Regency parlor games and kissing forfeits—with pictures!

I thought I’d share a few illustrations that highlight the hilarity of regency-era parlor games as well as the freedom they gave members of the opposite sex to interact closely. Sometimes very, very closely.

This is plate 46, Le dessous du chandelier, from Le Bon Genre 1812. Le Bon Genre: Observations sur les modes et les usages de Paris was a series of satirical prints highlighting social trends and leisure activities. In this print, two men and three women are using candlesticks for kissing. They might have played a game with “The Candlestick” as the forfeit for someone who lost.

The Winter Evening Pastimes; Or, The Merry-maker's Companion by Rachel Revel 1825 describes how the loser must present a lady with a light. He takes a candle and kneels before her. He is then ordered to see if the candlestick is stamped with a hallmark and gives the lady the candle to hold as he tilts the silver candlestick up to look at the bottom. Then, he is ordered to kiss the candlestick.

Get it? What he’s supposed to do is kiss the LADY since she’s now the candlestick, as she’s holding the candle. A “candle” is the wax object and a “candlestick” is the stand to hold a candle upright, and “candlestick holder” is just redundant. But if the man doesn’t get it and kisses the empty candlestick in his hand, everyone will laugh at him.

I can’t imagine a guy falling for that more than once. They've played it a little differently from this particular book's description, with one man tipping the candlestick and spilling the candle and the other man balancing the candle and the candlestick on the lady's head to kiss her.

What about this one from the same series, plate 45, Le baiser deviné. A woman holds her hands before another's eyes, who has to guess which young man is kissing her while another a couple look on. Presumably, this is a forfeit in an organized game and not just something people did when they were bored. It might’ve made those days at Netherfield more interesting, though.

In case you don’t believe men and women liked to get cozy, check out Plate 55: a man teaching a woman how to play diavolo. 1812-3. The title translates to Devil's Lesson, or The Rose-Colored Devil. Anyone else reminded of some guy who’d sidle up behind you while playing pool under the guise of “giving you a lesson”?

But let’s get back to the kissing games. This is plate 65, from July 1814, called Le baiser à la Capucine. It shows a couple trying to kiss while back to back, watched by three others, one of whom holds a fob-watch. This looks a lot like the parlor game forfeit "Kiss if You Can" mentioned in the The Winter Evening Pastimes book.

The man and the woman assigned to him kneel back to back. At the words make ready, the lady looks over her left shoulder and the gentleman's head turns over his right shoulder. At the word present, he must approach his lips to her cheek as much as possible, and then at the word fire he must try to kiss her. The lady is supposed stoop down or suddenly spring up to avoid him. The guy might try to get one arm round her waist and holding her head with his other hand to get the kiss in.

I wonder how many people wanted the kiss versus those who were happy to avoid it? If that dinner at Pemberley had happened and ended with parlor games, I’ll bet Darcy and Elizabeth wouldn’t have tried to avoid it.

I put a game like this in a book. This image is Plate 66 and shows a game of blind-man's buff, with a man sitting on a girl's lap, watched by three others and it’s from September 1814. This is Colin maillard assis, or seated blind man’s buff. Blind man’s buff is a very old game with a lot of variations. In Her Affections and Wishes, I put Elizabeth in Darcy’s lap; no one objected.

Here’s a game or a forfeit I haven’t been able to recognize yet. This is Le pont d'amour, or love bridge and is plate 67 from Le Bon Genre, also from September 1814. The game appears to be a girl sitting on the back of a man on all-fours, while another man kisses her; two other girls watch. I'm not sure who is wining or losing, but everyone seems happy except that guy on the floor.

Let’s never confuse the prudish Victorians with the bawdy Georgians who preceded them.

Finally, a weird one with no kissing. Plate 48 from 1812 has two women and three men play a game that involves rolling pieces of paper and tying them on as horns. This is Les Chevaliers Gentils, The Gentle Knights. It’s a memory game where players try to recite a long, complicated phrase without making any mistakes when their turn comes up in the circle. Presumably, when for each mistake, you have to make a paper horn and attach it to your head and become the horned knight rather than the gentle one.

Not a kissing game, but that guy looks real cozy lounging around his lady friend. She doesn’t seem to mind that hand on her thigh.

What do you think? Did any of this surprise you? Did you know the Georgians weren’t opposed to a few kisses as a part of friendly games? What would you want to see in a Jane Austen variation or a regency romance? I’ve incorporated parlor games and their forfeits in three books and I’m eager to highlight them again.

All images from the British Museum

Winter Evening Pastimes; Or, The Merry-maker's Companion:: Containing a Complete Collection of Evening Sports, Including Twelfth-night Ceremonies, with Copious Directions for Crying Forfeits, and Promoting Harmless Mirth and Innocent Amusement, Rachel Revel. Alexander Mesnard1825