draliman on life

Sometimes called a billet-doux, or a love letter, a love note is a personal letter to a loved one expressing affection.  The loved one does not necessarily have to be animate, human, alive, or known.

The theme for this week’s Prompt for the Promptless, hosted as ever by the talented Queen Creative, is love letters!

I thought we’d take a look at love letters through the ages. Let’s start with a love letter recently discovered carved into a stone tablet, which was buried in the middle of a desert somewhere probably.

As you can see, the cavemen didn’t waste words – in fact they didn’t have many words to waste! There is a directness to this letter which I find refreshing.

Next up, let’s zoom all the way forward to medieval England. A period of chivalrous knights and beautiful damsels, you say? Not a bit of it! Take a look at this recently discovered example.

Wow – serious stuff. I imagine that “Lady Emily” feels pretty special as Sir Killalot slaughters his way into her heart.

Let’s zip forward to the roaring Twenties next. Now we really get to hear some flowery stuff, as evidenced by this next example.

Surely we have reached the very pinnacle of love letters! Let’s try the Fifties next.

Although not as flowery as our Twenties example, I love the sweet innocence of this letter. Any girl would surely feel special to receive this! Finally, we’ll take a look at a typical love letter of our time. Well, love text.

And there you have it. I’m not even sure it’s written in English. I mean, what the hell? Such a shame.

We have seen that love letters have pretty much gone full circle. We began, and ended, with the caveman.