A footman is a male domestic worker employed mainly to wait at table or attend a coach or carriage.
Etymology
Originally in the 14th century a footman denoted a soldier or any pedestrian, later it indicated a foot servant. A running footman delivered messages.
[The Concise Oxford Dictionary, ] He might run beside or behind the carriages of aristocrats, running alongside the coach to make sure it was not overturned by such obstacles as ditches or tree roots. A footman might also run ahead to the destination to prepare for his lord's arrival.
[Olmert, Michael (1996). Milton's Teeth and Ovid's Umbrella: Curiouser & Curiouser Adventures in History, p.87. Simon & Schuster, New York. .]
Roles
The name was applied to a
household domestic worker who waited at table and attended, rode on his employer's coach or carriage in case of untoward incidents.
[ In many cases, a footman was expected to serve as an armed bodyguard. Many were skilled with pistols to defend their employer's coach against Highwayman.
]
The first footman was the designation given to the highest-ranking servant of this class in a given household. The first footman would serve as deputy butler and act as butler in the latter's absence, although some larger houses also had an under-butler above the first footman.
In a larger household, various footmen might be assigned specific duties (for which there might be a traditional sequence), such as the silver specialist. Usually the footmen performed a range of duties which included serving meals, opening and closing doors, carrying heavy items, or moving furniture for the maid to clean behind. The footmen might also double as , especially for visiting guests.
Servants
Male servants were paid more than female servants and footmen were something of a luxury and therefore a status symbol even among the servant-employing classes. They performed a less-essential role than the cook, maid or even butler, and were employed only by the grandest households. Since a footman was for show as much as for work, his good looks were highly prized, including a tall stature and well-turned legs, shown off by the traditional footman's dress of stockings below knee breeches. Footmen were expected to be unmarried and tended to be relatively young; they might, however, progress to other posts, notably that of butler. One 19th-century footman, William Tayler, kept a diary which has been published. He was, in fact, married, but he kept it secret from his employers and visited his family only on his days off.
Once a common position in , the footman became much rarer after World War I as fewer households could afford large retinues. The role is now virtually a historic one, although servants with this designation are still employed in the British Royal Household, wearing a distinctive scarlet livery on state occasions.["Except at public functions, the last time I saw a footman in livery was in 1921": George Orwell writing in the Tribune of 3 March 1944]
Famous fictional footmen
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In Lewis Carroll novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, the Queen of Hearts' Fish Footman delivers a croquet invitation to the Duchess's Frog Footman, which he then presents to the Duchess.
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George (Richard E. Grant), first footman in service to Sir William McCordle (Michael Gambon), in the 2001 film Gosford Park, directed by Robert Altman.
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Thomas Barrow (Rob James-Collier) and William Mason (Thomas Howes) serve as first and second footman, respectively, to Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville) in the Julian Fellowes period drama Downton Abbey.
See also
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The Only Running Footman
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List of obsolete occupations
Sources
