Privileges
Foreign princes were entitled to the style "haut et puissant prince" ("high and mighty Prince") in French etiquette, were called "cousin" by the king, and claimed the right to be addressed as votre altesse (Your Highness).
Although Saint-Simon and other peers were loath to concede these prerogatives to the princes étrangers, they were even more jealous of two other privileges, the so-called pour ("for") and the tabouret ("stool"). The former referred to the rooms assigned at the palace of Versailles to allow members of the royal dynasty, high-ranking officers of the royal household, senior peers and favored courtiers the honor of living under the same roof as the king. These rooms were neither well-appointed nor well-situated relative to those of the royal family, usually being small and remote. Nonetheless, les pours distinguished the court's inner circle from its hangers-on.
The tabouret was even more highly valued. It consisted of the right to sit on a stool or ployant (folding seat), in the presence of the king or queen. Whereas the queen had her throne, the filles de France and petite-filles their armchairs, and princesses du sang cushioned seats with hard backs, duchesses whose husbands were peers sat, gowned and bejewelled, in a semicircle around the queen and lesser royalties, on low, unsteady stools without any back support — and reckoned themselves fortunate among the women of France.
Whereas the wife of a duke-and-peer could use a ployant, other duchesses, domestic or foreign, lacked the prerogative. But not only could the wife of any prince étranger claim a tabouret, but so could his daughters and sisters. This extended privilege was based on the fact that a peer was an officer of the Parlement of Paris, while the rank held by a prince derived from a dignity rooted in his blood rather than in his function. Thus a duchess-peeress shares in her husband's de jure rank as an official, but that rank is extended to no other of his family. Yet all descendants in the legitimate male-line of a prince share his blood, and thus his status, as does his wife and the wives of his patrilineal kinsmen.
Read more about this topic: Foreign Prince
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