SUNDRIES: An eighteenth century newsletter

ITALIAN CUSTOMS: The Palace of Valentin

Since this is Turin's week, let us start with congratulations to any Torinese members of our list for their city's moment of glory, and begin with this mid-eighteenth century account of one of several "Palaces Near Turin" from Johann Georg Keyssler:

Formerly the palace of Valentin which is but a half quarter of a league without the city from Porte neuve, was the scene of most of the court diversions and entertainments. The palace of Valentin is so called, as one may see in the memoires of the count de Grammon, from the title given to those gentlemen, who, on St. Valentine's day wait upon the ladies; it being a general custom all over Italy on that day for single women to chuse some one among their male friends or acquaintance, who is to gallant them wherever they go; and who, to discharge his office with honour, must present them with nosegays and other Bagatelles. This attendance, which expires at the year's end, is not liable to any exception, and often terminates in marriage. The parents, in the mean time, are very watchful over their daughter's behaviour, and things are conducted with so much decorum and honour, that even the monks themselves make no scruple of taking upon them the office of a Valentine; and possibly it is nobody's interest so much as theirs to recommend the innocence of these intercourses betwixt the sexes. But as these Valentine gallantries are intirely left off at court, the palace of Valentine is also neglected.
Johann Georg Keyssler - Travels Through Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, Switzerland, Italy and Lorrain.(238)

ENGLISH CUSTOMS: Valentine's Day and Valentine's Eve

The Connoisseur. By Mr Town, Critic and Censor-General offers this glimpse of 18th century Valentine's customs in a 'letter' (dated February 17, 1755) from an Arabella Whimsey - whose creator appears to be John Duncombe:

Last Friday, Mr. Town, was Valentine's Day, and I'll tell you what I did the night before. I got five bay-leaves and pinned them to the four corners of my pillow, and the fifth one to the middle; and then if I dreamt of my sweetheart, Betty said we should be married before the year was out. But to make it more sure, I boiled an egg hard, and took out the yolk, and filled it up with salt: and when I went to bed, eat it shell and all, without speaking or drinking after it, and this was to have the same effect with the bay-leaves. We also wrote our lovers names upon bits of paper; and rolled them up in clay, and put them into water; and the first that rose up, was to be our Valentine. Would you think it? Mr. Blossom was my man: and I lay a-bed and shut my eyes all the morning, till he came to our house; for I would not have seen another man before him for all the world.

About a century later, the Notes and Queries described a very different (if local) idea of the holiday:

ST. VALENTINE IN NORWICH

The day appropriated to St. Valentine is kept with some peculiarity in the city of Norwich. Although "Valentines," as generally understood, that is to say billets sent by means of the post, are as numerously employed here as in other places, yet the custom consists not in the transmission of a missive overflowing with hearts and darts, or poetical posies, but in something far more substantial, elegant and costly-; to wit, a goodly present of value unrestricted in use or expense. Though this custom is openly adopted among relatives and others whose friendship is reciprocated, yet the secret mode of placing a friend in possession of an offering is followed largely-; and this it is curious to remark, not on the day of the saint, when it might be supposed that the appropriateness of the gift would be duly ratified, the virtue of the season being in full vigour, but on the eve of St. Valentine, when it is fair to presume his charms are not properly matured. The mode adopted among all classes is that of placing the presents on the door-sill of the house of the favoured person, and intimating what is done by a run-a-way knock or ring as the giver pleases. So universal is this custom in this ancient city, that it may be stated with truth some thousands of pounds are annually expended in the purchase of Valentine presents. At the time of writing (February 2.) the shops almost generally exhibit displays of articles calculated for the approaching period, unexampled in brilliancy, taste and costliness, and including nearly every item suitable to the drawing room, the parlour, or the boudoir. The local papers contain numerous advertising announcements of "Valentines;" the walls are occupied with printed placards of a similar character, and the city crier, by means of a loud bell and an equally sonorous voice, proclaims the particular advantages in the Valentine department of rival emporiums. All these preparations increase as the avator of St. Valentine approaches. At length the saint and his eve arrives-; passes-; and the custom, apparently expanding with age, is placed in abeyance until the next year. I am inclined to believe that this mode of keeping St. Valentine is confined to this city and the county of Norfolk.
Notes and Queries 19, March 9, 1850

FRENCH CUSTOMS: Burning the Valentine (Dimanche des Brandons)

Not all Valentine celebrations were on today's Valentine's Day. Several items in the Intermediaire des Chercheurs describe a custom in the Lorraine that starts on the first Sunday of Lent - the Dimanche des Brandons. One web site:

HOLIDAYS: Historical notes on St. Valentine's

Various, mostly apocryphal, tales are told of the saint (whichever of three he was) and his holiday (in modern times a victim of Church reform). But:

MANUALS: Love Potion Number IX

Love and its adjuncts have long prompted efforts at controlling others that range from desperate to dangerous. Secrets Magiques pour l'Amour en nombre d'Octante et trois (Eighty-Three Magic Secrets for Love), a collection of "Charms, Conjurations, Spells and Talismans" ("Charmes, Conjurations, Sortileges et Talismans"), offers one example of how this urge has spanned the centuries. The book itself is from 1868, but in fact is extracted from a work in the collection of Marc-Rene de Voyer d'Argenson, Marquis of Paulmy, a famous bibliophile - and, at the start of the eighteenth century, head of the Paris police. The editor ("C. J., book lover") has also added some recipes from the Great and Little Alberts, two collections that were popular in our period, as well as some citations from the Roman author Pliny echoed in later entries.

Otherwise, "it seems to us impossible to assign a precise date to this erotic grimoire. The writing of the two manuscripts shows a naïve, unpracticed hand, from the seventeenth, possibly even the beginning of the eighteenth century; but the formulas and secrets, gathered with no order or logic, certainly to back to various extremely diverse ages." The origins, too, are diverse: "Most can be attributed to a few miserable village sorcerers, such as our tribunals still summon from time to time, to send back to their sheep after a short period of administrative penance". Others give off "a perfume of priests and sacrilege, of compressed, shameful passions." Still others "breath in our face a toxic miasma of" the era of the poisoners (under Louis XIV).

The actual contents of the book include a wide range of advice, starting with (I) how, simply, to: "unfailingly be loved by whomever you please":

If you can have from the person by whom you hope to be loved something that comes from their body, be it hairs, saliva, blood, underwear where they have sweated. Put that with something similar of your own, tie it all up in a red ribbon, where you will form these characters [drawn in the text] with your name and theirs in your own blood. Roll all this so that the [last two characters] which is where the two names are touch: then take another ribbon and tie your characters in love knots. Close all this in the body of a sparrow, and carry this under your armpit until it stinks...

See what I mean about 'desperate'?

Personally, I'd prefer IV: "Rub your hands with verbena juice and touch him or her to whom you want to give love." This is probably the simplest of the various ways listed (through XXII) to be loved by another.

From XXXIII on, the tone starts to change. Want to see your loved one while you sleep? You'll need some pulverized coral, diamond dust, and more. And if, after all that, you don't see them, it's probably not meant to be.

Want your wife only be able to bear "yours"? Dry goat fat and gall and, when you're ready to use "it", soak the goat goodies in oil and rub the item in question with this lubricant: "She won't be able to stand anyone but you." (XXXIV)

There's a number which are downright sinister: "To Force a Person to Come Satisfy You" (XL); "To Attract to Yourself Any Person You Desire, And Make Them Submit to Your Will, Either Girl, Man or Woman, So That They Will Not Rest Until They Have Satisfied You" (XLI); "To Make Someone Follow You "(XLIV) (wisely, this one also includes a way to UNDO the spell); "To Make Two Lovers Quarrel (XLVII); etc..

But even some of these hint at male adolescent fantasy: "How to Make a Girl Dance Naked in Her Nightshirt" (last part of XLVIII). (Good news, guys - in 200 some years, there'll be this thing called 'the Internet', and all you'll need is a credit card.)

But women's concerns are certainly not ignore. Well before the current vogue for vaginal plastic surgery was "To Shrink" (LXIV): "Make a decoction of comfrey, wash with it three or four days after the... And eight days before. Only seven or eight days are needed, lest it become too narrow."

Etc. Let me just end with the same warning as the 19th century editor put at the start of this edition: "For the edification of bibliophiles and no others."

I trust no readers will misuse this dangerous information!

VERSE: Valentine's Day

No doubt whole anthologies exist on this subject. Neither of the following is completely unknown, but both will be new to many here.

First, this further glimpse at English folk customs from John Gay's "The Shepherd's Week : Thursday; or, The Spell" (1714)

Last Valentine, the day when birds of kind
Their paramours with mutual chirpings find;
I rearly rose, just at the break of day,
Before the sun had chas'd the stars away,
A-field I went, amid the morning dew,
To milk my kine (for so should huswifes do)
Thee first I spy'd, and the first swain we see,
In spite of fortune shall our true-love be;
See, Lubberkin, each bird his partner take,
And canst thou then thy sweet-hear dear forsake?
"With my sharp heel I three times mark the ground,
And turn me thrice around, around, around.

And then, from William Shenstone:

Song 8. 1743.
Valentine's day.

'Tis said that under distant skies,
Nor you the fact deny,
What first attracts an Indian's eyes
Becomes his deity.

Perhaps a lily, or a rose,
That shares the morning's ray,
May to the waking swain disclose
The regent of the day.

Perhaps a plant in yonder grove,
Enrich'd with fragrant power,
May tempt his vagrant eyes to rove
Where blooms the sovereign flower.

Perch'd on the cedar's topmost bough,
And gay with gilded wings,
Perchance, the patron of his vow,
Some artless linnet sings.

The swain surveys her pleased, afraid,
Then low to earth he bends;
And owns, upon her friendly aid,
His health, his life depends.

Vain futile idols, bird or flower,
To tempt a votary's prayer!--
How would his humble homage tower
Should he behold my fair!

Yes--might the Pagan's waking eyes,
O'er Flavia's beauty range,
He there would fix his lasting choice,
Nor dare, nor wish, to change.

JOURNAL DES SAVANTS: Struck dumb by love

Only one item from the Journal des Savants this week, that of 1679 (132), this extracted from a German periodical:

A young man [became] mute without being able to articulate a single word through the effort [sic] of a love which he did not recognize himself, but suddenly recovered the use of his speech, several days after a sight of the loved object.

"Mlle. Gaussin has had the most illustrious lovers, but she has always sacrificed self-interest to pleasure."
Bachaumont, 1-30-1762 (Tome I, 31)