Etiquette database

Access directly to the Etiquette Database (in French).

This database brings together sources taken from normative texts and/or memoirs from the French court in the modern era.

It has been formulated as part of the research programme “Court etiquette: normative texts and customs”, the aim of which is to compare theory and practice.

It is organised according the typology of the texts, the different court seasons and the reigns. The resulting connections and crossovers allow a keen analysis of etiquette under the Ancien Régime. It is both a tool for highlighting research that has been undertaken and a research tool in its own right.

This database is based on a wide-ranging body of information retrieved from the sources that it lists:

 On the one hand, sources written by contemporaries describing daily life at court. The great writers of memoirs of the period in question have been examined exhaustively: Dangeau, Sourches, Saint-Simon and Luynes. Other authors have also been analysed, such as the Comtesse de Boigne, the Marquis de Bombelles and the Baron de Breteuil. Finally, the analysis has been enriched by a study of foreign authors such as Spanheim, Goldoni and Saint-Maurice. Around forty authors in total make up the database.

 On the other hand, normative sources coming from the royal power or its agents. The principal royal rules and orders, which are transcribed in full online in the corpus raisonnés (in French), have been taken and integrated into the database.

The database has been accessible since October 2016 through the resources portal of the Centre.