Quotation from: Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period

Written by: Paul Lacroix


If we now direct our attention to the _tiers etat_, that class which, to
quote a celebrated expression, "was destined to become everything, after
having for a long time been looked upon as nothing," we shall notice that
there, too, custom and tradition had much to do with ceremonies of all
kinds. The presence of the middle classes not only gave, as it were, a
stamp of grandeur to fetes of an aristocratic and religions character,
but, in addition, the people themselves had a number of ceremonies of
every description, in which etiquette was not one whit less strict than
in those of the court. The variety of civic and popular ceremonies is so
great, that it would require a large volume, illustrated with numerous
engravings, to explain fully their characteristic features. The simple
enumeration of the various public fetes, each of which was necessarily
accompanied by a distinct ceremonial, would take up much time were we to
attempt to give it even in the shortest manner.

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