My previous post was a bit of a digression concerning Noble Savages; the idea that aboriginal peoples were innocent and virtuous. 
      In long 18th century prose, however, we more typically find the terms “barbarous” and “savage” used to condemn poor behaviour, and this is how Austen uses these words.  
​   In Sense & Sensibility, Marianne thinks a “barbarous” rival has damaged her reputation with Willoughby. Willoughby’s farewell letter to her was “barbarously insolent.” And when she learns her sister Elinor’s secret, she condemns herself. “How barbarous have I been to you!” The term is used light-heartedly in Pride & Prejudice, when the newly-engaged Bingley spends all his time with Jane Bennet “unless when some barbarous neighbour, who could not be enough detested, had given him an invitation to dinner which he thought himself obliged to accept."
   Catherine Morland suspects General Tilney of murdering his wife, a “barbarous proceeding.” Henry Tilney refers specifically to the laws, manners and customs of England to criticize the wildness of her suppositions. “Remember that we are English, that we are Christians.”
   The most explicit reference to barbarism occurs in Mansfield Park. When Fanny Price learns that her newly-married cousin Maria has run away with Henry Crawford, she is stupefied. She sees it as “too horrible a confusion of guilt, too gross a complication of evil, for human nature, not in a state of utter barbarism.”​ ...

​   Professor Emma Clery was the guest lecturer for the recent 2020 Wellington lecture. Clery opened her talk with a story which brought the hardships, the stark choices and uncertain chances of 18th century life before her listeners in vivid detail: a Royal Navy convoy taking soldiers to the Caribbean which was hit by storms, shipwreck and illness.
   The 26-year-old Arthur Wellesley, (the future Duke of Wellington), Francis Austen (one of Jane Austen’s six brothers), and Thomas Fowle (the fiancé of Jane Austen’s older sister Cassandra) were all members of the ill-fated  convoy.
   “They were all younger sons in large families,” which, Clery pointed out, was not a coincidence. “Younger sons.... quite literally had to make their way in the world.” Tom Fowle and Cassandra could not afford to marry yet, and Francis was a midshipman, like Fanny Price's brother William in Mansfield Park, hoping for promotion. Arthur Wellesley's noble birth and connections had got him a lieutenant-colonelcy but he too didn't have enough money to marry the girl he loved.
   The convoy broke up and turned back and only Francis Austen and Tom Fowle made it to the Caribbean, while Wellesley went on to military glory elsewhere. But for all of them, military life meant carrying out orders they might not personally agree with.

   In my previous post, we looked at how English people of Austen's time viewed their country and their culture in relation to the rest of the world.
​   When we look back to Austen’s time, we see patriarchy embodied in both law and custom. It's routine for modern commentators to emphasize the subordinate legal and social position of women 200 years ago. It's routine for the heroine of a historical romance novel to shake her unruly curls and declare, "I will not be auctioned off like some prize heifer!" while her emerald-green eyes blaze with defiance.
     But when we look at what Englishmen and women of Austen’s class said about themselves at the time, when we look at how they compared themselves to other countries and cultures, it is clear that people of her era firmly believed that English gentlewomen were the most privileged women on earth...