Should they have been called "serviettes", to establish "U" credentials? - ThreadSky

About ThreadSky

bthegeby.bsky.social • 12 hours ago

Should they have been called "serviettes", to establish "U" credentials?

Comments

No, napkin is U. Anything that originates from French is non-U. Something that stuck after the Napoleonic wars apparently.

bthegeby.bsky.social•12 hours ago

But you kill Saxon animals and eat them French. Cow/beef, calf/veal, sheep/mutton...etc

bthegeby.bsky.social•12 hours ago

D'accord. Ça irá!😉

gilliancarrin.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Ah. That explains scent, not perfume.

helenebismarck.bsky.social•12 hours ago

This actually a very useful rule, thank you.

saskiadanielceramics.com•12 hours ago

Only know it because I had foreign parents who were trying very hard to be British.

tds153.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Terribly sorry to butt in but do you know this Betjeman poem? A helpful compendium of middle class solecisms and faux pas, as viewed from slightly above.

https://allpoetry.com/How-To-Get-On-In-Society

saskiadanielceramics.com•8 hours ago

Ooh, I don't. Thank you.

dhanendran.co.uk•12 hours ago

The relevant page from Nancy Mitford's 1955 essay "The English Aristocracy" (https://www.unz.com/print/Encounter-1955sep-00005/) is endlessly fascinating (and bizarre to our 2025 ears).

bthegeby.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Glory be! You can hear the shutters going down..m

helenebismarck.bsky.social•12 hours ago

No! As a very elegant friend of mine informes me „say Serviette and my mother will shoot you!“ It is apparently almost as bad as calling pudding "Dessert“.

bthegeby.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Oh. Being a mongrel of U and L (one grandpa each) makes life much easier 😁

Posting Rules

Be respectful to others
No spam or self-promotion
Stay on topic
Follow Bluesky's terms of service

Comments

Posting Rules

Reply