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Satisfying the new massive need for heat in the household provoked an increase in the demand for wood (this was before other forms of combustion, such as coal, were available at the turn of the century) which caused an increase in the price of up to 60/70%.
During the coldest winters, the poor ransacked the woods and forests, risking getting caught by the King's Guards or by the nobility's property foresters..
But wood, peat and coal were not the only forms of combustion used: the poor had less and could not afford to be queasy when it came to foul odor, so they used manure that, duly dried out had the caloric power equal to peat and even superior to wood (4.0 compared to an average measure of 3.5 of wood).
If finding manure was easy enough in the country, the poor in the city had to gather the horses' “leftovers”.
Even the windows (a certified innovation in Italian cities such as Genoa and Florence at the turn of the 14th century) gradually substituted wooden shutters with canvases soaked in turpentine (serving to make the fabric semi-transparent) which contributed to the struggle against the cold.
With glass windows, the necessity for light and heat merged: glass became lighter and clearer, illuminating indoor establishments which had for centuries had been dark and damp. Initially, small and round glass windows joined by lead (as can be seen in cathedrals) were invented, progressing with construction techniques to larger and clearer window panes.
Fortunately, the exhibitions of the two prodigious children at the Court began to show some profit. A gold tobacco tin and a small, but very valuable watch was given to Wolfgang by the Countess Adrienne-Catherine de Noailles de Tessé (the Dame of Honor of the Dauphin and mistress of the powerful Prince of Conti to which Wolfgang had dedicated two sonatas on the harpsichord which was composed and published in the following weeks), a small transparent and engraved gold tobacco tin for Nannerl and a silver pocket-sized escritoire with a matching silver pen for Wolfgang from the Princess of Carignano. Other gifts arrived in the following days: a red tobacco tin with gold rings, a tobacco tin in glass material ingrained in gold, a tobacco tin in “laque Martin” (also known as “vernis Martin”, invented in 1728 by the Martin brothers, an imitation of Chinese and Japanese lacquer, it was much more economical as it was initially produced with copal, a resinous substance similar to amber) with flowers and pastoral instruments in enamaled gold, a tiny ring mounted in gold with an antique setting, as well as a quantity of gifts whose value Leopold did not underestimate (ribbons for daggers, arm ribbons and tassels, tiny flowers for Nannerl's bonnets, small kerchieves and other necessary accessories to be fashionable in Paris). One last curious gift was a solid gold toothpick holder given to Nannerl.
Table settings
In reference to the gift of the toothpick holder, this allows us to speak briefly about some innovations that were forthcoming and were to become part of future etiquette: table settings. Related to food at the beginning of the 1700s, the objects that constituted the instruments at the table were the spoon, the fork and the knife.
The name “spoon”, already known from Ancient Egypt and by the Romans, is derived from cochlea (seashell) and during the Middle Ages it was made of wood or for the wealthy, gold or silver, ivory or crystal.
The knife originated even farther back with a much more aggressive history. This is possibly why its use was limited, for fear of wounding a dining companion or using it as a weapon in the case of a dispute (in China, it was against the law) up till the Renaissance Period when a rounded tip was invented, surely much safer.
The fork appeared in the modern use of bringing one's food to their mouth in Venice in 955 when the Greek Princess Argilio (who probably learned to use it in Byzantium) flaunted hers on the occasion of her wedding with her son to the Doge Pietro III Candiano.
The diffusion of this useful instrument, however, had to come to terms with the Roman Catholic Church which, due to the orthodox schism, identified the use of the fork with the Byzantium use and banded its use as demonic.
To better understand the deeply anchored curse of the mentality of people, we know of one cultured person from the 17th century, Claudio Monteverdi, who when obliged to use a fork for good manners for his hosts, later requested three masses to pardon his sin. The fork was introduced at the French Court, needless to say, by Catherine de' Medici, whose son Henry III, went as far as legislating (without much success) its common use.
During those days of mourning, the Mozarts dressed, at least in part, according to Parisian fashion; Leopold cites Wolfgang's black outfit complete with a French hat. Actually, the Mozart family had four black outfits tailored for the death of the Prince-Elector of Saxony Frederick Christian, brother of the Dauphine of France.
The rules of mourning
Death in the 18th century was frequent, whether due to disease, war or an epidemic.
Often times, as we learn in the Mozartian epistolary, an event of mourning jeopardized Leopold Mozart's plans, ruining potential earnings and weeks of contacts and maneuvers in order to obtain an invitation to a certain court or palace for the exhibitions of his children.
The aesthetics of mourning were well-defined; the dress code of the family members of the defunct, as well as the length of time the clothing should be worn..
In the case of the death of a monarch, the mourning process involved all of the subjects with evident exterior displays that included mourning wear of the nobility to the black band worn on the upper arm of the citizens.
On the occasion of the death of a regal mourning, all events and shows were postponed for weeks or even months, as was the case that involved the Mozarts and their projects in Vienna: the death of the Archduchess Maria Josepha of Austria, betrothed to the King of Naples Ferdinand IV of the House of Bourbon that provoked the suspension of every event for six weeks.
In Versailles, the rigorous protocol required that the mourning dress of the King was to be purple while that of the Queen was to be white. This was declared for the death of any member belonging to the royal family or of any foreign monarch.
There was no mourning for a child under the age of seven years old, as it was considered below the age of descretion. In any case, infancy death was common and accepted with resignation.
For widows, the rules were equally as rigid. The entire household was covered in black, including paintings and mirrors and the bedroom of the widow was painted over in black. The widow had to wear a black veil and dress in the same color.
The regulations for mourning in France, as well as other European countries, were even imposed by law. In France in 1716 the duration of mourning was shortened to half by law establishing the widow a duration of one year and six weeks.
During the first four and a half months, the widowed dame had to wear a cape, surcoat and a cheesecloth skirt, then for the next three months she had to wear a dress of crêpe and wool, and for the following three months she wore clothes in silk and chiffon, and finally for the remaining six weeks she began the “half mourning” where the dress code was less severe and the use of jewelry was allowed.
Leopold calculated that the purchase of clothing and the expenses to reach the location at the Royal Palace of Versailles amounted to 26/27 Louis d'or in sixteen days, since in Versailles “horse cabs” and “rental carriages” were not available, only wagons. Due to the rainy days, in order to avoid getting their clothes muddy before approaching the Court, the four Mozarts had to take round trips with two wagons for a cost of 12 soldi each. The mother and Nannerl traveled together on one and Leopold and Wolfgang on the other. Up until that time, the Mozarts had received in cash, while waiting for the King's donations, the amount of 12 Louis d'or which only covered half of the sustained expenses. The 50 Louis d'or that were donated by the King through the Office of the Menus plaisir du Roy (responsible for the lesser royal pleasures) were held in a tabacco shop and allowed them to make ends meet for the relocation to Versailles (without including the value of the abovementioned gifts).
While in Paris, the Mozarts attempted to speak French, at least the basics that would allow them as foreigners to communicate with the locals, but judging from the errors found in the epistolary, their fluency of the language left much to be desired. Even in Wolfgang's letters in the following years, we note many spelling and grammatical errors in his use of the French and Italian languages, having learned by the seat of his pants through opera libretti and during the course of his three journeys to Italy. In a letter from Paris, peculiarly addressed to Hagenauer's wife, Leopold expresses his opinion on the beauty of French women. His impression was that they were so excessively made-up, “unnatural”, he says, “like the dolls that are made in Berchtesgaden” (a place in the Bavarian Alps 25 kilometers from Salzburg) “that even if they are pretty, they are repelling in the eyes of an honest German.”.
Beauty products
On the vanity table of an elegant dame (without excluding husbands, who also used various creams and makeup) there were many products aimed at creating fashionable pale and fresh skin, as well as substances to alter the tone, false beauty marks, etc.
Since the 16th century, there had already been books printed with recipes of every type for curing diseases or for the preparation of beauty oils and creams, such as “I Secreti Universali in Ogni Materia” by Thimoteo Rossello, published in Venice in 1575 whose second volume contained a list of a dozen recipes for making hair blond and beautiful and how to have splendid white skin.
Several similar publications were also widespread in the 18th century, for example “La Toilette de Venus” published in 1771, or “La Toilette de Flore” from the doctor Pierre-Joseph Buc'hoz who offered recipes for oils and beauty creams derived from flowers and plants.
Transparent and brilliant skin (the fashion to follow was the “convent complexion”) in the 1700s was praised enough to forgive a woman who displayed even stupidity or unrefined behavior.
Men and women who applied make-up used ceruse to whiten their complexion (originally derived from egg whites and later a white pigment made with toxic lead) and rouge for lips and cheeks (originally derived from animal substances such as scarlet-colored insects or plant-based red sandalwood, later derived from minerals such as lead, minium and sulfur baked in ovens at high temperature), not to mention the dozens of essences, creams, pastes and eau de cologne.
In one of his writings, the Knight d'Elbée calculates the sales of 2,000,000 jars of rouge and reports the words of Montclar (among the most famous vendors of rouge in Paris), who confirms having sold three dozen jars of rouge a year to Signor Dugazon (the actor, Jean-Baptiste-Henry Gourgaud), while his wife, the actress Rose Lefèvre purchased six dozen jars from Bellioni and Trial each for six francs a jar.
The make-up or rouge was not, however, chosen by its tone or color. It needed to make a statement about the person wearing it, so much so, that a certain type was reserved for the dames of social class as opposed to the dames of the Court (the princesses wore a very intense color), while another color was appropriate for the middle class, and obviously another for the courtesans.
There were also lotions: to lighten the color of the skin or to give it a blush tone, to enhance and to wash it, to eliminate freckles and blackheads, to rejuvinate skin yellowed by age, etc.
Entire fortunes were squandered on beauty products, to the point of boiling gold foil in lemon juice in order to obtain an otherworldly complexion in the light of day.
Then there were the ointments to repair the scars on the skin from disease, smallpox in particular which was widespread in that era, products for hair, nails and for teeth.
And what about false moles, also known as beauty marks? They were tiny pieces of sticky cloth in various shapes (hearts, moons, stars, etc.), purchased from the famous manufacturer Madame Dulac, meant to complete the make-up with personality and spirit.
The position of these false beauty marks (each with an assigned name) were rigorously imposed by well known rules: the assassin (at the corner of the eye), the romantic (in the middle of the cheek), the cherished (near the mouth), the regal (on the forehead), etc.
To complete the preparation of the head of the noblewoman before leaving the house neccessitated the setting and styling of her hair which, for the great noblewomen on important occasions usually involved true architectural creations by the greatest hairdressers in Paris.
The height of the hairstyles reached towering limits, so much so that caricaturists represented the hairdressers standing on stools, if not ladders to reach the peaks while they worked on their creations.
If during the early part of the 18th century, brown was the favored standard for beauty of hair color, at the turn of the century, fashion abruptly changed: dark hair fell out of favor to blue eyes and blond hair.
A pale complexion, though, remained an essential element. To reach this objective, many underwent a bloodletting procedure often many times a day through the application of bloodsuckers or being stuck with a pin in an exterior vein.
Even religious devotion and the morality of the Parisians gave Leopold reason to express many of his sarcastic doubts. Regarding the business that the Mozarts expected from the exhibitions in Versailles, all moved so slowly that Leopold complained that at the Court “things go at a snail's pace, even more than at other Courts” mostly because every entertainment activity (festivities, concerts, theatrical performances, etc.) had to pass through the evaluation and the organization of a special commission of the Court, the Menus-plaisirs du Roi (the lesser royal pleasures of the King). Leopold Mozart writes to Hagenauer's wife, illustrating some of the Parisian Court's different practices compared to what was done in Vienna: in Versailles you do not kiss the hand of royalty or bother them with requests and pleas, least of all during the ceremony of the “passage” (the procession between the two wings of courtiers that the royal family practiced while going to mass at the chapel inside the palace). It was not customary to display honor to royalty by bowing the head over a bended knee as was done in other European Courts. Instead, one was to stand up straight and comfortably and watch the members of the royal family walk by.
In reference to these customs, Leopold does not miss the chance to remark with great surprise that among the guests present, the daughters of the King stopped to speak with Wolfgang and Nannerl, letting them kiss their hands and doing likewise. Even on the evening of the New Year during the “grand couvert” (royal dinner where numerous courtiers and guests stood by watching the high ranking social class) held in the Hearth Hall that also served as the antechamber to the Queen's apartments, “My Mr. Wolfgangus had the honor to pass the entire evening near the Queen”. He conversed with her (she spoke German very well as she was of Polish origin and spent some years of her youth in Germany) and even ate the food offered by her. Leopold also draws attention to the fact that they were all accompanied to the “grand couvert” hall (given the large crowd that flocked in order to watch the dinner) by the Swiss Guards and that he, too, was near Wolfgang while his wife and Nannerl were placed near Louis, Dauphin of France (heir to the throne) and one of the daughters of the King.
The Swiss Guards
Today when we talk about the Swiss Guards, the first thing that comes to mind are the pictoresque soldiers at the State of the Vatican, with their colorful Renaissance uniforms that guard of honor of the Pope.
In truth, dating back to the 14th century during the epoch of the Hundred Years' War, many European kings used Swiss mercenaries to form military corps for their protection.
The first monarch to create a Swiss Guard corp was Louis XI and his successor Charles VIII progressively increased the number to 100, hence the name Cent suisses (the Hundred Swiss).
Between the end of the 1400s and the beginning of the 1500s, the Papal State followed the example of the King of France to the point that Julius II had at his service 150 Swiss Guards that demonstrated their faith during the course of the Sack of Rome which was carried out by the German mercenary Landsknecht soldiers enrolled in Emporer Charles V's army.
Even the Savoys had their Swiss Guards in the 16th century, and during the 18th century the Swiss were personal guards to Frederick I of Prussia, the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, Joseph I of Portugal and even utilized by Napoleon Bonaparte.
The Mozarts arrived in Versailles on the evening of Christmas Eve in 1763 and were able to watch the traditional mass in the Royal Chapel: the first at midnight, a second later during the night, a third at sunrise, the last at the early morning hours of Christmas Day. As a musician, Leopold voices his opinions of the music: good and bad, he says, specifying that the pieces for only voices and the arias were cold and lacked quality, meaning the French (evidently Leopold did not enjoy French vocal style, preferring Italian and German). However, he found the choral pieces excellent, so much so, that he took advantage of the opportunity to continue Wolfgang's musical and stylistic training, accompanying him everyday to the King's mass held at 1 pm in the Royal Chapel (unless the King decided to go hunting, in which case the mass was anticipated to 10 am).
The blatent visibility of the wealth accumulated by the richest Parisian aristocrats, from the fermiers généraux (private parties who received the privilege of collecting taxes in certain areas, becoming excessively wealthy) and the important upper class bankers (about a hundred people altogether according to Leopold) struck the moderate Salzburg enough to consider them “astonishingly mad”. The display even led women to wear fur coats in warm weather: fur collars, fur bands in their hair in place of flowers, ribbons of fur around their arms. At the opera and receptions, the great dames who could afford it flaunted the most luxurious furs (ermine, wolf pelts, otter, sable). Particularly favored were “hand muffs”, in fur or angora in cilinder shape (so-called barrel) or draping majestically to the ground. However, the use and abuse of fur was not only limited to women.
Men wore daggers adorned with ribbons which were highly fashionable in Paris, made of very thin fur, causing Leopold to mockingly comment that something so ridiculous would surely impede the dagger from freezing.
Even excessive love for luxury by the French was reproached by Leopold, in particular the habit of sending newborns to caretakers in the countryside, entrusting them to a “tenant” who would distribute the children to the wives of farmers, where they wrote the names of the parents and guardians in a ledger in collaboration with the local parish in exchange of an offering for their “certification”.
The “care” of children in the 18th century in Paris – To be born female was a difficult fate
In general, when a female child was born, it was a disappointment for the parents. Wealthy or poor, the reaction was the same.
No celebrations and above all, a fate marked by a “lesser” future in comparison to male children. It would not be her who carried the family lineage, or to inherit property and public positions (in the case of noble families) and it would not be her to contribute to the sustainance of the family with physical strength, unless helping in the household or working as a housekeeper (in the case of poor families).
In the aristocratic homes, newborns were immediately entrusted to the tenants and taken away from their homes and mothers until they were weaned.
The tenants were often ignorant farmers that neglected the children often to the point of death or, as happened to Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord (Prince and later an astute politician for all seasons), was rendered an invalid.
It appears, in fact, that Talleyrand had a permanent limp due to a fall from a chair that was too high of which the absent-minded tenant had left him unattended.
After the children were weaned, they were returned to their families and were entrusted to a nanny who looked after their every need, from basic education (reading and writing, catechism, some bible study) to attending to their personal habits, often with the aid of the many publications dedicated to educating children.
There was no familiarity with the mother, let alone with the father, if not on the occasion of the morning visit to the mother's room where she received him or her with indifference, paying more attention to her dogs.
From a very young age, the wealthy daughters were dressed like the adult women (corset, farthingdale, noteworthy hairstyles complete with a hat, etc.) and were given dolls with complete wardrobes.
The weekly magazine of information Le Mercure de France announced to its readers in 1722 that the Duchess d'Orleans had given the Dauphine of France (wife of the Dauphin who was first born son and heir to the King of France) a doll with a complete wardrobe and jewels of astronomical value for those times: £22,000.
When the wealthy girl reached the age of six or seven years old, she began to receive dance, singing and music (harpsichord) lessons in order to prepare her for her role in society...and in the end would be sent to a convent, based on the prestige of the other girls she consorted with.
It was obviously not a monastic life as we are accustomed to imagine it today but a kind of boarding school where the girls lived a relatively secluded and morally "guaranteed" life: there were well-furnished apartments for girls of noble lineage and in the most prestigious convents, contacts and friendships were intertwined between the girls who, once they were released and returned to the world through marriage, would be able to obtain social and economic advantages for the family of origin and that of the husband.
It often happened that the young women were married by exclusive decision of the family without consulting the daughter from the age of twelve or thirteen and then sent back to the convent until they reached the appropriate age to consummate the marriage.
Thus it was for a daughter of Madame de Genlis, married at the age of twelve, and for the Marquise de Mirabeau of which she became the widow of the Marquis de Sauveboeuf at thirteen.
In particular convents there was also a curious typology of girls who, even without pronouncing binding religious vows, received a habit and the honorary title of Canoness, which gave prestige to them and to the families to which they belong: however they had the obligation to reside in the convent two out of three years.
The Canonesses were divided, according to age, into Dame aunts, each of whom was entrusted with a Lady niece, who would receive her support to build relationships with the other Ladies and, on the death of her aunt, would inherit her furniture, the jewels and any income and benefits related to her office in the convent.
The main convents and most coveted by the noble families were that of Fontevrault, in the Loire Region (where the Daughters of France, the daughters of the Kings and Dauphins of France were educated), that of Penthémont (where the Princesses were educated and "they withdrew" the Dame of quality once they became elderly or widows).
Hospitality in these convents was not free, on the contrary. In 1757 the cost could range, in Paris, from 400 to 600 livres to which other expenses were added: 300 livre for the maid plus more money for the trunk, bed and furniture, for heating wood and for candles or oil for lighting, for washing linen, etc.
At the convent of Penthémont, the most expensive, there was the distinction between ordinary pension (600 livre) and extraordinary (800 livre which became 1,000 if the boarders desired the honor of eating at the Mother Superior's table).
At the end of their preparation in the most prestigious convents the girls were ready for marriage and, if we give credit to what their contemporaries thought, "they knew everything without having learned anything".
Marriage, for most of these girls, simply represented the fulfillment of the family project and had value for the status she would give them, based on her husband's condition, and for the luxury and comfort she would allow.
As new brides, they would then begin the tour of visits to the aristocratic circle of friendly families of their family and their husband to affirm her new condition as married women ready for society life, with a side of fashionable clothes, jewelry, hairstyles. to show off at the Opera and on every occasion, especially if you belonged to the elite who had the opportunity to access the "presentation" at the Court.
At that point, to be capable, the girl had to learn the fashionable words and use them naturally: Amazing, Divine, Miraculous, are terms to be used to describe a musical performance at the Opera rather than a new hairstyle or a new dance step.
A lady's day did not begin until eleven o'clock, when she woke up, she called the maid who helped her wash and dress while the mistress stroked the inevitable pet dog that slept in her room.
The fact that the habit of nursing newborn children to ignorant peasants who often neglected them was widespread not only among the aristocrats but also in decidedly less wealthy sections of the population (the cost, in fact, was very low) which caused disabilities that, for the poor meant misery and marginalization for the rest of their lives. Leopold observes that in Paris one could not easily find a place that was not full of miserable and crippled people.
In and out of churches or walking in the streets one was continually subjected to requests for money from the blind, paralyzed, crippled, pustular beggars, people whose pigs had devoured a hand as children, or who had fallen into the fire and burned their arms while their keepers had left them alone to go to work in the fields. All this disgusted Leopold, who avoided looking at those poor people.
The poor
Social inequalities were extremely large in the 18th century.
In the face of an aristocratic class, which lived in luxury and which was "forbidden" to work (thus living off the remaining part of the population) and among the large and middle bourgeoisie (which got along quite well thanks to finance, trade and professions), there were crowds of poor people and going farther down the social ladder, of miserable people without a home, food or family.
Of Neapolitan beggars, Prince Strongoli says in 1783, that "they overflowed without a family" because misery often prevented the formation of family ties or even caused their disintegration, with husbands abandoning their families or children leaving to seek better fate elsewhere, usually in some city where they hoped for more opportunities.
The needy not only included slackers and wanderers by choice but also all those who were unable to earn their daily bread because they were too old or too young (although children started working at a very young age), disabled or sick.
During Prince Strongoli's time, it is estimated that in Naples a quarter of the population (100,000 out of 400,000 inhabitants) belonged to the poor or miserable class.
The number of the poor then increased or decreased also on the basis of contingencies: famines, wars, job losses, diseases, epidemics could increase the percentages even to 50% or more in moments of the worst crisis.
Without reaching the frightening numbers of Naples at the end of the 1700s, poverty was also great in other European cities: from south to north (Rome, Florence, Venice, Lyon, Toledo, Norwich, Salisbury) ranging between 4% and 8% of the population.
One can therefore easily imagine the enormous mass of miserable and poor people in Europe, considering that the continent's population amounted to about 140 million in the mid-1700s rising to 180 million on the threshold of the French Revolution.
A small part of the enormous mass of poor children, because they were orphans or belonging to families who were unable to feed and care for them, were "taken care of" by the Conservatories or Hospitals which, born in Naples, Venice and other Italian cities during the 16th century, also spread to other large European cities.
In his letters, Leopold also refers in passing to the remains of the famous "Querelle des bouffons", the dispute between the supporters of the Italian theatrical musical style (performance of the Serva padrona – “The Maid Turned Mistress”by Pergolesi) among which the encyclopedists with Jean-Jacques Rousseau in the front row, and the admirers of the French style à la Lully (who, incidentally, Giovan Battista Lulli, was also Italian, in spite of the French name). Although the discussion had been resolved a dozen years earlier, evidently the controversial aftermath had not completely subsided and Leopold does not hold back from giving his opinion on the matter: French music, all of it, is worth nothing while the German musicians present in Paris or whose printed compositions were widespread in the French capital (Schobert, Eckard, Honauer, etc.) were helping to change the musical taste of their French colleagues. Some of the main composers operating in Paris, Leopold writes, had brought their published compositions to Mozarts while Wolfgang himself had just delivered 4 Sonatas for harpsichord with violin accompaniment marked in the Mozart catalog as K6 and K7 (those dedicated to the Delfina Victoire Marie Louise Thérèse, daughter of King Louis XV) and K8 and K9 (those dedicated to the Countess of Tessè). We will speak more about the compositions published in Paris by Wolfgang (but composed in the previous months, not without the help of his father) after completing the information on the stay of the Mozarts in the French capital. In the meantime, Leopold figures out, and does not fail to highlight it to his interlocutors from Salzburg, the clamor he expects will provoke the Sonatas by his son, especially considering the age of the author.
