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One other thing that has disappeared from common use(although I have seen it done among some "higher" circles still) is using the husband's full name for the wi

One other thing that has disappeared from common use(although I have seen it done among some "higher" circles still) is using the husband's full name for the wife here in the UK. So if you have a man called "John Bridgerton", his wife would be referred to in certain circumstances as "Mrs John Bidgerton". Like you'd get an invite to the King's Ball, and it would say: "Hereby inviting: Mr John Bridgerton and Mrs John Bridgerton"

cjs_ac 2y ago
A real-life example of this is Princess Michael of Kent.
kevinmchugh 2y ago
Very old Americans at least still do this as well. My 100 year old grandma insists that using the wife's first name is only appropriate when the husband is deceased. My wife has a 100 year old grandfather and he until recently followed the rule as well. His last letter he addressed to my wife specifically using her own first name. This was a strange way to learn of my own death.
- triyambakam 2y ago
  That's funny. My grandmother does it too to my wife. I think the fact that they write letters is also something very old Americans still do.
- linsomniac 2y ago
  King of the Hill did it: "Hey Hank. Hey Hank's Wife."
ziotom78 2y ago
A memorable occurrence in this happens in "Sense and Sensibility", Part III, Chapter XII, when Elinor Dashwood learns that the man she loved and believed had just married was in fact free: “Is Mrs. Ferrars at Longstaple?” “At Longstaple!” he replied, with an air of surprise. “No; my mother is in town.” “I meant,” said Elinor, taking up some work from the table, “to enquire after Mrs. Edward Ferrars.” She dared not look up; but her mother and Marianne both turned their eyes on him. He coloured, seemed perplexed, looked doubtingly, and, after some hesitation, said,— “Perhaps you mean my brother: you mean Mrs.—Mrs. Robert Ferrars.”
- ziotom78 2y ago
  Here is a fantastic rendition of the scene: https://youtube.com/watch?v=IuHZPR8e5c8 https://youtube.com/watch?v=IuHZPR8e5c8
  - ninalanyon 2y ago
    The whole film is marvellous, Emma Thompson's adaptation is brilliant.
    - jtmoulia 2y ago
      I don't know if this was intentional, but I appreciate that you dropped another example with "Thompson"
selimthegrim 2y ago
This is done still on wedding invitations in the US
- hydrogen7800 2y ago
  Many of the gift checks for my wedding were made out this way. It made it very inconvenient to cash them since there was not yet such a person by one of the names on those checks, and the bank wouldn't deposit them. They insisted the checks would have to say "Mr. OR Mrs." Who thinks of that when sending a wedding gift? Most annoying to me was that I had never heard of anyone having this difficulty before, but it must happen every day.
  - ganoushoreilly 2y ago
    I did run into this with one teller at a bank we use. Wife showed them a copy of our marriage certificate on her phone and the teller said, congrats and that was that. We had 0 issues with online check submission though.
    - t-3 2y ago
      That's because online doesn't usually check the names, just the numbers. They wouldn't know unless you called in and told them, such as in case of an error.
  - toast0 2y ago
    The ATM check frontend is much less picky than the teller check negotiation frontend. And the backend generally doesn't care too much either. To my recollection, I've only had one check ever refused by the ATM backend, and that was because the issuer hadn't signed it (on accident... I got the check back, took it to the issuer and they signed it on the spot, no harm done). I have had ATMs refuse a State of California Warrant (like a check, but not because it's drawn on the State's General fund), but a teller took it, no problem.
    - xp84 2y ago
stoneman24 2y ago
A while ago, my wife and I were invited to the Royal Garden Party at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh, in the presence of the late Queen. Very nice invitation in the form of Mr <me> and Mrs <me>. As it was in recognition of my wife’s charitable works, She was not pleased at such a form of address. But we still went.
bregma 2y ago
In many American weddings it is still traditional for the bride's father to "give her away" to the groom, thus transferring chattel ownership.
- wahern 2y ago
  I suspect that's a reductive "just-so" story that happens to fit into some popular feminist narratives, though coming on the heels of some adjacent theories popular among men in the 18th and 19th centuries that misconstrued the legal history of coverture. It's difficult to find credible information using Google these days, but I would guess that the giving away of the bride is a custom more tied to exogamy--the practice of marrying outside one's social group (tribe, town, etc). In cultures that practice exogamy, it's typically either the young men (male exogamy) or the women (female exogamy), but not both, who would leave the group to marry. Giving away the bride seems more about relinquishing social and familial ties in the context of female exogamy. In some cultures, e.g. traditional chinese female exogamy AFAIU, the bride and her old family (or whole clan?) were strictly forbidden to communicate after marriage. If women were just chattel (or something approximating chattel--there's a hole spectrum in-between, and overusing "chattel" this way diminishes the gravity of actual chattel slavery, IMO) then we wouldn't expect to see dowries (the bride's family giving the new couple money and gifts), but only brideprices (the groom's family giving the bride's family money and gifts). Yet AFAIU dowries were more the norm in European culture, notwithstanding there were times, places, and contexts where brideprices also existed, exclusively or in combination. And nobody says the groom is "chattel" just because the bride's family is transferring assets. Interestingly, while I think female exogamy was historically much more common around the world, modern American culture seems to skew toward male exogamy, at least along some dimensions. It's never discussed in those terms[1], but you can arguably see it in statistics showing how the proximity and frequency of contact with extended family skews very heavily toward the wife's family. [1] To the extent it's discussed, it's in feminist narratives and termed "emotional labor". It's not mutually exclusive with the anthropological concept. Male/female exogamy is value neutral, and feminist discourse is just slapping a value on it, in this case a negative value.
  - hammock 2y ago
Fuzzwah 2y ago
Just recently I read about the etymology of the Japanese 奥さん Okusan = “your wife” Until Japan started modernizing in the 19th century, it was considered rude to call people by their real names. If you asked your lord, “So how’s Sharon doing,” those may have been your last words. So everyone called each other by their position names or by their nicknames if they were close, and for women in noble families or samurai families, it was usually the place they lived. In ancient times, nobles had manors that looked like this. This is the entrance, the garden, the main building, and this building in the north of it was always the wife’s residence. So they often called her “Kita-no-kata,” the lady in the north. Now, nobles built their houses based on a fung-shuei-like belief that Japanese shamans made everyone believe, like how rich people communities are into weird stuff, so the wife’s residence was almost always in the north. But centuries later, in the age of samurai, priorities shifted. They were invading each other like there was nothing else to do, so they built their houses and castles with defence in mind first and foremost. So the wife’s room wasn’t necessarily in the north anymore. So they were like, “So, how is the… umm… lady in the depths of your house?” 奥方様はいかがお過ごしですかな？奥方様 means the lady in the depths, and it was shortened to 奥様, after the samurai age, and while 奥様 is still used now, we needed a slightly less formal version, so now if is often 奥さん. Deep-san! source: https://www.facebook.com/metroclassicjapanese/posts/the-etymology-of-the-japanese-%E5%A5%A5%E3%81%95%E3%82%93-okusan-your-wifeuntil-japan-started-modernizin/1083845280406889/ https://www.facebook.com/metroclassicjapanese/posts/the-etym...
mjd 2y ago
I once wasted a couple of hours trying to find information about my great-grandmother, Selma Brenner Rauh. I found nothing. ... until I started looking for Mrs. Sidney Rauh ...
derekp7 2y ago
I recall encountering this in the 70's, on a Flintstones episode from the 60's where a scene referenced Mrs. Fred Flintstone and Mrs. Barney Rubble. Confused the heck out of me at a young age.
dlbucci 2y ago
I learned about this from my mother, who, like my father, is a doctor. Invitations addressed to "Dr. and Mrs. Father Lastnames" were a source of great offense to her!
cvoss 2y ago
If you go to a shop in a small town in America that sells used goods, you will almost certainly find a few editions of the local church cookbook. Depending on its age, it will likely refer to many of the women who submitted recipes in this manner. You could probably even date the cultural transition by comparing the books across a few decades.
hilux 2y ago
I believe the more typical reference would be: "Mr and Mrs John Bridgerton"?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

cjs_ac 2y ago

A real-life example of this is Princess Michael of Kent.

kevinmchugh 2y ago

Very old Americans at least still do this as well. My 100 year old grandma insists that using the wife's first name is only appropriate when the husband is deceased. My wife has a 100 year old grandfather and he until recently followed the rule as well. His last letter he addressed to my wife specifically using her own first name. This was a strange way to learn of my own death.

triyambakam 2y ago
That's funny. My grandmother does it too to my wife. I think the fact that they write letters is also something very old Americans still do.
linsomniac 2y ago
King of the Hill did it: "Hey Hank. Hey Hank's Wife."

ziotom78 2y ago

A memorable occurrence in this happens in "Sense and Sensibility", Part III, Chapter XII, when Elinor Dashwood learns that the man she loved and believed had just married was in fact free: “Is Mrs. Ferrars at Longstaple?” “At Longstaple!” he replied, with an air of surprise. “No; my mother is in town.” “I meant,” said Elinor, taking up some work from the table, “to enquire after Mrs. Edward Ferrars.” She dared not look up; but her mother and Marianne both turned their eyes on him. He coloured, seemed perplexed, looked doubtingly, and, after some hesitation, said,— “Perhaps you mean my brother: you mean Mrs.—Mrs. Robert Ferrars.”

ziotom78 2y ago
Here is a fantastic rendition of the scene: https://youtube.com/watch?v=IuHZPR8e5c8 https://youtube.com/watch?v=IuHZPR8e5c8
- ninalanyon 2y ago
  The whole film is marvellous, Emma Thompson's adaptation is brilliant.
  - jtmoulia 2y ago
    I don't know if this was intentional, but I appreciate that you dropped another example with "Thompson"

selimthegrim 2y ago

This is done still on wedding invitations in the US

hydrogen7800 2y ago
Many of the gift checks for my wedding were made out this way. It made it very inconvenient to cash them since there was not yet such a person by one of the names on those checks, and the bank wouldn't deposit them. They insisted the checks would have to say "Mr. OR Mrs." Who thinks of that when sending a wedding gift? Most annoying to me was that I had never heard of anyone having this difficulty before, but it must happen every day.
- ganoushoreilly 2y ago
  I did run into this with one teller at a bank we use. Wife showed them a copy of our marriage certificate on her phone and the teller said, congrats and that was that. We had 0 issues with online check submission though.
  - t-3 2y ago
    That's because online doesn't usually check the names, just the numbers. They wouldn't know unless you called in and told them, such as in case of an error.
- toast0 2y ago
  The ATM check frontend is much less picky than the teller check negotiation frontend. And the backend generally doesn't care too much either. To my recollection, I've only had one check ever refused by the ATM backend, and that was because the issuer hadn't signed it (on accident... I got the check back, took it to the issuer and they signed it on the spot, no harm done). I have had ATMs refuse a State of California Warrant (like a check, but not because it's drawn on the State's General fund), but a teller took it, no problem.
  - xp84 2y ago

stoneman24 2y ago

A while ago, my wife and I were invited to the Royal Garden Party at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh, in the presence of the late Queen. Very nice invitation in the form of Mr <me> and Mrs <me>. As it was in recognition of my wife’s charitable works, She was not pleased at such a form of address. But we still went.

bregma 2y ago

In many American weddings it is still traditional for the bride's father to "give her away" to the groom, thus transferring chattel ownership.

wahern 2y ago
I suspect that's a reductive "just-so" story that happens to fit into some popular feminist narratives, though coming on the heels of some adjacent theories popular among men in the 18th and 19th centuries that misconstrued the legal history of coverture. It's difficult to find credible information using Google these days, but I would guess that the giving away of the bride is a custom more tied to exogamy--the practice of marrying outside one's social group (tribe, town, etc). In cultures that practice exogamy, it's typically either the young men (male exogamy) or the women (female exogamy), but not both, who would leave the group to marry. Giving away the bride seems more about relinquishing social and familial ties in the context of female exogamy. In some cultures, e.g. traditional chinese female exogamy AFAIU, the bride and her old family (or whole clan?) were strictly forbidden to communicate after marriage. If women were just chattel (or something approximating chattel--there's a hole spectrum in-between, and overusing "chattel" this way diminishes the gravity of actual chattel slavery, IMO) then we wouldn't expect to see dowries (the bride's family giving the new couple money and gifts), but only brideprices (the groom's family giving the bride's family money and gifts). Yet AFAIU dowries were more the norm in European culture, notwithstanding there were times, places, and contexts where brideprices also existed, exclusively or in combination. And nobody says the groom is "chattel" just because the bride's family is transferring assets. Interestingly, while I think female exogamy was historically much more common around the world, modern American culture seems to skew toward male exogamy, at least along some dimensions. It's never discussed in those terms[1], but you can arguably see it in statistics showing how the proximity and frequency of contact with extended family skews very heavily toward the wife's family. [1] To the extent it's discussed, it's in feminist narratives and termed "emotional labor". It's not mutually exclusive with the anthropological concept. Male/female exogamy is value neutral, and feminist discourse is just slapping a value on it, in this case a negative value.
- hammock 2y ago

Fuzzwah 2y ago

Just recently I read about the etymology of the Japanese 奥さん Okusan = “your wife” Until Japan started modernizing in the 19th century, it was considered rude to call people by their real names. If you asked your lord, “So how’s Sharon doing,” those may have been your last words. So everyone called each other by their position names or by their nicknames if they were close, and for women in noble families or samurai families, it was usually the place they lived. In ancient times, nobles had manors that looked like this. This is the entrance, the garden, the main building, and this building in the north of it was always the wife’s residence. So they often called her “Kita-no-kata,” the lady in the north. Now, nobles built their houses based on a fung-shuei-like belief that Japanese shamans made everyone believe, like how rich people communities are into weird stuff, so the wife’s residence was almost always in the north. But centuries later, in the age of samurai, priorities shifted. They were invading each other like there was nothing else to do, so they built their houses and castles with defence in mind first and foremost. So the wife’s room wasn’t necessarily in the north anymore. So they were like, “So, how is the… umm… lady in the depths of your house?” 奥方様はいかがお過ごしですかな？奥方様 means the lady in the depths, and it was shortened to 奥様, after the samurai age, and while 奥様 is still used now, we needed a slightly less formal version, so now if is often 奥さん. Deep-san! source: https://www.facebook.com/metroclassicjapanese/posts/the-etymology-of-the-japanese-%E5%A5%A5%E3%81%95%E3%82%93-okusan-your-wifeuntil-japan-started-modernizin/1083845280406889/ https://www.facebook.com/metroclassicjapanese/posts/the-etym...

mjd 2y ago

I once wasted a couple of hours trying to find information about my great-grandmother, Selma Brenner Rauh. I found nothing. ... until I started looking for Mrs. Sidney Rauh ...

derekp7 2y ago

I recall encountering this in the 70's, on a Flintstones episode from the 60's where a scene referenced Mrs. Fred Flintstone and Mrs. Barney Rubble. Confused the heck out of me at a young age.

dlbucci 2y ago

I learned about this from my mother, who, like my father, is a doctor. Invitations addressed to "Dr. and Mrs. Father Lastnames" were a source of great offense to her!

cvoss 2y ago

If you go to a shop in a small town in America that sells used goods, you will almost certainly find a few editions of the local church cookbook. Depending on its age, it will likely refer to many of the women who submitted recipes in this manner. You could probably even date the cultural transition by comparing the books across a few decades.

hilux 2y ago

I believe the more typical reference would be: "Mr and Mrs John Bridgerton"?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]