definitely a really well known pop culture usage of Master- Proper Englishman Alfred Pennyworth calls Bruce Wayne "Master Bruce," it's a cool dichotomy because as a parental figure he still sees Bruce as a boy, but as a servant he uses a title to address his employer.
and Master William and Master Carlton from the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
I was fascinated by the scene in P&P when Lydia and Mr. Wickham return to Longbourn, now married and Lydia says to Jane that she now has a higher rank that Jane because she is a married woman! Not an exact quote, but pretty much.
If I recall correctly, in that scene they are going in to dinner and her comment implies that a married woman would have precedence over the unmarried women of the party when it comes to the order for entering the dining room and for the seating arrangements. Lydia's full social standing would be based on the status of her husband. Since Mr. Wickam was the son of the former estate manager at Pemberly and her father is landed gentry, I don't believe her social position has actually increased. (This is my interpretation as a fan of Regency & Victorian romances, not based on actual research)
Yeah you're talking about the whole making Jane sit lower because she didn't get married first thing. Yeah that's just the rank of how daughter sit when there are no sons in a family. But here's the funny thing once Jane and Mr Bingley get married in the fabulous double wedding where Darcy and Elizabeth also get married. Then they take their birth order ranks back and then it would be Jane and her husband and then Mr Darcy and Elizabeth and then Lydia would be knocked into third place and Mary would go lower until she gets married.
Daughters are seated at the table from their mother's right hand. And Sons are seated at the table from their father's right hand at opposite ends of the table when it's just a family dinner. When they are dining in company the husband would sit by the wife. At the wife's right hand. And then the daughters would proceed from the mother's left hand on the what is essentially the female side of the table. And depending on how formal the setting is the son-in-law's would then take up their wife's birth order position at the right hand of their father-in-law if their father was not present at the dinner. If the father-in-law is alive and at the dinner then the bride and her husband sit in their appropriate order based on husband's father starting from the bottom of the table.
My great-grandmother insisted that I learn all of the Victorian era etiquette things when I was little because I was the only female great-grandchild born before she passed away.
Formal dinner at the Bennett's after the end of the book with everyone there which (I don't imagine happened very often especially the Wickham part) but anyway here's the hypothetical setup.
Mrs Bennett & Mr. Bennett
Jane. Mr. Bingley
Elizabeth. Mr. Darcy
Lydia. Mr. Wickham
Mary. Unmarried male guest2
Unmarried male1-miss guest1
Kitty. Male guest 3
Married male guest and wife
This is why Mr Collins taking up his seat at the bottom of Lady Catherine's table is such an honor for him and why he feels like life could give him nothing better.
I finally understand why Emma was so upset when Mrs. Elton called Knightly "Knightly" 😆
Yesssss!!!!
Can you imagine how badly Emma would have lost it if Mrs. Elton had presumed to call him “George”?! 🤣
God Bless,
Tahlia
@@FranciscanGypsy she would have absolutely lost her mind!
@@EllieDashwood isn't also the case that the use of surname alone was a thing men did to each other and women didn't, so Mrs Elton is also being inappropriate as she is behaving doubly in an unladylike way; firstly by being too familiar and secondly by behaving unlike a lady
Women did not called men by their surnames without a title. It was very unladylike of her. Calling a man by his surname along was something that generally signified familiarity, or perhaps even disrespect.
Darcy would probably have called his friend Charles, but when a person's Christian name was as pompous as Fitzwilliam, his friends would have called him Darcy and his sister would have called him "Brother".
The name FItzwilliam signifies that the family is descended from the son (illegitimate) of one of the Stuart Kings.
Boys at school were generally referred to by their surnames alone. If there was more than one boy in the family, they would be known as Wilkinson Major and Wilkinson Minor. If there were more they could be Howerd Primus, Howerd Secundus and Howerd Tertius. atc
oh i'm reminded of when mrs crowley asks "what should we called each other" and lady grantham replies "we could always start with mrs crowley and lady grantham" i guess it must have seemed very obvious to her :-)
Now I’m starting to wonder exactly how inappropriate it was that Mr. Rochester started calling his governess “Jane” or even “Janet” in Jane eyre 😳
It probably was, although it came out a well 30 years later than P&P, so I don't think things changed that much. In any case, Mr. Rochester always conducted himself as if he was above the laws of men (and certainly those pompous society rules), so it does make sence that he would choose to call her by her first name. Although, I'm can't remember right now at which point he starts doing so, and if they were alone or in company. 🤔
Absolutely unacceptable 🤦🏻♀️
as her employer - can’t he call her whatever he chooses - would be interested in what anyone thinks
Servants such as maids were called by their first name. Not sure about governesses though?
She was a servant?
During a reading Jane Austen added that Kitty married a clergyman in Derbyshire (near her sisters I guess), while Mary married one of her uncle's law clerks and stayed in Meryton. So Kitty did do better.
I wish Jane had written a sequel to P&P that would have been awesome! 😃😭
It depends on what you consider "better." I always thought that Mary's marriage to one of her uncle's clerks was the equivalent of marrying the boss's daughter. The Philipses have no children, so a clerk who married their niece would be in a good position to eventually take over Mr. Philip's law practice, which seems to be a good one and will probably be even better in the future because of the marriages of the two eldest Bennet girls. I would say their fortunes were about equal.
@@dorothywillis1 Totally agree with you; although a clergyman might have the dubious distinction of being accorded a gentleman, clerical stipends varied hugely throughout the dioceses, and some certainly had no hope of maintaining a "gentleman's" status in society. Anthony Trollope's mid C19th novels are full of impoverished parish clergyman with not a chance of being accorded any semblance of social rank.
@@christopherseton-smith7404 Trollope's novels are also full of clergymen who have very comfortable livings and close ties to the local Big Wheels. Somehow I don't see Kitty as a Mrs. Quiverful, let alone a Mrs. Crawley. (BTW, I wrote this comment once before and thought I had posted it, but I can't find it. So if I am repeating myself, please forgive me.)
@@dorothywillis1 Good point. I wonder if the clergyman in Derbyshire had the living in Kympton? The clerical position there was probably in Darcy's gift, with clerical positions being popular postings for second sons, so it is entirely likely that Kitty's clergyman husband was either a distant relation or a favored Darcy family friend. Kitty and her husband and any children would likely have benefited from such a connection.
As for Mary, I entirely agree that her husband likely inherited the Phillips' law practice, as that would have been the only method the Phillips had of keeping it in the family. I imagine it could have been a lucrative and thriving business. The Phillips family may not have been quite genteel, but do recall that they hosted lottery parties and events for the officers in Meryton. The officers attended eagerly, so the Phillips family were not looked down upon so very greatly. Any children that Mary had could have depended on some assistance from rich uncles and could likely have been launched into the gentry by way of education and profession - and would have been better provided for than, say, Lydia's children.
I think it also shows a lot in the relationships between female characters. Isabella Thorpe encourages Catherine to be on first name terms with her at an early stage, and this gives the illusion that they are close friends, but it's Miss Tilney and Miss Morland up to the night when she gets kicked out of Northanger Abbey, and the switch to first names then shows the genuine friendship that they have.
The naming conventions also give credence to why Marianne (and Mrs. Dashwood) assumed she and Willoughby were engaged in S&S. Combined with the lock of hair, gifting her a horse, and his taking her to Allenham.
They were also writing letters
The first name thing is highlighted in Sense And Sensibility when Elinor is startled when she overhears Willoughby call Marianne by her first name and Elinor wonders to herself that they are such terms with each other and yet have not made their engagement known to the family. I kind of wondered about that before. It all makes sense now...
Although Emma is probably my least favorite Austen heroine, Mr. Knightley is my favorite Austen hero.
And obviously, as a Miss (Ellie) Dashwood you need to marry a Mr Ferrars. Just saying! 😆
God Bless,
Tahlia
So true about S&S! They were just breaking all the rules. Mr Knightley is amazing!!! 😍 Edward Ferrar’s is not. 😂
@@EllieDashwood Well, Dan Stevens as Edward Ferrars is :)
@@EllieDashwood I think Edward is more relatable than amazing. He's not a dream fantasy fulfillment guy to get, but at least for me with my mild autism, strong introversion, past social anxiety and repeated depressions he's actually a point-of-view character to root for, and getting together with the wonderful girl that is Elinor is his Austenian karmic happy ending for making the right moral choices.
The only time it's mentioned is in his letter to Lizzie after he gets rejected.😂
His real name was Fred Bloggs and he ran a whelk stall darn the Mile End Road, but the publishers said, "Nah Jane, no one is gonna Adam an Eve that sweet'art, you'll 'ave to posh 'im up a bit".
😂😂😂 That is definitely what happened!
I get the impression that Austen really was poshing the language up a lot. The private conversations were conducted in a very stilted and proper form. It seemed unnatural to me.
@@AdrianColley I think that Austen was spot on when it came to people from "the Shires". My ancestors lived in the slums just to the north of St. Clement Danes, not her territory at all, know wat I mean Ade me old cock sparra?.
@@AdrianColley The concept of a fictional novel and what a novel ought to be like have evolved over time. She wrote hers over two hundred years ago, and back then the expectations for a novel were very different. Only later people started to think the dialogue in a novel should imitate the way people actually speak. And even still today too, the way real speech and real discussions happen is markedly different from how we write and deliver dialogue. Modern dialogue tries to give off the impression of realism without truly being realistic.
Several respondents here have incorrectly asserted that anyone with a surname that begins with Fitz is descended from someone given that surname because they were born out of wedlock.
The very first use of a surname, in English, was FITZGERALD, circa 1177, if I am not mistaken. Inheritable surnames only started to be used in the 12th century. William the Conqueror's native language was Norman French. The language of the English court remained Norman French, for well over one hundred years.
As others have written, the prefix Fitz merely means "son of".
The tiny grain of truth is that some English kings gave some of their bastard children the surname FITROY.
Fun fact: my great-grandmother was alive until I was 20, and she and my brother used to write letters to each other and she would address his as “Master First-Last Name” it was CUTE 🥰
Aw!!!! That is so cute!!!
An ex-colleague was once surprised to see his infant son addressed as "Master So-and-so" on a plane ticket. I had to tell him that that was how young boys were addressed in English back in the day.
Honestly, I used to do that to my nephews when they were still 'in short trousers' ie under the age of about 12 (and I'm only 44, not 94!)
My dad still does that when writing to my son!
That was standard when I was growing up. If you wrote a letter or a holiday card to a family you put Mr. & Mrs.---- ---- on the first line of the mailing address on the envelope, and Master --- ----- and Miss -- --- on the next line before the street number.
You have a very niche channel and I am SO here for it. This helps me a great deal in my reading b/c I am enjoying her works but also feel a bit lost at times with some of the social customs. Thank you! I found Lucy Worsley's doc on Jane Austen, and also the Regency Era accessible, too. Can't wait to read more Austen.
That was so interesting!! I knew his first name from the novel but liked that you dove deeper into the details on what types of relationships may actually use first names
Aw thank you! I'm so glad you liked it!
If you’re interested in the rules of comportment and general laws and customs of the early 1800s I highly recommend the book What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew by Daniel Pool. It gives a full breakdown of forms of address, order of precedence, servants hierarchy, how many shillings in a pound, why upper class people didn’t care for plumbing, and much more, all in quite a fun tongue-in-cheek tone.
1. I certainly did not know he had a First Name! Thank you! :D 2. Me, reading chinese novels where you have to learn 3 NAMES because everybody has a Birth Name, a Courtesy Name and an Honorary Title: Yeah, this makes sense! 3. You're frigging adorable.
Your reference to the term "Master" brought back the recollection that in the 1960s in the UK as a child receving post, for birthdays cards for instance, older relatives almost always addressed the envelopes to Master Christopher Seton-Smith.
That is so cool!!!
Back in 1986-1988 in Toronto, my grade 2 and 3 teacher, Miss Bailey, was English and had quite a bit of the old country about her. One day, she gave us the assignment to write a letter to a former classmate. I was instructed to write to the boy I knew from grade 1 as "Master Craig Banks".
I address correspondence to my nephews and great nephews as Master until age 16. Still correct and politely acknowledges their sphere in life.
Exactly so in Dunedin NZ about the same time... letters I might receive...it seemed to die out by the mid 60s.
In the teaching world, respect is clearly shown by the way one addresses either the students, or they you. Growing up in the late 50s>> mid 60s, boys were quite often addressed by their surname..just the custom. In the past 3 years, making use of my experience in retirement, the two schools I have been at allow the children ( we are talking primary age here ) to use either Mr or first name as the adult allows. It is always done respectfully so I just go with way it is done.
But I always refer to Mr, Miss or Mrs in front of pupils.
In Japan, my daughter was always "Heather sensei".
That was correct also in the United State through at least the 1970s and beyond. No one seems to know it now
Fitz- Son of, from the French Fils, therefore Fitzwilliam means Son of William.
The term Fitzroy, was used by English Kings to denote illegitimate offspring Fitz - Roi (French for King).
I've got a Fitzroy in my tree! She was one of several of King Henry's (illegitimate in this case) daughters named Matilda/Maude. I think he had three, the Empress Maude/Matilda, and at least two illegitimate ones. He must have really liked the name Matilda 🤷🏼♀️
I love that! Name meanings and orgins are so fascinating!
That whole tittle/Last name thing has always been such an interesting topic for me! Here in Spain we don't use the last name as often, I don't even know the last name of some of my friends, as you just don't hear them on a daily basis, maybe only as a way to differenciate two people with the same first name
People have only addressed others by their first names extremely recently and in many non-English speaking countries they are still formal. If you think about it, everyone in France is still addressed as (in translation) Sir and Madam when they enter a shop and in languages where there is a formal and familiar form of ‘you’, that is still usually observed (we dropped the familiar ‘thee/thy/thou’ in the 19th century). When I was a child in Great Britain in the 1960s my parents were always addressed as Mr or Mrs except by friends or family, even by neighbours with whom they were friendly but with whom they were not close enough to have entered each other’s houses. My grandmother who was born in the 1890s had a casual friend for decades called Miss Adam and when I asked what her first name was, my grandmother said it began with J as she’d seen it on an envelope but didn’t know what it was! It was a sign of respect for the age and status this unmarried lady who’d been a businesswoman before the war, and therefore a bit of a trailblazer.
That is so interesting! And it’s very true! I think in different parts of the US kids still call adults Mr or Mrs Last Name meanwhile in the area where I live they call nearly everyone by their first name. It’s such a complex topic!
@@EllieDashwood In Germany it depends on the circumstances. Students at university or the members of a sports club or a volunteer service one calls each other by the first name. In a more formal setting and in business, one does only use the last name.
The equivalent of "Miss" was abolished, because it shows the marital status.
Ellie Dashwood we have a similar title/name convention where I grew up, where small children called adults by Mrs/Miss/Mr + Last Name and as we were 12-ish, we transitioned to Miss + Last Name for adults that we knew as children, and that’s how we still refer to them even once we’re adults. At least to their face. Weirdly I think we actually keep the Mr Last Name for older men... or we just say screw it and refer to them by their first names.
@@KiraFriede So you're saying that all women are called "Frau" now?
In my father's family adult friends of the family were called aunt or uncle by the next generation. One can see it a lot more in Hawaii to show warm respect to adults.
In Chinese culture, siblings addressed each other as Elder/Younger Sister/Brother until pretty recently! Aunts and uncles have different titles depending on the side of the family as well as birth order compared to the parent as well as whether they’re a spouse. Grandparents on different sides have different titles as well.
I was raised in the rural South of the USA in the 1940's. Even then male children were occasionally referred to as 'Master', especially in correspondence. I remember getting maybe three letters addressed to 'Master' First, Last, when I was a teenager.
I know someone whose Ohio grandmother addressed letters & cards this way until he was an adult! So interesting.
Absolutely and it continued to be the known form until at least the 1970s
And of course we knew what Darcy first name was Fitzwilliam
Hahahah. Loved this one! My regency name would be Miss Brito, but I also hope I can be Mrs Tilney someday. He's my favorite too. And I love when Emma gets so mad at Mrs Elton calling "Knightley" after the first meeting with him... Who does she think she is??
I know! That Mrs Elton is unbelievable. lol. Also, I love it that you love Tilney too! I think he's often underrated among the Austen heroes, but he's so awesome!
I'm surprised you didn't bring up the most famous example of friends using last names. Watson and Holmes refer to each other as in fact the only person to simply call him Sherlock is Mycroft. I'm just a touch surprise because it's one of the most widely cited examples
There is a BBC program titled "Endeavor" about an English police dept.in the '60's. Everyone is addressed by their titles and last names. The main character is never called anything but "Morris", even when in an informal setting. His first/given name is Endeavor. He never tells anybody that because it is a giveaway that his parents were Quakers. Apparently not a popular thing to be and he left that religion when he left home.
Also Miss is the title used for a married woman who has kept her own name after marriage. Elizabeth Taylor was always referred to as Miss Taylor, as were all actresses who made their names before they married.
Dear Miss Dashwood,
I really enjoyed your video about this topic. I really appreciate the first mentioned reason for adressing someone with the title and last name as a sign of respect and honor, but I am also used to it. In Germany we call our bosses and persons with whom we are not very familiar by their title and last name. Except we agree to call us with our first name which (at least in my experience) has to be inniciated by the elder person. Above that there is a difference in address with a formal "Sie" (you) and a familiar "du" (you). So if you are talking to an older person or someone in higher rank (i.e. your boss), you call him or her "Herr [last name]" or "Frau [last name]. We had an equivalent for "Miss" - "Fräulein" (which literally means little woman) but that was removed from the official/ formal german in 1971 because all the women were angered by the degradation that came with this title and wanted equality with the men who were even unmarried called "Herr". I never heard of an equivalent to the english term "Master" but that doesn't mean that there is none...
When I went to school I was always called by my first name by my teachers but when we turned 18, we had the right to be addressed with our title and last name and be called "Sie" instead of "du". Most times we did not ponder on that but my economics teacher in my last school year insisted on calling us with our title and last name so we get used to it for our time outside of the school. Funny enough he still addressed us with the informal "du" while in comparison my other teachers called me/ us with our first names but then addressed us formally with "Sie".
I really enjoyed this mindgame of what we are familiar with and what is done the same way as in Austen's regency England and all the other reasons you mentioned in your video.
Have a wonderful day,
Frau Nielsen
It was a most interesting video, but the time-tunnel audio quality was no help.
I recently had your channel recommended to me by the algorithm, and I'm loving it. Came back to the beginning of your videos to watch them all, and it gave me a craving for some Austen films, so I have been watching a few of those, too. I noticed that in the BBC *Emma*, there is one point at which Emma does refer to Mr. Knightley as simply Knightley: when she is worried that Mrs. Weston is about to reveal bad news of someone she loves. It's a beautiful little extra character touch, and had Mrs. Weston not been so agitated about Frank's engagement to Jane, perhaps she would have picked up on Emma's attachment to her friend from that slip alone!
It's Fitzwilliam...just think! Lizzy may have called her man "Fitzy" in private! 😆
I bet she still called him Mr Darcy even in bed. I recall that Mrs Bennet called her husband Mr Bennet. Did he have a first name? I think he said his name in the apocryphal Lost in Austen miniseries. But I forgot it already.
On use of undecorated surnames: it's common for schoolchildren to address each other by their surnames, for instance, I was universally addressed as "Colley" by my classmates in the 1980s. This didn't apply between friends interacting outside of school. One odd exception: the name _Mary_ is so incredibly common in some places (here in Ireland) that some friends address each other on a surname-only basis just to reduce confusion.
funny... I just commented a few comments up on exactly this in '70s and '80s irish schools. I feel (slightly) less freakish now for still thinking of childhood friends as Dunne and Doyle and Kennedy... still kinda weird tho when you think about it.
My brain: Ooh I would have moved up to Miss "last name" since my older sister is m... Oh wait! She's not actually married, she just lives as if she is...oh dear! The scandal! I would be doomed to become a spinster due to our family's ruined reputation. Also, I'm already in my thirties and single...I would already be firmly labeled an OLD spinster 😓 And old spinster from a scandalous family no less.
Thank godness for modern times where I am just a person living MY life 😅
yes, but it's curious to think about the new forms of propriety. like nowadays how people start identifying which pronouns they answer to.
Every time I read the book, I change all the young mens’ names to their first names in my head (Mr. Bingley becomes Charlie, Mr. Darcy becomes Fitz, Mr Wickham becomes George, etc) it makes it’s always more fun for me that way
I see lots of comments about "master" still being used in the South or by their grandmother. Just adding that I definitely knew the "master = young boy" concept growing up, and I was growing up in the 2000s in the Midwest with lots of close ties to the northeast. So, it's not just the South or grandmothers. I always thought of master as a formal term, not an outdated one. I've probably mostly encountered it on formal invitations.
"Oh Fitzy dear" called Elizabeth. and oh dear....I'd be Mrs. Butterfield which makes me sound like maple syrup lady.
There are other ways of making the name more informal. "William" or "Will" is probably the easiest.
@@dorothywillis1 The fitz- prefix is one of those words that mean "son of", like Irish Ó, Danish -sson, German von, etc. So "William" would be much more appropriate than "Fitzy".
@@AdrianColley I wasn't the one who called him "Fitzy"! :-) It would be interesting to know what his sister calls him. "Fitzwilliam" is a difficult name to shorten, which may have been one reason his mother and aunt chose it. (Dignity, always Dignity!) It is the sort of name that leads to strange nicknames being given at school, such as P. G. Wodehouse's Darcy "Stilton" Cheesewright or Zenobia "Nobby" Hopwood, or Harold "Stinker" Pinker.
@@dorothywillis1 We're in total agreement.
@@AdrianColley actually the bastard son of... tge name Fitzroy means the bastard son of the king
Austen shared with her nephew (James Austen-Leigh), who shared in the Memoir of Jane Austen, that Kitty Bennett did in fact make a better match than Mary. Kitty married a clergyman from near Pemberly, and Mary one of her uncle's Phillips's clerks. I hope the clergyman Kitty married was the one who got the living Wickham was supposed to get.
Six years late-but I note that Dad’s paternal grandfather was from Northern Ireland, a minister born in the 19th century. I once saw a letter the reverend wrote to Dad sometime in the early 1940s and the envelope was addressed to “Master David Gilmore.” The formality stuck around longer than one might think.
It’s entirely your fault that I am binge watching all my fave Jane Austin movies again lol love this channel 🥰
It was pretty common in the 1800's and 1900's in the Netherlands as well for women to address their husbands by either their last name, or sometimes their profession if it was a highly respected one.
I was addressed as “Master” a few times - my aunt and I think the local library did… it helped distinguish me from my dad who had the same initial, so “Master J Baldwin” was me.
You missed off “esquire”, or “esq” as a postnomial which I got a few times and really needs to make a comeback. You lose that at 21.
Also unusually for Britain, I don’t have a middle name. Some families still carry on the tradition of passing a name down the family but skipping its use. So Paul McCartney is actually James Paul McCartney but as his dad was James, the some was called Paul.
I’ve only had my academic postnomials (BA or MA) added to my name a few times, and today I only really use “Dr” in a professional context. Students attempt to call me “professor” sometimes but in the UK, that is a specific title that’s bestowed on you as a rank - unlike in other countries where ‘professor’ is standard for what we would call a lecturer. In British universities it’s normal for students to call you by your first name rather than your title. We’ve become much more casual than a lot of places where to do so would be a high crime…
Got my nickname at age 5 weeks when someone wrote a wedding invitation to my parents and added “Master Jack” to it but she wrote a backhand and the a looked like an o and I’ve been Jock ever since. I’m not the Jock Ellis who played horn for the Grateful Dead.
Esquire.... no. You don't lose that at 21.
Esquire signifies that you are a landholder.
If you use Esq. after your name, then you do not use Mr before your name., so you can be Mr Jonathan Baldwin or Jonathan Baldwin, Esq. signifying you are a man of property.
@@MandyJMaddison Or a lawyer in the US.
Your point about Professor is an excellent one & is why Rowling drives me mad with her Professor This, Professor That for what are in fact secondary school teachers. There are no British schools that I know of, not even public ones like Eton &c, in which teachers would be referred to in such a way. We call teachers Sir or Miss (regardless of marital status) to their faces & when referring to them it would be Mr X, Miss or Mrs Y (depending) or very occasionally Dr (I had a maths teacher once with a PhD in astronomy). Professorships are I believe given out a little more frequently than they were "in my day", but certainly at one time it denoted that you were the head of the department as much as anything else. So Professor Z is almost certainly the top banana of the History dept, for example.
Given that further education in the WW appears to involve something called a "mastery", it would surely make more sense to call the teachers Master or Mistress, to denote their expertise.
If I had been a boy, I was to have been called James Adam & referred to as Adam, because my Dad was James but (as I was told this by my Mother) she thought the two names sounded better in the J A order.
To another commenter's point about addressing older adults as Aunt/Uncle, I did this too but am quite glad it wasn't done to me, as the alliterative Aunt (or inevitably, Auntie) followed by a name beginning with A sounds dreadful to my ears!
I have been really enjoying this channel!!! In New Zealand, we still use master in a few formal places, for example, a letter from the doctor or the bank- this stops when you turn 13- and become a mister.
from Levin....in my 99 years teaching, I can't really remember a time when I used "Master" unless I was being ironic........growing up in early 60's Dunedin it was very common. The old couple down the street still called each other Mr/Mrs Cameron in front of non-family.
@@neville132bbk at the dentist today my youngest son was enrolled as master.
My gran still addresses birthday cards etc to my sons ‘Master Firstname Lastname’ when posting them, but not if giving it to them in person. She also had the most beautiful penmanship, like so perfectly beautiful it’s almost unreadable to my children who don’t encounter that writing anymore. I think the master thing is the cutest thing, but I just love my gran soooo much. She’s 88 years old and still fit as a fiddle. She drives from Scotland to England to visit me every year. Honestly she’s the best.
I forgot to say, my gran also has two really ‘odd’ middle names, Holland and Schofield. One of them is her mums maiden name and one after an aunts middle name. She wasn’t born in the regency era, she was born in 1933, but it’s cool that those traditions can still be seen in Britain today, albeit more rarely.
This reminded me of some things I've been observing about forms of address in Japan, as reflected in anime. Even if you don't speak Japanese, if you watch the subtitled versions you start to notice patterns reflecting relationships that don't always get reflected in the translation. Two do: [Name]-san = Mr/Ms. [Name], and [Name]-sama = Lord/Lady [Name]. But the familiar titles are often omitted, and I think that's a shame because they give important clues to relationships.
[Name]-kun is diminuitive-but-respectful-of-masculinity, I guess sort of like calling a male child "sport" or "bud" or "tiger". It's usually used toward a male character by a familiar friend of either gender. [Name]-chan is purely cutesy and affectionate, and seems to be used in situations where English speakers would find it not-weird to call someone "sweetie" or "honey": from adult to adorable child, between female friends, or between partners when being all lovey-dovey. Leaving out such titles can hide important information. For instance, some viewers will loudly argue that the central relationship in "Seraph of the End" isn't gay, but even without any other evidence...Mika consistently calls Yuichiro "Yu-chan" (something no other character does, and which I've never heard between male friends in any other story) and Yu does not object or think that's weird.
Also, kind of like the "Mr. Darcy" thing, female characters often refer to male characters they like with more respectful titles than they technically have to. The girl who has a (totally ignored) crush on Yu calls him "Yu-san" even though she out-ranks him and the other members of the squad call him either Yu, Yu-kun, or "idiot-Yu". In "Inuyasha", Sango often calls Miroku by a title roughly translating to "Lord monk"...but I'm not surprised the subtitles leave that out because when they've been traveling together for a couple of years and these two clearly have a crush on each other, it would seem weird to modern English speakers to be so formal.
Thank you for clarifying san/sama! I was wondering about that. Inuyasha was one of my favorites, the subtitles made it so much clearer than the dubbed but still fun either way!
In P&P, we never come to know what Mr. and Mrs. Bennet's first names are either. They still call each other 'Mr. Bennet' and 'Mrs. Bennet'. Maybe they did call each other affectionately by their first names during the early years of marriage, and later adopted more formal forms of address as that affection waned? Or that Mr. Bennet had a first name that was a bit mouthful for Mrs. Bennet to pronounce and she kept calling him Mr. Bennet, and he did likewise? We do not know. 😄 For a similar reason I suspect Lizzy would keep calling Mr. Darcy just that, unless she were to call him 'Fitzy' or something of that kind. 'Fitzwilliam' just sounds too formal, complicated and unendearing unlike Henry, George or John. 😉
But there is a suggestion in many places that the first name of Mrs. Bennet might have been _'Jane'_ as it was a usual practice during the period to name the eldest son after the father and eldest daughter after the mother. (Of course, old Mr. Darcy never got to name his son after himself, but then 'Fitzwilliam' was a cool, noble-sounding name!) In one particular scene in P&P 1995, Mr. Gardiner calls Mrs. Bennet (his sister) as 'Fanny'. Must have been a random pick by the film makers, I think. As for Mr. Bennet, since he never had a son, there is no way to guess what his first name might have been.
And this thing about who gets to be called ' Miss _surname_ ' seems a bit complex too. Besides the case you have mentioned (of the eldest unmarried daughter keeping that name and passing it on to her next sister when she got married), you could address someone by that name when her elder sister wasn't around. Thus Mr. Darcy could call Elizabeth as 'Miss Bennet' as long as Jane wasn't immediately present. That makes me wonder. What if Mr. Darcy was talking to Elizabeth addressing her as 'Miss Bennet' all the time and suddenly Jane were to come to them? He would switch that name to Jane and call Lizzy as 'Miss Elizabeth Bennet'? A bit tricky, I think.
Did the same rule apply to men too? Could Mr. John Knightley be called 'Mr. Knightley' as long as his elder brother wasn't around? I need to take another look at _Emma._
On a lighter side, Emma _did_ call Mr. Knightley by his first name 'George' at one time. But she did that as a child and merely to irritate Mr. Knightley. Since he didn't take offense at it like she hoped he would, she was disappointed and dropped it. 😀
Those are all great points! And yes, this was endlessly complex and I think personalized to each situation, feelings of the parties and relationships between them. And now I’m just imaging Elizabeth going around calling him “Fitz” 😂
I don’t think you really need to use a name if you are just talking to one person, unless you really want to like affectionately when engaged like Darcy uses Elizabeth. I feel a name would be more important when you announce someone or refer to someone who isn’t there.
Jane, as the eldest daughter would be addressed and referred to as Miss Bennett, and Elizabeth would be Miss Elizabeth. Elizabeth would be Miss Bennett once her sister got married. This was a subtle way of letting people know that Jane was was number 1 in the marriage market. Usually the second daughter wouldn’t get engaged before her elder sister had married.
@@sarasamaletdin4574 True.
"Master Bruce, will you please leave the batcave and have supper like a human being should?"
The TV show house does this and it drives me crazy. It's always Chase or Cameron and for years I thought those were their first names. Also Bones does this between the 2 leads. I think even after she's knocked and married he still calls her Bones.
Thank you for this clear and interesting video !! About naming the servants, I thought Donwnton Abbey did a fantastic job. For example, Thomas Barrow is called "Thomas" when he is a footman, "Barrow" when is is a valet and underbutler, and finally "Mister Barrow" when he becomes the butler. We could also note that only the other servants call him "Mister Barrow", the family sticks to "Barrow" because he is still their inferior. Anna Bates is called Anna as a maid, and the ladies complain about having to call her "Bates" when she marries and becomes a lady's maid (eventually they don't !). Maybe she'll be called "Mrs Bates" by the staff when she succeeds to Mrs Hughes, the governess ? But I believe lady Mary will always call her Anna... What do you think ?
You recall that in Mr. Trollope's Chronicles of Barset, the archeacon's wife calls him Archdeacon to his face.
Fun fact: I grew up in Georgia in the Deep South. I have a younger brother who had a different father from me. His grandparents wrote us letters and they always addressed them to “Master [brother’s name].” So as late as the 90s it was a title still used in some parts for a young man, not yet mature. (And of course mine was addressed as “Miss.”)
I mentioned some other traditions from the video that still kinda exist today in another comment. But if you think about it, even the friends using surnames is super common today, especially for men. They obviously don’t put ‘Mister’ in front of it but most nicknames are just surnames or some variation of it. It’s also seen as quite a familiar way to refer to someone. I think it’s the mister part that throws us off today.
Saying that, it could also be a hangover from schools using last names only in the past, and in more posh public schools (in Britain a public school is an independent fee paying school, usually for the elite, such as Eton or Harrow). I’m sure we’ve all seen in Harry Potter when Snape or McGonagall refers to Harry as just Potter.
So while Britain is obviously a very modern country, and we almost never use ‘Mr’ except in the case of teachers, it is interesting that it has influenced so many things.
The formal levels of address lasted for quite a long time in some places. My mum told me quite recently, that her dad (and his brothers and their wives) used the formal you (the equivalent of Vous in French or Sie in German) when addressing their mother. Mum and her cousins, on the other hand, were allowed to use the informal you (Tu in French) when speaking to their grandmother.
Yes, that was true for my grandmother too.
She had to use the formal "you" when she spoke to her mother.
We had letter writing after home work hour at school to write home. Envelopes were addressed MR & MRS (Parent), MISS (sister) & MASTER (brother). 🙂 (1980's - So long ago)
Fun fact: my dad, who’s in his 80s now, went to a very traditional English school where the boys were all called by their surnames. The only person there who called him by his first name was his brother; his friends shortened ‘Whitfield’ to ‘Whitters.’ So even when giving him a nickname, it was based on his surname!
That’s so interesting and cool!
I commented on just this above (as did someone else) as the norm in Irish schools into the 1980s (at least).
What I found interesting, after having just listened to the audio book, is that the Bennet girls' aunts have no first names given. They're known as "Aunt Phillips" and "Aunt Gardiner." Why is that? Does that mean Jane would be known as "Aunt Bingley" to Elizabeth and Darcy's children?
Did you know that Sir Percival Blakeney (a.k.a. The Scarlet Pimpernel) was actually a Baronet? Check it out. :)
Before Miss to Mrs denoted marital state, they were honorifics to specify women's social status. After 1900 it was more closely identified with a woman who was married or unmarried. At times in the 18th century, an adult woman addressed as "Miss" was a recognition that she was a prostitute. So it's relatively recently that these titles were exclusively used to signal a woman's marital status.
That’s interesting!
Riley was my great grandmother’s maiden name and two of my cousins named their children Riley because of that.
That is cool! Your family has very Regency naming tastes!
My maiden name was Shannon, and the younger branches are full of children named "Shannon." My great-grandmother's maiden name was Norman, and one of her sons and a few grandsons are named "Norman."
Gosh, you are just adorable. I am so happy to have stumbled over the channel. So that means there are moments when Mrs Dashwood calls her husband by his first name? Interesting, I thought they'd just always be on a last name basis. Oh, and I am the oldest sister and the only unmarried one, so I'd be Miss MyLastName.
Aw! Welcome to the channel! And it is interesting because Jane Austen never really wrote married couples behind closed doors we don't really get to see their first names!
The transfer from Master to Mister upon adulthood wasn't always the case. The younger son, the 'heir' of a peerage was also Master as a title. Even when in adulthood.
Don't mind me as i swoon over my favourite book boyfriend: Dorothy Dunnett's; Francis Crawford, Master of Culter ❤
9:29 - 9:44 "So much drama is happening in the Regency England of my imagination, apparently." - Love that😍
I have always wondered why Fanny Price has to call Tom Mr Bertram and Marina Miss Bertram in spite of their being first cousins and of the fact that she is allowed to call the other two by their first names as opposed to Miss Julia or Mr Edmund.
I'm thrilled you would choose Mr Tilney over Mr Darcy. Henry Tilney is my favourite Austen hero!!
"Steerforth, old boy! I can't believe it's you! I've missed you."
My aunt always addressed my birthday cards with "Master" when I was a kid and it always weirded me out. Didn't find out until I was an adult what that meant.
I'm sure someone else already pointed this out, but you've misspelled "multiple" and "marriage."
Perhaps it's because I grew up in a different era than you (I was born in the mid-60s) or because I live in the South, but, in my part of the world, we still use the terms Master for boys under 21 (or 18 depending on how mature they are) and Miss for unmarried girls and women.
If either version induced even 1 person to read the novel and discover Jane Austen, then I'm overjoyed. It's like how my daughter loves graphic novels. I can get her to read a graphic novel retell of a classic, but she'd never pick up the novel. Someday she will, and then she'll discover even more of the stories. I love breaking down and dissecting like this video did. However, some comments were just snobby. We should celebrate that both of these movies introduced Jane Austen to the masses.
This is so helpful. I'm enjoying your videos. :)
Pardon me if I am wrong. Wasn't Lady DeBurgh's maiden name Fitzwilliam? Which means her sister (Darcy's mom) was a Fitzwilliam, which became his first name. The person who accompanied him to his aunts estate was a Fitzwilliam.
Master is still used in formal communications in the American South.
For a hot second i thought you meant latin America (as in The Continent) and was extremely confused
I'm from Argentina and many times, I hear "Master" in movies but not only for a young man but also for the owner of a large house...
In the eighties, princess Anne's son was called Master Peter. I always found it weird (I'm not British!)
oh that's why in North and South when Thornton wants to propose a second time he only says Margaret name!
In Downtown Abbey, the little boy is called Master George.
I like Tilney too! I love his sense of humor.
Yes! He’s awesome!
I'm my dad's first daughter, so I would have been Miss Lunn. I guess my older half-sister would have had her father's first name? How did it work with blended families, as rare as they might have been in Regency era? (we have the same mother, if that makes any difference?)
Also, the rank below baronet is not 'mister' but knight, also called Sir [First Name] [Last Name].
Thank you! That was bothering me but I wasn't able to articulate it.
I am here three years late to say that I agree that Henry Tilney would make the best husband of all Jane Austen's heroes.
He totally would be an incredible husband!
I get it, my mother's maiden name was Carter so I named my first born son Carter as a way to honor her family name.
I am pretty sure the Earls of Matlock carry the surname Fitzwilliam (in universe), that's why Darcy's cousin was Col. Fitzwilliam, and Darcy was named after his mother's maiden name (she was Lady Anne Fitzwilliam). And I like headcanon that the old Mr Darcy was named George, hence GEORGiana and his godson George Wickham. I wouldn't be surprised if one of the girls had a son named Bennet. Jane could name a daughter Charlotte, which is a version of Charles, kind of like Caroline, but we're not naming anyone after her 😅
Just had a thought- get a voice to text app , transcribe lots of your talks, and create a book.
Well, it’s not like we can envision anyone shouting out to Mr. Darcy with, “Hey! Fitzy!!”
Some upper servants would simply be referred to by their surname and the lowest would have been called by their first name. Or, in some households, by whatever first name the employer chose for them.
Also, in the 17th/early 18th century calling a woman 'Miss', was not polite
I would be Miss Jackie Sepulveda since I’m unmarried and the youngest daughter of my family
Oh how excited I'm to learn more 😅 already liked it, before watched
In the NHS, boys are referred to as 'Master Jones' etc. The only time I've ever seen it
I was thinking about which Austen hero I like the most just yesterday. At first I thought it was a toss-up between Knightley and Henry Tilney. Then I thought harder n I'd like Henry Tilney for a boyfriend but Knightley for a friend. But the two of them are my faves. You have no idea how excited I got when you said you'd like to marry him as well 😄 "Someone else loves him too!" I thought. But then of course people love him 🤷🏻♀️ What's not to like?
I'd be Miss Rahim since my older sister got married and I'm the next and last of this family
When the oldest son of a noble family inherits the title, it appears to be standard to refer to him as [name of title] instead of Mr. [Surname].
Does the second oldest son become Mr. [Surname], or is the brother still addressed with his full name?
No idea, but my guess is this would be comparable to marriage for women, so it would make the Mr [Surname only] title pass along, the way the Miss [Surname only] would. I does make me wonder if age made a difference. Upon the death of the father, would the oldest son immediately receive the title, even if he was a minor of maybe 8 or 9? He wouldn't yet get the power, of course, but maybe the formal title? Hmm...
In Harry Potter characters often call peers they don’t know too well or aren’t friends with by their last name, like Malfoy is barely ever called Draco. And we hear Crabbe and Goyle’s name about once. So is this common in England these days or more wizard quirk?
It used to be more common in private schools, which is probably what Rowling was channeling.
It's quite common for boys in school to be referred to as their surname (or a nickname of their surname) due to the tradition of calling people in football by their surname. For example, I know people with the surname Boots, Smith and Gabica who went by Bootsy, Smithy and Bica. These are often used by the boys in their team, and through usage may also spread to other people in the school.
Probably the use of "Master" most Americans would be familiar with is Alfred calling batman "Master Bruce"
Wasn't it also the case that you only could adress a person with their first name when everybody around had the same privilege (well, maybe apart from the servants, they were not thought to be "persons" sadly)?
Oh I would marry either Mr Knightly or Captain Wentworth although I get terribly seasick so that might not go well.
Wait is this where to whole “call people by their last name” thing comes from in Harry Potter? Because that always confused me because I’ve basically never heard people irl do that.
Love your video! Have a question though - could you share any sources discussing the forms of address in Regency England? might wanna explore this topic further
You made me think how Alfred calling Bruce Wayne "Master Bruce" is both out of endearment and a jab because he wears a children's costume to fight crime haha
I'd be Miss Souza, I'm the oldest and do not have sisters. Would my younger brothers both be Master Souza? They are twins, and I think it would be very silly if Victor got do be called Master Souza and Vinicius by his first name lmao.
I loved your explanation about Darcy's first name been his mother's maiden name, that was always weird to me, but then I found out the reason my full name has the "de Oliveira Souza" (It's Juliana Dantas de Oliveira Souza, no middle name, but three last names just because) part was because my great-grandfather his first name was "Oliveira", but now I'm thinking he was named that after his mother's maiden name because "Oliveira" is a last name, and we have all been carrying it for generations for some reason.
1:13 my dad and his siblings all had former familial last names as middle names. And my cousin has my last name as his first name. Of course, my last name is at least a common first name (Ryan). My parents keep asking if I'm going to use my last name as a middle name for a future kid. That would be weird because I hyphenated and my kid won't be hypenating, so it will definitely sound weird.
If my husband and I were around during recency times, I would be known as Mrs. Feigner because that is what I am known as now after being married to him for almost nine years.