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The Butler Name.
International Butler Academy
Thursday, 19th April 2007
 
The Butler name derives from the old French; Bouteillier; the cup-bearer or the one in charge of the bottles. 

Bottle and the French equivalent both come from the medieval Latin butticula, a diminutive of buttis, a cask, which is also the origin of the word butt for a large wooden container for liquid (the beer cellar in medieval times would have contained wooden casks, not glass bottles). 

So the buttery, therefore, had originally nothing to do with butter but was the place of the butts.  Only later was the word extended to mean somewhere that provisions in general were stored, perhaps because people did mistakenly make that association.

Through a complicated process that had to do with the loss of gentlemen servants and changes in social organization, the Butler slowly rose to be in charge not only of the buttery, but also of the ewery (where the napkins and basins for washing and shaving were kept) and the pantry (which did supply the bread, butter, cheese and other basic provisions), and later still he took over the cellerer's duties of looking after the wine, which indeed became one of his principal duties. 

By the middle of the nineteenth century, the Butler reached his full flowering as head of the male domestic servants, in larger households sometimes having a whole suite of rooms dedicated to his various functions.  In the twentieth century, social change meant he almost vanished as a breed.  In our modern age the Butler has been reinvented as a kind of Swiss-Army- knife, all-purpose household manager, often the sole permanent servant, as much required to organize his master's travel arrangements and supervise redecorating the house as he is to serve the wine at formal dinners.

Butler is one of those words which has survived almost unchanged in the language for several hundred years, but whose meaning has progressively changed along with his duties.  But as few of us encounter a real Butler these days, even fewer than in his heyday, our understanding of the word is stuck in a fantasy world of Wodehousian invention.

Butler

\But"ler\, n. [OE. boteler, French; bouteillier (from bouteille), a bottle-bearer, a cupbearer, fr. LL. buticularius, fr. buticula bottle.  An officer in a king's or a nobleman's household, whose principal business it is to take charge of the liquors, plate, etc.; the head servant in a large house.  N: a manservant (usually the head servant of a household) who has charge of wines and the table, receiving guests, directs the serving of meals and performs various personal services.  Properly a servant in charge of the wine (Gen. 40:1-13; 41:9).  The Hebrew word, _mashkeh_, thus translated is rendered also (plural) "cup-bearers" (1 Kings 10:5; 2 Chr. 9:4).  Nehemiah (1:11) was cup-bearer to king Artaxerxes.  It was a position of great responsibility and honor in Royal households.  Butler: a surname (very common: 1 in 1098 families; popularity rank in the U.S.: #91).

The Correct Pronunciation

Click here: www.butlerschool.com/butler01.wav for the correct English pronunciation (small audio file).

The Number of Butlers Worldwide

The International Guild of Professional Butlers ( www.butlersguild.com ) estimates that there are some 50.000 professional Butlers in the world today.

The Duties of a Modern Butler

Oversee the household staff, many times at more than one residence.  Knowledge of high social etiquette and protocol.  Receives guests and supervises the reception of visitors.  May double as House Manager, Personal Assistant, Valet, Chef, Body Guard, and a number of other positions.  Organizes duties and schedules of domestic staff.  Schedule and oversee household maintenance.  Organizes parties and events.  Performs light housekeeping duties.  Books hotels, restaurants theatres etc.  Household accounting and creating household budgets.  Maintains the wardrobe and clothing inventory for the gentleman.  Packs and prepares for the gentleman for travel.  Assists with maintaining household security.  Schedules the maintenance for miscellaneous items in the estate (stables, boats, planes etc.).  Staff hiring and firing.  Staff training.  Knowledgeable about wines and spirits and oversees the wine cellar and liquor inventory.  Strong communication, organizational and management skills.  Ability to be multi-task oriented.  Organizes trips and may travel with the employer.

The Salary Range of a  Modern Butler

Salary is usually based on a  number of factors such as the amount of experience and/or formal training and the duties and hours included in the job description.  Butlers usually earn a salary between $50.000 and $150.000 annually, plus benefits.  A Butler can be a live-in or live-out employee.

The Victorian Era (1839 - 1901)

The Victorian era corresponds with the reign of Queen Victoria in England from 1839 to 1901. The period is beloved for its attention to high morals, modesty and proper decorum, as inspired by the Queen and her husband, Prince Albert.  The Victorian era was also an optimistic time in which scientific and industrial invention thrived.  Developments in printing produced a proliferation of Victorian scrap art, cards, and magazines.  The importance placed on civic conscience and social responsibility engendered notable developments toward gender and racial equality, such as the legal abolishment of slavery in America. In addition, humanitarian and religious organizations such as the Salvation Army reflected the Victorian concern for the poor and needy of the period.  Poverty was overwhelming.

In 1901, when the British population was 38 million and every middle-class home had at least one servant, there were 1.7 million women and 140,000 men in domestic service.  Even a modestly prosperous household could expect to retain the services of a general domestic servant, and mostly these were young single women.  In fact, right up until the start of the First World War, domestic service was the largest single occupation for women.  However, it was fading in popularity by 1891.  The hours worked were very long, the work was arduous and often lonely and it did not provide the freedom which was available to factory and shop workers.  Large households could expect to employ dozens of servants such as; Butler, UnderButler, Housekeeper, Cook, Footman, Ladies Maid, Kitchen Maid, Stillroom Maid, Housemaid, Coachman and Groom.

"There was no status in being in service, you were a nobody; marriage was the way out of it."
(Rosina Harrison, Rose: My Life in Service).

"As I stood in my lonely bedroom at the hotel, trying to tie my white tie myself, it struck me for the first time that there must be whole squads of chappies in the world who had to get along without a man to look after them.  I'd always thought of Jeeves as a kind of natural phenomenon; but, by Jove! of course, when you come to think of it, there must be quite a lot of fellows who have to press their own clothes themselves, and haven't got anybody to bring them tea in the morning, and so on.  It was rather a solemn thought . . ."
(P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves Omnibus).

"The hard reality is, surely for the likes of you and I, there is little choice other than to leave our fate, ultimately, in the hands of those great gentlemen at the hub of this world who employ our services".
(Mr Stevens, the Butler, in Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day).

A History Lesson

Readers of historical novels are familiar with some of the servants that large establishments employed to do all the work required to keep the place running smoothly.  Large estates had an army of outdoor servants (gardeners, gamekeepers, and grooms) and an equally large army of indoor servants. The number and kinds of servants varied depending on the social status of the employer and the size of the estate.

Male servants ranked above female servants and non-liveried servants, those who did not wear uniforms, ranked above those servants who did.  The highest ranking male servant (who in some ways was more a professional employee than a true servant), was the Land Steward. He was often the son of a minister or businessman.  Some Land Stewards were attorneys and had their own homes and own businesses on the side.  The Steward was the manager of the estate.  He hired and fired workers, settled tenant complaints, saw to the harvesting of crops, managed the timber, collected the rents and kept all the financial records.  Very wealthy men with more than one estate had several Land Stewards.

A few, very wealthy homes employed a House Steward.  The highest ranking male house servant was the Butler. The Butler's duties varied depending on the size of the house.  He was in charge of the wine cellar and in the days before refrigeration, that was a delicate task.  He was in charge of the silver and gold plate, china, and crystal.  He supervised the cleaning of this valuable silver and gold and guarded it against thieves.  As time passed, the position of the Butler gained more and more prestige until he became the top servant in Victorian times - in charge of the men and women underservants.  While the Butler did not wear livery, he did alter his clothing slightly while on duty - he wore a black tie rather than a white one for instance.  It would not do to mistake the Butler for a gentleman.

The highest ranking male house servant, next to the Butler, was the valet.  He cared for his employer's clothing, shined his shoes and boots, did the hairdressing and barbering and made sure the gentleman looked good.  A valet had to be well-dressed himself, but was not to outshine his employer.  When the gentleman went shopping or traveling, the valet went along since there were men who literally could not dress or undress themselves without assistance (those regency coats and boots were tight!).

The highest ranking indoor liveried servant was the footman.  Footmen did many jobs around the house - both indoors and outside. Inside, he laid the table, waited at table, served tea, answered the door and assisted the Butler. Outside, he rode on the carriage, opened doors, served as an escort when a lady paid calls, and carried torches to deter thieves when the lady and gentleman went out at night.  The footman carried letters to and fro and special footmen called "running footmen" ran in front of or beside a carriage.  These running footmen had mostly died out by the time of the regency, but in their prime, they were colorful characters, both literally and figuratively.  They often wore very bright and luxurious livery and some noblemen would organize footraces between their running footmen.  The qualifications for being a footman were good looks and a good physique.  Their livery was knee breeches, often plush ones with silk stockings (footmen had to have good legs) and coats of satin and velvet with starched shirts.  Footmen had to powder their hair - a custom that did not die out among the Buckingham Palace footmen until Prince Philip put a stop to it.  He thought it was unhygienic.

A page was a young boy who was sort of an apprentice footman.  He performed odd jobs and tasks and was put into livery to stand around and look good when the lady chose to entertain.  Sometimes the page was a young black boy who was put into an especially fancy livery and treated almost like an ornament.

Women servants did not rank as high as men and were not paid as much even though their work was often harder.  A footman carried letters, but a chambermaid often had to climb flights of stairs with loads of coal for the fire or cans of hot water for the bath.

The highest ranking woman servant was the housekeeper.  She kept the keys to all the storage closets and supervised the maids and cook.  She served as the Butler's right hand helper.  She kept books and household accounts and ordered food and supplies.  She very much ran the house.

The next highest woman servant is the personal maid.  She dressed and undressed the lady, cleaned, pressed and mended rips in clothing and did the lady's hair.  In the Victorian age, when clothing was very heavy and elaborate (and buttoned and laced up the back) a women could literally not get dressed or undressed without assistance just like the regency fops with their tight coats.  Personal maids also looked after the jewelry and served as a companion and confidante.  It was very much the thing to have a personal maid who was French, but if a lady could not find a French maid, an English personal maid who could speak a few French phrases was almost as good.

The cook was considered to be of better quality if she had trained with a male chef.  Not many people were wealthy enough to afford a male chef, so they searched for female cooks who had trained with men.  The cook was the dictator of the kitchen.  The cook had many kitchen helpers to assist her in the massive amounts of cooking that had to be done.  There were always scullery maids (the lowest of the female servants) whose job it was to clean the pots and pans.  These poor girls spent their days with their hands in hot water and harsh washing soda.  After a large party, there could be hundreds of greasy pots and pans to clean before the girls could go to bed.

There were several kinds of maids - chambermaids, parlor maids and maids-of-all-work.  These young women were the ones who swept, dusted, polished, cleaned, washed, fetched and carried from early morning till late at night.  The schedule of the week for maids has them working from 6:30 am till 10:00 pm with one half-day off a week.  They had to do all the cleaning and polishing with none of the labor saving devices we take for granted.  There was no such thing as polish for instance.  Furniture polish was made from linseed oil, turpentine and beeswax.  Carpets had to be brushed by hand, lamps had to be cleaned and filled and fires had to kept lit and tended.  This necessitated maids lugging large amounts of coal up flights of stairs to all the fireplaces, and a large estate could have many, many fireplaces.  The sheer amount of work involved in a maid's job is difficult to imagine.  Maids wore two kinds of clothing.  In the mornings when most of the heavy work was done, they wore cotton print dresses and heavy aprons.  Later in the afternoon, they changed into black dresses with ruffled aprons and caps with streamers.  By Victorian times, all but the wealthiest had given up footmen and the maids answered the doors and announced visitors.

The era of large estates and many servants died out after World War I.  For a long time, a job as a servant was the only one a respectable young woman could get, and after jobs in offices and factories became available, few young women or men wanted to spend long hours working for little money and little chance to have a life of their own.  More job opportunities, smaller houses and more labor saving devices finally put an end to the huge numbers of servants who used to work in stately homes.

Sources;  The International Guild of Professional Butlers, Victorian Household Hints by Elizabeth Drury, Not In Front of the Servants by Frank Dawes, Rise and Fall of the Victorian Servant by Pamela Horn, Etiquette by Emily Post, Victorian life and Victorian fiction: A companion for the American reader by Jo McMurtry Hamden.

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