No
Posted by Andrea Jutson on June 20, 1998 at 04:35:27:
In response to PDAs: Yes or No?, written by AmandaB on June 19, 1998 at 15:55:39
] On the P&P board, someone claimed that a married couple would never kiss in public. Is this true? I know things were a lot more formal back then.
Yes, a lot of things were a lot more restrained than we're used to today (although the level of restraint relied a lot on the breeding and moral sense of the person), and I'm almost as certain as it gets that no, people would not have kissed publicly, unless perhaps it were just a family greeting. (Not sure- probably no one would have minded if no one had made a big deal about it- HC?) But as to "real" kissing, no, not done. That was reserved for the privacy of the home- I don't think anyone would kiss that way in front of other members of the family, even. I think, if anything, the views on delicacy back then amongst the well-bred (as different from high-born mind you:-) were a bit more particular.
Still, don't confuse the Regency with the Victorian period- if you want to see "restraint", the Victorians were IT! They even put curtains around chair legs and piano legs, because they were deemed "immodest"!:-) By comparison, Regency times were much more permissive- the low cut necklines and loose, flowing lines of Regency era clothes vs. the stiff, restrictive Victorian ones are enough evidence of that!
-Andrea (who hopes she hasn't bored you to death already!:-)
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