A History of Courtship

Explore 800 years of lust, love, and loss.

The author takes the reader on a journey from medieval courtly love, through to the sexual license of the Restoration, and Victorian propriety. Pick up historical 'dating tips', from how to court (or be courted); write romantic love letters, give and receive gifts, propose and pose as a sighing swain.

A historical approach to the problem of finding a mate, with case studies of classic romantic mistakes and plenty of unusual tales. In the fourteenth century young men tried to impress the ladies with their footwear, donning shoes with pointed toes so long that they had to be secured with whalebone presumably because size mattered!