Struggling to find that special someone? Justin Pollard looks at the ways in which our ancestors tried to woo would-be lovers – and deal with the consequences when things didn’t quite go to plan
LIFE HACKS FROM HISTORYJUSTIN POLLARD SHARES THE PAST’S BEST (AND WORST) SELF-HELP ADVICE LIFEHACK #09
Love is one of history’s unintended consequences, taking generals away from battles, rulers away from governing and ordinary people away from their sanity (and trousers). But what can history teach us about falling in love?
Firstly, you’ve got to meet ‘the one’. Indeed, ‘one’ is usually the preferred number, unless you’re reading the 1631 ‘Wicked’ Bible, which contains a handy misprint for would-be fornicators: “Thou Shalt Commit Adultery”. This was very much on the physicist Erwin Schrödinger’s mind when he first arrived at the University of Oxford in the 1930s and attempted to set up a ménage à trois, much to the disgust of his hosts. Feeling unwelcome, he eventually returned to his native Austria.
DRUNK IN LOVE
Having found ‘the one’, we must make a good impression. This is where the US millionaire James Gordon Bennett Jr went wrong. Turning up drunk to a New Year’s Day party at his fiancée’s house in 1877, he took a wrong turn and proceeded to urinate into a fireplace in front of all the guests. His subsequent horsewhipping at the hands of his prospective brother-in-law put him off marriage for another 37 years.
Having won your lover’s heart, it’s time to show that you care with a gift. Prince Grigory Orlov, a former favourite of Catherine the Great, purchased the last-known part of the 787-carat Great Moghul diamond and gave it to the empress in a bid to rekindle her dwindling affections. It didn’t work and Orlov died insane, obsessed with money, and still out of favour.
The statuettes on the bonnets of Rolls-Royce cars are modelled on Eleanor Thornton – lover of Lord Montagu of Beaulieu
But perhaps best of all is the secret token – that little act or gift never spoken of but which you know. Eleanor Thornton was the secretary and lover of the motoring pioneer Lord Montagu of Beaulieu. When Messrs Rolls and Royce asked him to come up with a bonnet ornament for their cars, he had a statuette of his lover commissioned – the ‘Spirit of Ecstasy’, known in the Montagu family as “Miss Thornton in her Nightie”.
But the course of true love never runs smooth, and there will be pitfalls. In 1765, during the reign of Qing dyna
