Court Culture

Horkay Hörcher Ferenc: Esztétikai gondolkodás a felvilágosodás korában (1650-1800) (Aesthetic Thought in the Age of Enlightenment, in Hungarian), Gondolat, Budapest, 2013, pp. 27-66.

A comparison of 17th century French aesthetic views based on Descartes' and Pascal's philosophy.

A Descartes és Pascal filozófiáján alapuló esztétikák vitája a 17. században.

„Wielkie rzeczy rodzą się wśród wielkich niebezpieczeństw”. W XVII stuleciu takim wielkim niebezpieczeństwem dla Rzeczypospolitej było Imperium Osmańskie. Zmagania z turecką ekspansją pozostawiły trwałe ślady o charakterze materialnym i wizualnym; strach mieszał się z uznaniem dla przeciwnika, rola przedmurza chrześcijaństwa – z fascynacją kulturą orientalną. Sabine Jagodzinski skupia się na omówieniu zmienności postrzegania zagrożenia tureckiego i jego komemoracji w rodach Żółkiewskich, Sobieskich i Radziwiłłów.

Muzeum Pałacu Króla Jana III w Wilanowie, 2020
ISBN 978-83-66104-52-5

René d’Anjou’s Livre des tournois is famous as the most substantial
account of the organisation of a medieval tournament that has come down
to us. It survives in eight manuscripts, most of which have an almost identical layout; the best of these is a magnificent work of art in its own right.

But these manuscripts are striking in another way: as a group, they show
that this work is one of the first illustrated manuals, in which text and
image are complementary, and form a single whole. The copyists understood
this, and followed the original because the layout and exact images
were an essential part of the whole. Justin Sturgeon’s interdisciplinary
study reveals the patterns and relationships which give the manual its very
specific character.

The study begins by exploring the relationship between the work’s images
and the way in which heraldry forms a visual counterpart to the narrrative
in the text We then turn to the subject matter and to René’s authoritative
use of sources, both written and practical, and how they relate to
late-medieval tournament and court culture. The author shows that René
was drawing on specific precedents toconstruct his idealized version of
such an event. Analysis of the visual presentation uses spatial and ritual
theory to engage with a series of spectacles surrounding the punishment
and review of the noble tourneyers, and their impact on group identity and
status. The last section of the book concentrates on the physical manuscripts.

The evidence from all eight known medieval manuscript copies is
used to construct a new understanding of the provenance and transmission
of the work, before turning to scrutinize the reception of two copies in
detail. The conclusion draws together threads of identity, authority, and
the importance of the Livre des tournois as a product of the culture and
circumstances of its production.

The second volume is a series of appendices to the main text, including
the first scholarly edition of the source manuscript to make use of all eight
medieval manuscripts,with tables anddiagrams showing the relationship of
all the extant manuscripts.

The third volume contains 300 supporting images, ncluding detailed high
resolution close-ups of vital examples, and images that utilize a special
technique, developed by the author, of highlighting important details
within images while identifying clearly where they are to be found in the
picture as a whole.

It is fair to say that it is probably the first instance of a technical handbook,
and the existence of eight copies which reproduce text and illustrations
using the same illustrations and the same layout, represent a group which
has no immediate parallels among medieval books. Presenting the important
comparative material has required the design of tables of illustrations,
and the use of highlighting of particular details, in a way which uses the
tools now available in digital imaging to great effect.

Now in paperback: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-courts-and-elites-in-the-hellenistic-empires.html.

During the Hellenistic Period (c. 330-30 BCE), Alexander the Great and his successors reshaped their Persian and Greco-Macedonian legacies to create a new kind of rulership that was neither ‘western’ nor ‘eastern’ and would profoundly influence the later development of court culture and monarchy in both the Roman West and Iranian East. Courts and Elites in the Hellenistic Empires approaches the Argead, Seleucid, Ptolemaic, and Antigonid empires not as territorial states but as network polities based on personal relations converging at the respective dynastic courts. Drawing on the socio-political models of Norbert Elias and Charles Tilly, and covering topics such as palace architecture, royal women, court factions, and monarchical ritual, the book shows how the Hellenistic courts were instrumental in the integration of local elites in the empires, and the (re)distribution of power, wealth, and status. It analyses the competition among courtiers for royal favor and the, not always successful, attempts of the Hellenistic rulers to use these struggles to their own advantage.

The article analyses one of the hexametric poems copied on a second century AD papyrus, possibly from Hermupolis, P.Lit.Goodspeed 2: a Hellenistic hymn to Aphrodite celebrated as a patroness of the sea and of wedded love. This portrayal of the goddess perfectly fits with Ptolemaic royal propaganda in III BC. The address to a "Ptolemai[c] Arsinoe" (II 5) reveals that here the goddess is worshipped as a divine image of a queen Arsinoe, most probably Arsinoe II Philadelphos, who had strong links with key-figures of the Ptolemaic navy. The hymn is compared with contemporary Alexandrian poetry, like the epigrams of the Milan papyrus P.Mil.Vogl. VIII 309. Some hypotheses are also presented about the context for the composition and the performance of the hymn (a Cypriot cult of Arsinoe Philadelphos?).

This book analyses Anna of Denmark’s material and visual patronage at the Stuart courts, examining her engagement with a wide array of expressive media including architecture, garden design, painting, music, dress, and jewellery. Encompassing Anna’s time in Denmark, England, and Scotland, it establishes patterns of interest and influence in her agency, while furthering our knowledge of Baltic-British transfer in the early modern period. Substantial archival work has facilitated a formative re-conceptualisation of James and Anna’s relationship, extended our knowledge of the constituents of consortship in the period, and has uncovered evidence to challenge the view that Anna followed the cultural accomplishments of her son, Prince Henry. This book reclaims Anna of Denmark as the influential and culturally active royal woman that her contemporaries knew. Combining politics, culture, and religion across the courts of Denmark, Scotland, and England, it enriches our understanding of royal women’s roles in early modern patriarchal societies and their impact on the development of cultural modes and fashions.

This contribution to a conferenence volume (Vienna 2016) deals with an illustrated mottet that was performed at the wedding of William V and Renata of Lorraine in 1568 [Mus.Hs. 2129 der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek]. I am investigating the pen drawings and the texts in the third part of the manuscript that is dedicated to famous women of the old testament. Both husband and wife are addressed in the pictorial programm attributed to Richard of Genua.

Essay and catalogue entries. Exhibition catalogue edited by Pietro C. Marani and Maria Teresa Fiorio.

"Despite Leonardo's impressive theoretical output and teaching practice, sixteenth-century sources (Giovio and Vasari) give us an unclear image of his pupils and the workshop he set up following his arrival in Milan in 1482" 

Featured catalogue entries: Leonardo (Uffizi GDSU 428 E), Leonardo (Royal Collection, 12276), Verrocchio (Uffizi GDSU 444E and Victoria and Albert Museum 2314), Lorenzo di Credi (British Myuseum 1860,0616.29), Francesco Napoletano, Fernando Yanez de la Almedina, Hernando de los Llanos, il Giampietrino, Francesco Galli Napoletano, Andrea Solario, Bernardino de' Conti, Ignazio Fumagalli.

As key players in the transatlantic slave trade, the monarchies of Hueda and Dahomey (in modern-day southern Benin) connected themselves to global commodity flows. From the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, imported merchandise fueled practices of conspicuous consumption and ritualized largesse, the performance of which was pivotal in consolidating their rulers’ power. Focusing on specific items (tobacco, porcelain) and behavioral practices (smoking, spitting), this article examines how these goods were materially and symbolically integrated into courtly culture and associated with the religious beliefs and ritual practices of Vodun. In order to track recurring aspects of courtly scenography, to compare the signification of bodily practices in different parts of the world, and to identify material links engendered by global trade, it combines microhistorical investigation based on written records with archaeological findings, anthropological observations, and the analysis of visual sources and sculptural artifacts. The essay argues that royal palaces constituted crucial laboratories of aesthetic change and new cultures of elite consumption. In this process, exogenous elements not only enriched the material culture of the palaces, celebrating the monarchs’ global splendor; they were also charged with new meanings that inscribed foreign goods and related practices into specifically regional cultural codes.

Whereas tournaments of the late thirteenth century were infused with cross-channel contact, whether in reciprocity of form or in the international composition of the participants involved, by the early fifteenth century, tournament forms in England and the Netherlands had significantly diverged. As has been thoroughly explored by recent historians, English tournaments became increasingly socially exclusive, whilst retaining an international dimension in the interests of diplomacy. However, this essay demonstrates that this development was by no means typical of all late medieval tournaments. The case of the Low Countries demonstrates that the more socially inclusive style tournaments did continue into the fifteenth century, and provided an opportunity for the ducal household and noblemen to come into contact with patrician townspeople and even more diverse urban audiences.

In: Freemasonry and Fraternalism in Eighteenth-Century Russia [Sheffield Lectures on The History of Freemasonry and Fraternalism. Vol.2], Edited by Andreas Önnerfors & Robert Collins (University of Sheffield:  Centre for Research into Freemasonry and Fraternalism, University of Sheffield, UK, 2009), 7-32.

Диссертация представляет собой первое исследование иконных окладов с фигуративными изображениями середины XVI – первого десятилетия XVII века, выполненных в кремлевских мастерских. В работе впервые суммируется и систематизируется весь существующий материал, который дополняется сведениями о несохранившихся украшенных иконах. Ранее эти памятники не были рассмотрены как единое художественное явление с присущими ему характерными особенностями. Выделяются композиционные и стилистические изменения, которые произошли в этом виде искусства с середины XVI века по начало XVII столетия. Некоторые из произведений впервые вводятся в научный оборот; в ряде случаев благодаря натурным исследованиям удалось уточнить атрибуцию памятников. Изучение стиля, иконографии, технико-технологических особенностей позволило внести коррективы в датировки. Проанализирована роль заказчиков в создании иконографических программ окладов, а также распространение патрональных изображений на различных частях драгоценного убора. Впервые памятники московского ювелирного искусства сопоставляются с произведениями европейского прикладного искусства по целому ряду параметров (орнаментика, типология, технология). На основании художественных и технологических особенностей прослеживается работа европейских и восточных ювелиров при царском дворе. Памятники, отличающиеся от произведений других стран православного мира драгоценностью материалов и сложностью исполнения, рассматриваются как особая линия поствизантийской традиции.

我们对明代王府宦官的历史知之甚少。有关明代宦官研究的英文代表作蔡石山的《明代宦官》（1996）对此只字未提。然而，明太祖朱元璋仿照皇宫制度，为每个王府配备了固定数量的内官，行使各种职能。这样，可以认为承奉司就相当于皇宫内的司礼监。如同侍奉皇帝的宦官，王府的宦官住在王城内，不同于王官，他们住在王城外。随着王府的不断增多和扩大，朱元璋制定的规章很快就不合时宜了：藩王们需要越来越多的宦官，郡王以下也开始使用宦官。国家试图维持对这些宦官的控制，但亲王们总是擅自招收更多净身之人——原则上这是不合法的。同时，国家还试图使这些宦官也承担法律责任，将之纳入亲王违法范畴。但是最终，出现了与皇宫宦官发展相似的结果：这些王府宦官所行职责远远超过了侍奉妃嫔和充当侍卫。他们主持婚礼和葬礼，管理王府地产，监督器具制造，参与其主人的书籍出版，等等。他们拥有自己的差役。有些宦官唆使宗室成员为非作歹，干预继承，甚至取代其主控制王府。如同他们在北京的同僚，不少王府宦官也很腐败。然而，大部分宦官对其主人尽忠职守，有时历经数十载，在王府内兢兢业业，建功立业。藩王们也对其宠信有加。他们为其向朝廷请求赐封，为其赋诗作文，为其厚葬。一些杰出的宦官还获得王府表彰。这些职位高低不等（有些净身者并无官方职位）的宦官构成了藩王社会的重要群体之一。这是明代宦官文化中一个被忽略的方面。

This comparative study investigates court politics in four kingdoms that succeeded the south Indian Vijayanagara empire during the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries: Ikkeri, Madurai, Ramnad, and Tanjavur (the latter under both the Nayaka and Maratha Bhonsle dynasties). Building on a unique combination of unexplored Indian texts and Dutch archival (VOC) records, this research offers a captivating new analysis of political culture, power relations, and dynastic developments -- with chapters devoted to foundations myths, successions to the throne, the power of courtiers, court protocol and diplomatic insults, influences from Sultanate courts, and mutual relations.

In great detail, this monograph provides both new facts and fresh insights that contest existing scholarship. By highlighting their competitive, fluid, and dynamic nature, it undermines the historiography viewing these courts as harmonic, hierarchic, and static. Far from being remote, ritualised figures, we find kings and Brahmins contesting with other courtiers for power. At the same time, by stressing continuities with the past, this study questions recent scholarship that perceives a fundamentally new form of Nayaka kingship. Thus, this research has important repercussions for the way we perceive both these kingdoms and their ‘medieval’ precursors.

In the third century BCE, the Ptolemaic imperial court at Alexandria was the unchallenged center of culture and learning of the Hellenistic world. Backed by the vast wealth and prestige of the Ptolemies, the city of Alexandria became the symbolic capital of the world (pun intended). Third-century Alexandria was the main hub of a global imperial network stretching from the Indian Ocean to the Black Sea. Many poets, philosophers, inventors, geographers, and other men of letters migrated to that center to enjoy the generous patronage of the Ptolemies and to acquire prestige by being associated with the royal city.

The Hellenistic Age was a period of intensified globalization, and it was through the royal court that writers and scientists were able to gain access to the extensive elite networks that connected communities throughout the Mediterranean and beyond. Literary authors contributed to the growth of interconnectivity by creating a common ‘Hellenistic’ imperial culture and language, as well as through the expression of imperial themes in their work. Most notable among the latter was the idea that the civilized world was, or ought to be, a single peaceful oikoumene, of which Alexandria was the glorious, magnetic heart.

English: The Archivo General de Simancas (Valladolid, Spain) contains in the Patronato Real section (legajo nº 29, document nº 28) a document entitled "Relación de efectos que Pedro Fernández recibía y entregaba de orden del rey" ("List of Items Received and Delivered by Pedro Fernández on the King´s Orders"). This unpublished record contains information regarding the household of King Enrique III of Castile (1390-1406) between 27 August, 1397 and 18 August, 1398. This study aims at examining some of the institutional, cultural, material and historical aspects of the Court of Castile at the end of the fourteenth century | Spanish: En la sección Patronato Real del Archivo General de Simancas (Valladolid, España), bajo la signatura legajo nº 29, documento nº 28 se conserva el documento que, con el título atribuido de "Relación de efectos que Pedro Fernández recibía y entregaba de orden del rey", en la actualidad inédito, alude a la realidad de la cámara regia del rey Enrique III de Castilla (1390-1406), entre los días 27 de agosto de 1397 y 18 de agosto de 1398. El presente trabajo buscará estudiar algunos aspectos institucionales, culturales, materiales e históricos de la corte castellana a fines del siglo XIV.

Pierre-Ernest de Mansfeld (1517-1604) was one of the most important political figures and art patrons in the sixteenth-century Low Countries, but he was first and foremost an army commander. In the course of his long and distinguished military career in the service of Charles V and Philip II, he played a leading role in many notable feats of arms, including the battle of Saint-Quentin in 1557, the battle of Moncontour in 1569, and the siege of Antwerp in 1585. His sumptuous residence in Luxembourg was decorated with paintings of some thirty different battles; in half of these he had personally participated. Using visual and other sources, this essay offers a panorama of Mansfeld’s martial exploits, from the border wars with France in the 1540s and 1550s to the Dutch Revolt in the 1570s and 1580s.

This thesis (2006) discusses the mingling of changes and continuities in the layout of mediaeval Constantinople through the lens of monastic buildings (both imperial and otherwise) and the urban worship of saints and the Theotokos; its chronological focus extends from the late ninth through the middle of the twelfth centuries. It further addresses the important changes that Evergetine monasticism elicited in imperial religiosity and the care of the dead in the court context.

R. Strootman, ‘Eunuchs, renegades and concubines: The “paradox of power” and the promotion of favorites in the Hellenistic empires’, in: A. Erskine, L. Llewellyn-Jones, and S. Wallace eds., The Hellenistic Court: Monarchic Power and Elite Society From Alexander to Cleopatra (Swansea: The Classical Press of Wales, 2017) 121–142.

From the fourteenth century CE onward, south Indian states ruled by Hindu kings were strongly influenced by politico-cultural conventions from Muslim-governed areas. This development was, for instance, manifest in the dress and titles of the rulers of the Vijayanagara Empire. As has been argued, they bore the title of Sultan and on public occasions they appeared in garments fashioned on Persian and Arab clothing. Both adaptations exemplified efforts to connect to the dominant Indo-Islamic world. From Vijayanagara’s fragmentation in the sixteenth century new Hindu-ruled kingdoms arose. We may wonder to what extent those succeeding polities continued practices adopted from Islamic courts. With that question in mind, this paper discusses royal dress at court audiences in four Vijayanagara successor states, chiefly on the basis of embassy reports of the Dutch East India Company and south Indian works of art. It appears that kings could wear a variety of clothing styles at audiences and that influences on these styles now came from multiple backgrounds, comprising diverse Islamic as well as local elements. Further, not all successor states followed the same dress codes as their dynasties modified earlier conventions in different ways, depending on varying political developments.

– Jacques van Noyen (attr.): Plan des fortifications de Thionville en 1568 (cat. 26), pp. 367-368.
– Anonyme: Le siège de Maastricht en 1579 (cat. 35), pp. 377-379.
– Giacinto Gimignani: La bataille sur la digue de Kouwenstein en 1585 (cat. 37), pp. 383-384.
– Romeyn de Hooghe: Le commencement du siège d’Anvers et la remise de la Toison d’Or à Farnèse par Mansfeld en 1585 (cat. 38), pp. 385-386.
– Giovanni Guerra: Quatre dessins de la série Alexandri Farnesii heroica acta (cat. 39a-d), pp. 386-390.
– Gerhard Stempel: Deux plans du siège de Wachtendonck en 1588, dédiés à Mansfeld” (cat. 40a-b), pp. 391-393.
– Frans Hogenberg: Evénements historiques de la Révolte (cat. 41a-m), pp. 393-404.
– Pierre Lepoivre: Receuil de plans de sièges, batailles, fortifications, etc. (cat. 42a-p), pp. 405-410.
– Pierre Lepoivre: Traité d’architecture, perspective et fortification en six livres (cat. 43a-b), pp. 411-414.
– Antoon van den Wijngaerde: La bataille de Saint-Quentin, le 10 août 1557 [dessin] (cat. 46), pp. 418-421.
– Antoon van den Wijngaerde: La bataille de Saint-Quentin, le 10 août 1557 [gravure] (cat. 47), pp. 421-424.
– Antoon van den Wijngaerde: La bataille de Saint-Quentin, le 10 août 1557 [tableau] (cat. 48), pp. 425-429.
– Antoine Lafréri (éd.): Carte de la France occidentale avec la bataille de Moncontour, 1569 (cat. 49), pp. 430-431.
– Anonyme: La bataille de Moncontour, le 3 octobre 1569 (cat. 50), pp. 431-432.
– Jean Perrissin et Jacques Tortorel: La bataille de Moncontour, le 3 octobre 1569 (cat. 51a-b), pp. 433-435.

in: Un prince de la Renaissance. Pierre-Ernest de Mansfeld (1517-1604) (ed. Jean-Luc Mousset, Krista De Jonge), exhibition catalogue (Luxembourg: Musée national d’histoire et d’art), 2007.