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For years now, I have wanted to write a post about shitty curtsies. The problem is that I have to remember which productions have them (most? all? j/k), AND get visual aids that convey just how shitty and awkward the curtsies are. Let’s start with what a curtsy is, was, and should be, and then look at some examples that make my teeth grind.
The word “curtsy” derives from “courtesy,” which is what it’s all about: a gesture of respect. The women’s equivalent to a bow, a woman bends her knees and to varying degrees her head in a gesture of reverence or courtesy. Per the reasonably reliable Wikipedia, both men and women “reverenced” — a slightly different maneuver — through the 17th century, when things got gendered differently and men started bowing and women curtsying.
The modern British curtsy is done like this:
Looking historically, here’s how a reverence was done in 16th century dance, which is akin to how it would be done when greeting someone (you’d probably go through the set-up steps more quickly):
As things get gendered, here’s a baroque style (later 17th century) bow and curtsy:
By the late 19th century, both had evolved into this:
Key to all of these (reverence and curtsy) is KEEPING YOUR BACK STRAIGHT AND YOUR BUTT TUCKED IN. Were there situations when someone should be more flourishy? Probably! Does it look ridiculous, especially if you hold up your skirts awkwardly? YES!
Now there are probably plenty of examples of good curtsies on screen. I’m shocked to say I found this gif from the recent Marie Antoinette TV series, and it’s mostly lovely: backs relatively straight, head dropped, arms very balletic (I only wish far-right chick hadn’t bent her wrists):
Check Natalie Dormer, possibly the only good thing in The Tudors (2007-10), executing a very nice (if too modern) curtsy:
Ditto wrong for the period, but not badly executed in the second season of The Spanish Princess (2019-20):
Bridgerton (2020- ) figured out how to do it right!
Claire is from the future, but she’s got the basics down in Outlander (2014- ):
But there are FAR TOO MANY skirt-hiking, butt out, I look like I have lived my entire life amongst the pigs and now I am trying to be fancy examples on screen! The problem is it’s hard for a screencap to convey just how shitty a curtsy can be, and it can be hard to find a clip and it’s an ass pain to make a gif. So I can’t mock the bad curtsies in Dangerous Liaisons (2022) any more than these screencaps:
But given that I love you, I not only tracked down clips but WENT AND MADE GIFS! Just so you can see the “I AM A LADY FROM YE OLDEN TIMES” ungainly awkwardness.
Shitty Curtsies: Unnecessary Arm Flourishes
The King’s Daughter (2022) decided to go for an interpretive dance version:
Watch the scene and roll your eyes with me:
Shitty Curtsies: Skirt Hiking
The curtsying in episode 1 of Maria Theresia (2017-21) wasn’t awful, except for the totally ungainly skirt hiking. Honestly, as soon as the skirt is hiked, things look stupid.
Watch the clip and cringe with me:
There’s a key scene in Poldark (2015-19) where Verity tries to teach super-low-class country bumpkin Demelza how to curtsy. Obviously Demelza is going for comedy here, but even Verity looks stupid by holding up her skirt unnecessarily:
Check this montage of Demelza’s curtsies, starting with this one:
Meanwhile, the fucking children of King James IV of Scotland should be reverencing, not hiking their skirts and bobbing for Princess Margaret’s arrival as they do in The Spanish Princess (2019-20):
I’ll leave it to you to decide whether you want to fire up episode 5 so you can join me in the eye rolling.
Shitty Curtsies: Baby Got Back
Just ask Brigitte Bardot in Royal Affairs in Versailles (1954). It’s probably perfectly period correct to stick your butt out a little bit, but it just looks dumb. Bardot’s isn’t awful, but if she hadn’t grabbed her skirt it would have looked a whole lot better:
Watch the scene and be embarrassed for her:
Similarly, Cecily of York should have been raised better in The White Princess (2017):
The Buccaneers (2023- ) was really trying hard to avoid historical mannerisms (or anything else period; why didn’t they just Clueless this fucker and go totally modern?) so it makes sense that Nan does a shitty, skirt-hike-y, butt-out practice curtsy:
But someone please wrangle the extras hired for episode 3 of Maria Theresia, because they are deeply confused about what to do with their butts:
I can’t embed it, but watch the scene starting at about 16:15 and question your life choices with me.

I liked the curtsies from Sense and Sensibility (1995). Not overdone, just simple. :)
I always pictured Cinderella’s stepsisters as the poster girls for shitty curtsies!
When I was a teenager, my father (who did amateur theatre) taught me what he said was a curtsy for presentation at court. Standing on my left (non-dominant) foot, I pointed my right toe forward and slightly left, then swept it in a large arc around me to as far behind me as it would go, sinking till I was almost sitting on my right thigh. Is this at all for real, and if so — when?? Thanks to whoever knows.
Watch the videos at the top of this post – what your father taught sounds like an exaggerated version of those.
That is how I was thought in my youth ballet class
I’m not going to lie, having the Versailles hoi polloi from MARIE ANTOINETTE (BBC) get their references almost entirely proper, except
for one awkward customer, just adds to the verisimilitude.
After all, there’s always one.
Although most of her form is lovely, I note that the baroque dance lady has given in to clutching her skirts — ephemeral as they are!
Some folks over on Tumblr were discussing this and a lot of women mentioned being taught to do the whole grab your skirt curtsy as children, so I wonder if it got turned into something messy through a weird game of etiquette telephone or something.
One of my favorite curtsy scenes was in the first Downton Abbey movie (2019). Cora, Mary, and Edith are visiting Princess Mary. The three of them take a small step backward, drop down with a gentle head bob and immaculately straight backs, and then rise. In perfect unison. They were undoubtedly trained by the Dowager Countess!
https://youtu.be/nSXiL_Ee-Uo?si=P8mWCTn7G5kNbbZy shows the curtsy at the very beginning of a minute-long clip.
I think wee aristo girls were taught to hold their skirts up in the 20th century at Mme Vacani’s dance school in London. They also taught social dances. I’ve seen old photos of the little ones holding up their starched Liberty of London print dresses as they practice – adorbs. And of course Outlander’s Claire can curtsy – it was still expected of English women in the 1940s. Onto a different film, is it me, or does anyone else thing that the baroque style is more of a plié than a curtsy?
You have trained me well…………when I saw the still from the “Buccaneers I said out loud, without missing a beat……..”no chemise?…..that’s going to chafe”
I remember in the SCA, how we’d say “you’re not offering your bewbs to the crown” when demonstrating/practicing courtsy’s. That being said, I never saw any pics or video of myself in a curtsy, so have zero idea if I was doing them well, adequately, or terribly. And whatever garb I happened to be wearing for the day definitely did impact the situation, I always felt reasonably graceful in a cotehardie, but kind of weird in the Viking stuff. And I never figured out what I should do if I were in armor.
Verity might have an excuse that she’s holding her skirt up because she’s trying to show Demelza the correct feet position. Except that in this case, she should have hiked it up a lot more.
Weirdly I have trained for this one! The videos above are basic reverences, what you would give to an equal or very close superior. What we often see attempted in frock flicks are the deeper curtsies reserved for royalty (and high nobility depending on your degree of social separation). But they almost always go for the late eighteenth century variant of non supportive foot behind rather than non supportive leg forward (you need to get it out out the way as there is a limit to how low you can go with feet in first position, the classic diamond shaped curtsy). So we get anachronistic, badly performed reverences; they are meant to showcase control, as well as convey the correct amount of respect. French etiquette manuals from the mid eighteenth century assumed the reader could execute both styles, and some refer to the emerging foot forward variant, but often give lists of who to give them to (some english ones do as well).