THE KISS OF FRIENDSHIP
The kiss is also employed as a conventional salutation between persons
who only stand on a footing of friendship or acquaintance with each
other. In our northern countries the friendly kiss usually occurs only
between ladies, but in this instance its usage is very widely extended.
With men and women it is properly only allowable when there is a marked
difference in age between both parties, but, on the other hand, it
seldom or never takes place between men, with the exception, however, of
royal personages who, on solemn occasions, are wont to greet and take
leave of each other with more or less sincere kisses of greeting and
farewell. Here we find ourselves again in a sphere in which, alas, we
have sadly fallen away from the good old ways. In former times, to wit,
the friendly kiss was very common with us between man and man as well
as between persons of opposite sexes. In guilds it was customary for the
members to greet each other “with hearty handshakes and smacking
kisses,” and, on the conclusion of a meal, people thanked and kissed
both their hosts and hostesses. In a description of a wedding in the
olden time in the district of Voer in Denmark we read:
“When they had eaten, the parish clerk got up first, put his arms round
the parson’s neck, and kissed him on the mouth, saying: _Tak for mad,
hr. pastor_ (Thanks for your hospitality, sir priest). Then the parson
planted himself against a chest of drawers, and all the women, old and
young, went up to him, one after the other, and kissed him on the mouth.
Some of the old goodies could not quite reach him, for the priest was a
big, tall man, and they had actually to climb on to his boots, though he
stooped down to them slightly.” Peder Havgård said that he would not
have cared much to be in the parson’s place, for it was a mean and poor
country thereabouts, and some of the women were very shabbily-dressed
and dirty-looking.
If we glance outside Denmark it appears that the kiss of friendship is
considerably in vogue. In Iceland it is still a general form of
salutation, although of late years there is said to be a certain falling
off in its use; and every one who travels in South Germany and Austria
can study at the very first railway station the different forms of that
kind of kiss which in those countries is specially used by way of
leave-taking; officers and students, farmers and merchants, all treat
each other to sounding kisses, usually on the cheek. One can observe the
same sort of thing in France, but more especially in Italy. I can attest
from personal experience that it is looked upon as the most natural
thing in the world for people to kiss their intimate friends when saying
good-bye, a shake of the hand being far too cold a leave-taking beneath
the warm sky of Italy.
It is, however, undoubted that, speaking generally, the custom of
kissing, as an ordinary greeting, has immensely declined; in ancient
times and in the Middle Ages it was much more frequent than nowadays.
It was the common practice with the Hebrews for acquaintances, when they
met, to kiss each other on the head, hands, and shoulders; and it was
assuredly with a kiss of pretended friendship that Judas betrayed his
Master.
Even the Greeks in former times used kissing as a common salutation; not
only friends and acquaintances kissed each other, but also persons who
quite accidentally met when they were travelling.
The custom of kissing, however, became less general later on. In a
discourse of Dion Chrysostomus, called _From Eubœa_, or “The Hunter,”
is a story of a rustic coming to the city and meeting two acquaintances
in the assembly, whom he goes up to and kisses. “But,” says the rustic,
“people laughed prodigiously at my kissing them, and, on that occasion,
I learnt that it is not customary for people of the city to kiss each
other.”[22]
Kissing seems to have been much more in vogue with the Romans, amongst
whom it was the usual custom for people to salute each other with a kiss
on the hand, the cheek, or the mouth. Many even scented their mouths in
order to render their kisses more pleasing--or less unpleasant. Martial
laments over this usage in a little epigram to Posthumus:
What’s this that myrrh doth still smell in thy kiss,
And that with thee no other odour is?
’Tis doubt, my Posthumus, he that doth smell
So sweetly always, smells not very well.
This kissing of friends gradually became a veritable nuisance to the
country. Fashion ordained that every one should give and receive such
kisses, but, in reality, every one preferred evading them. Martial, in
another epigram to this same Posthumus, exclaims:
Posthumus late was wont to kiss
With one lip, which I loth;
But now my plague redoubled is,--
He kisses me with both.
and
Posthumus’ kisses some must have,
And some salute his fist;
Thy hand, good Posthumus, I crave,
If I may choose my list.
Under such frightful circumstances people had recourse to shifts which
seem almost as unsavoury as the kisses they would escape:
Why on my chin a plaster clapped;
Besalved my lips, that are not chapped;
Philænis, why? The cause is this:
Philænis, thee I will not kiss.
But such artifices, however, are of very little use; no one escapes the
_basiatores_ (kissers). They prowl about the streets and market-places;
not even the walls of the home, nor even the enforced solitariness of
the most hidden-places served as a protection against them:
There are no means the kissing tribe to shun,
They meet you, stop you, after you they run,
Press you before, behind, to each side cleave,
No place, no time, no men, exempted leave;
A dropping nose, salved lips, can none reprieve,
Gangrenes, foul running sores, no one relieve;
They kiss you in a sweat, or starved with cold,
Lovers’ their mistress’ kisses cannot hold;
A chair is no defence, with curtains guarded,
With door and windows shut, and closely warded,
The kissers, through a chink will find a way,
Presume the tribune, consul’s self, to stay;
Nor can the awful rods, or Lictor’s mace,
His stounding voice away these kissers chase,
But they’ll ascend the Rostra, curule chair,
The judges kiss while they give sentence there.
Those laugh they kiss, and those that sigh and weep;
’Tis all the same whether you laugh or weep;
Those who do bathe, or recreate in pool,
Who are withdrawn to ease themselves at stool.
Against this plague I know no fence but this:
Make him thy friend whom thou abhorr’st to kiss.
All greet one another with kisses; every condition of life, every
handicraft, found a representative amongst the _basiatores_. When a
man, in ancient times, was afraid of meeting his tailor, it was not so
much on account of the latter’s bill as by reason of his kisses.
“Rome,” says Martial, “gives, on one’s return after fifteen years’
absence, such a number of kisses as exceeds those given by Lesbia to
Catullus. Every neighbour, every hairy-faced farmer, presses on you with
a strongly-scented kiss. Here the weaver assails you, there the fuller
and cobbler, who has just been kissing leather; here the owner of a
filthy beard, and a one-eyed gentleman; there one with bleared eyes, and
fellows whose mouths are defiled with all manner of abominations. It was
hardly worth while to return.”
People kissed whenever they met: morning and evening, at all seasons of
the year: spring and autumn, summer and winter. The winter kisses seem
to have been especially unpleasant, and Martial censures them, in the
strongest terms, in his epigram to Linus:
’Tis winter, and December’s horrid cold
Makes all things stark; yet, Linus, thou lay’st hold
On all thou meet’st; none can thy clutches miss;
But with thy frozen mouth all Rome dost kiss.
What could’st more spiteful do, or more severe,
Had’st thou a blow o’ th’ face, or box o’ th’ ear?
My wife, this time, to kiss me does forbear,
My daughter, too, however debonaire.
But thou more trim and sweeter art. No doubt
Th’ icicles, hanging at thy dog-like snout,
The congealed snivel dangling on thy beard,
Ranker than th’ oldest goat of all the herd.
The nastiest mouth i’ th’ town I’d rather greet,
Than with thy flowing frozen nostrils meet.
If therefore thou hast either shame or sense,
Till April comes no kisses more dispense.
That Martial’s epigrams depict the actual state of the case without any
particular exaggeration it may, among other things, be inferred from the
fact that the Emperor Tiberius, according to Suetonius, issued an edict
against these _cotidiana oscula_ (daily kisses).
The friendly kiss was likewise much in vogue in the Middle Ages.
In _La Chanson de Roland_ the Saracen king receives Ganelon with a kiss
on the neck, and then displayed to him his treasures:
Quant l’ot Marsilies, si l’ad baisiet el’ col;
Pois, si cumencet à uvrir ses trésors.
(603).
And Ganelon salutes the Saracen chiefs in the same way, and “they
kissed each other on face and chin”:
“Bien serat fait”--li quens Guenes respunt;
Pois, se baisièrent es vis e es mentuns.
(625, 628).
The friendly kiss is, on the whole, pretty often mentioned in the Old
French epics. “Out of friendship he kissed him on the mouth” is a verse
that frequently recurs:
_Par l’amistiet l’en baisat en la buche._
The kiss of friendship was also exchanged between the opposite sexes. It
was the general custom for ladies to salute with a kiss any stranger
whether he came as an ambassador, expected guest, or a chance passer-by.
In the old French mystery-play of St Bernard de Menton, the Lord of
Miolan is sitting one day with his wife and daughters in the hall of his
castle, when a squire steps in and announces that some strangers have
arrived. The lord of the castle receives them courteously, bids them
welcome in God’s name, and at once orders his wife do her duty to them.
She, too, bids them welcome, and kisses them; at last it comes to the
turn of the little girls, who assure their father that they know their
duty right well, and are even willing to perform it:
A vostre bon commandement
Les bayserons et festoyrons,
Trestons le myeulx que nous pourrons,
Mon seigneur, à vostre talent.
Which may be rendered thus:
As it is your orders dear,
We will kiss and make good cheer,
All, so far as in us lies,
Since your wishes that comprise.
W. F. H.
Whereupon they kiss the strange gentlemen. In the poem of “Huon de
Bordeaux” we are told how Huon’s mother, the Duchess of Bordeaux,
receives the French king’s embassy with kisses. The queen, in Marie de
France’s _Lai de Graelan_, sends an ambassador after Graelan to make his
acquaintance, and, when he arrives, goes to meet him, and kisses him on
the mouth.
In other Romance countries, too, kissing serves as a common mode of
greeting, which fact can be incidentally substantiated by means of
philology, inasmuch as the Latin verb _salutare_ (‘to greet’) both in
Spanish and Roumanian, and partially in French, has acquired the meaning
of ‘to kiss.’
When Abengalvon, in the old _Pöema del Cid_, meets Minaya Alvar Fañez,
he advances smilingly towards him in order to kiss him, and he “greets”
him on the shoulder, “for such was his wont”:
Sonrisando de la boca, ibalo abrazar,
En el ombro lo saluda, ca tal es su usaje.
The expression “to greet on the mouth” likewise occurs many times; but
also the verb _saludar_ (‘to hail’) is also used alone, as in the
Roumanian _sâruta_, to express ‘to kiss.’
Even in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the friendly kiss
flourished in France. When Leo Rozmital, the Bohemian nobleman, paid his
respects to Louis XI. at Meung-sur-Loire, the king led him to the queen,
and both she and all the ladies of her court kissed him on the mouth.
We get further information in a letter from Annibale Caro dated 29th
October, 1544. It is addressed to the Duke of Palma, and describes the
visit of the French Queen Eléonore to the Emperor Charles V. in
Brussels. “When we met,” says he, “the ceremony of reception with
kissing of the ladies was, in the highest degree, interesting; it
seemed as if I had been present at the Rape of the Sabines. Not only the
higher nobility, but even all the rest took each his lady, and the
Spaniards and Neapolitans were the most eager. It gave rise to much
merriment when the Countess of Vertus, Charlotte de Pisseleu, was
observed to lean over her saddle to such an extent, in order to kiss the
Emperor, that she slid off her horse, and kissed the earth instead of
His Majesty’s mouth. The Emperor hurried up to her assistance, and with
a smile kissed her heartily (_e ridendo la baciò saporitamente_).
Directly afterwards Duke Ottavio rode up, jumped quickly off his horse,
and the Emperor himself conducted him to the Queen’s carriage, and there
he was presented to the distinguished ladies. The Duke kissed the
Queen’s hand and was about to remount his charger, but the Emperor
called him back, and told him that he ought also to kiss Mdme.
d’Etampes, who was sitting right opposite to the Queen in the carriage.
Like a good Frenchman, he exceeded the Emperor’s order and kissed her on
the mouth.”
A vast quantity of other evidence goes to show how general was the
friendly kiss of salutation even during the Renaissance, especially
among the upper classes. Henri Estienne satirises it in his _Apologie
pour Hérodote_. “Kisses are allowed,” writes he, “in France between
noblemen and ladies, whether they do or do not belong to the same
family. If a high-born dame is in church, and any fop of her
acquaintance comes, she must, in conformity with the usage prevailing in
good society, get up, even if she be absorbed in the deepest devotion,
and kiss him on the mouth.”
Even Montaigne expresses his disapproval of such a state of things. “It
is,” says he, “a highly reprehensible custom that ladies should be
obliged to offer their lips to every one who has a couple of lackeys at
his heels, however undesirable he may be, and we men are no gainers
thereby, for we have to kiss fifty ugly women to three pretty ones.”
None the less, the friendly kiss held its ground right through the
seventeenth and even a part of the eighteenth century. Molière’s
marquesses kiss each other whenever they meet; for instance, in the
famous eleventh scene in _Les Précieuses ridicules_, when Mascarille
and Jodelet fall into each other’s arms with many warm kisses. In _Le
Misanthrope_ Alceste reproaches Philinte with embracing and kissing
every one, and “when I ask you who it is, you scarcely know his name!”
Vous chargez la fureur de vos embrassements;
Et quand je vous demande après, quel est cet homme,
À peine pouvez-vous dire comme il se nomme.
La Bruyère has, time after time, satirised this foolish custom, which,
especially at Court, seems to have assumed colossal dimensions; but even
in middle-class circles etiquette required men to salute ladies with a
kiss.
In an old comedy entitled _Le Gentilhomme guespin_ a father presents his
son, who is extraordinarily awkward and clumsy. The latter does not know
how he ought to behave to the ladies of the house, so the father in
despair gives him a dig in the ribs, and whispers in his ear: “He’s
bashful. Kiss the lady. One always greets a lady with a kiss.”
... Il est honteux. Là, baisez donc Madame;
C’est toujours en baisant qu’on salue une femme,
Molière has made use of this scene in _Le Malade imaginaire_, where
Thomas Diafoirus pedantically asks when he is introduced to Angélique:
_Baiserai-je?_ (Am I to kiss?).
In England we come across pretty nearly the same state of things.
Erasmus of Rotterdam, in one of his _Epistolæ familiares_, expresses his
great satisfaction with English customs: “When you arrive every one
kisses you; at your departure they bid you good-bye and kiss you; you
come back, then fresh kisses. You are kissed when you meet any one, and
so, too, when you separate. Wheresoever you go everything is filled with
kisses, and if you have only once tasted how delicate these kisses are,
and the deliciousness of their savour, you would want, my dear Faustus,
to be banished to England for time and eternity.” In another passage,
where Erasmus is speaking of the state of the inns in England, which he
mentions in terms of unqualified praise, he winds up as follows:
“Everywhere at the inns one meets with pretty, smiling girls: they come
and ask for one’s soiled clothes; they wash them and soon bring them
back again. When the travellers are about to resume their journey these
girls kiss them, and take as affectionate a farewell of them as if the
latter were their brothers or near relations.”
And Holberg in his letter writes: “In England it is considered
uncourteous to enter a house without saluting one’s hostess with a
kiss.”
Even in the Low Countries the friendly kiss was much in vogue. Adrianus
Höreboord, a professor at the University of Leyden, has, in a Latin
treatise, investigated the question as to whether the custom of allowing
strangers to kiss young girls, widows, and other persons’ wives, on
paying a visit, can be said to be in conformity with the laws of
chastity. Höreboord’s opinion is that such practice is in no way
objectionable: as a kiss can be given without any _arrière pensée_ the
kisses demanded by politeness may be quite chaste.
Erycius Puteanus, the learned Dutch philosopher, on the contrary, holds
that the aforesaid custom is not without danger--at any rate to more
sensually-disposed temperaments. In a letter on the education of a young
Italian girl he writes that he would never suffer any one to kiss his
pupil, adding: “Our Flemish girls never do so; they are not so ardent.
They do not comprehend the language of love in glances and kisses. In
the matter of Italian girls on the other hand, things are quite
different, and I teach my pupil the speech of our country and our
customs, kissing excepted.”
The kiss of friendship was so general in Germany, even in the eighteenth
century, that Klopstock could write to a friend in 1750: _Vergessen sie
nicht zu mir auf einen Kaffee und auf einen Kuss zu kommen_. It seems,
however, soon to have fallen into disuse.
As far back as 1747, Lessing had ridiculed it in a poem:
The kiss with which my friend will greet me
Is not what’s rightly termed a kiss,
But only formal salutation
Because cold fashion bids him this.
W. F. H.
VII
VARIOUS KINDS OF KISSES
Einen Kuss in Ehren
Darf niemand wehren.
_German Proverb._
No one should take amiss
An honest-hearted kiss.
W. F. H.