Video: 30 photos of the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens, where the best maids of honor and respectable wives were raised
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
It was believed that the most elegant maids of honor, respectable wives and just great clever people come out of the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens. After the girls got into this educational institution, they practically did not see their parents, and the conditions in which they lived were truly Spartan. In our review there are 30 photos from Smolny, which will allow you to see how his pupils lived.
The Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens, which opened in St. Petersburg on May 5, 1764, became the first female educational institution in Russia.
Empress Catherine entrusted the management of the institute to her personal secretary, Ivan Ivanovich Betsky, who initiated the opening of the institute for noble maidens. He was educated abroad, talked a lot with encyclopedists and adhered to rationalistic views, being sure that the most important thing is enlightenment, enlightenment and once again enlightenment!
True, Smolny clearly did not reach the educational institution, since the sciences were studied there superficially. The emphasis in the institution was on foreign languages, good manners and discipline. Reasoning women were not honored.
The charter of the Institute was sent out "to all the provinces, provinces and cities … so that each of the nobles could, if he wishes, entrust his daughters in their young years to this established upbringing from Us". There were few who wanted to send their children into prison for 12 years. Many doubted what I would teach their children there. But in 1764, the first enrollment took place.
True, instead of the supposed 200 female students, only 60 girls of 4-6 years old were recruited. These were children from low-income, but well-born noble families. A year later, the institute opened a faculty "for bourgeois girls." Peasant girls were not admitted to the institution.
The main goal of the Smolny teachers was to make a "parquet" out of the girl (parfaite French - "perfect"). The girl could receive a reprimand for the slightest deviation from the rules: an insufficiently neatly made bed, a loud conversation at recess, a stray curl, a bow not tied according to the regulations on an apron.
For a torn stocking, for inaccuracy or for tricks, girls were left standing in the middle of the dining room while others were having dinner. The girls were so carefully protected from vices that the seventh commandment about adultery was sealed in the Bibles.
The conditions at the institute were Spartan, since Betskoy was sure that a healthy mind was only in a healthy body. He believed that children need to be accustomed to the cold, so the temperature in the bedrooms of Smolny was no more than 16 degrees. The girls slept on hard beds, in the morning they always went out to exercise and washed themselves with cold water from the Neva.
The food ration in Smolny was more than modest today. The daily menu looked like this:
- Morning tea with a roll. - Breakfast: a piece of bread with a little butter and cheese, a portion of milk porridge or pasta. - Lunch: thin soup without meat, for the second - meat from this soup, for the third - a small pie. - Evening tea with a roll.
There were days when at the institute they spoke only French or German, and for a spoken Russian word they put a cardboard tongue around the neck of an inattentive girl. She had to wander through the galleries of the institute and could not even sit down. This lasted until the time when she heard Russian speech from someone else, and then the language passed to another victim.
At the second stage of training, geography and history were added, and at the third, reading of moralizing and historical books, heraldry, architecture and physics. At the last stage of training, they repeated everything previously studied, paying special attention to the Law of God and housekeeping, which was supposed to prepare the girl for her future family life. In addition, in the last year of their studies, the girls conducted lessons in the lower grades in order to gain experience in raising children.
The most important and exciting event in Smolny was a public examination attended by members of the imperial family. The day before the exam, the girl was handed a ticket, according to which she had to prepare well.
The six best students upon graduation from the institute received a gold code - the metal monogram of the reigning empress. It was worn on the left shoulder on a white striped bow. The graduates were awarded both gold and silver medals.
After graduating from the Institute of Smolyanka, they were either arranged as a maid of honor at the court, or given in marriage, or left at their own institute as teachers or class ladies.
The harsh rules at the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens can only be compared with those that exist in choreographic schools. Our photo cycle about the exhausting journey to Russian ballet allows you to immerse yourself in this atmosphere.
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