Being a Court Dwarf: Royal Property With a Salary

Congratulations. You got the job. You are seven years old. You are eighteen inches tall. And you have just been baked into a pie. Court dwarfs were real, permanent fixtures of European royal courts from ancient Egypt through the eighteenth century. They wore clothes made by royal tailors, slept inside royal palaces, and stood next to kings and queens at every public ceremony. The Spanish Habsburg court employed seventy of them. Peter the Great's sister kept ninety-three. Catherine de Medici received one as a gift — delivered inside a birdcage. This is the story of what that job actually was, what it cost, and what happened to the ones who decided they were done being the punchline. Jeffrey Hudson got there first. It did not go smoothly. If you know someone who laughs a little too hard at their own job title, send them this one. #courtdwarf #jeffreyhudson #royalhistory #terribleresumes #weirdhistory #historyfacts #medievalhistory #britishhistory #habsburghistory #historyanimation #doodlehistory #darkhistory #historyyouneverlearned #forgottenhistory #historyforyou