Keywords: ars moriendi, castrum doloris, early modern period, epitaphs, funeral essentials, funeral procession, funeral sermons, Prague, sepulcher essentials, tomb stones The thesis introduces a specific part of the cultural history of the early modern period - the funeral culture. Considering the extensiveness of thematter, the scope has been limited to the area of Prague, to the cultural sphere of secular nobility and to the time period between the years 1500 and 1700. Naturally, the timeframe is not and cannot be absolute given the nature of this subject matter, which is culture. In the introductory chapter, the paper seeks to clarify eschatology and religious conditions in the early modern period, depicting death and its grip in the 16th and 17th centuries. Each chapter is devoted to a specific phenomenon of the funeral culture, in the same order in which the succession should logically follow shortly before and after the death of an important person. As such, the thesis specifically discusses the doctrine of "good death" - so called ars moriendi, exhibitions of the body, the funeral procession, construction of the Castrum Doloris, funeral sermons, and provision of funeral monuments. At the conclusion, the thesis ventures into the geographically and religiously distant Duchy of Finland, which...

A travers l’analyse des déplacements des souverains hellénistiques et des imperatores romains en Orient, ce travail entend éclairer le concept moderne de voyage officiel et démontrer la validité de cette catégorie pour caractériser les voyages de ces personnalités politiques antiques. Au-delà du critère du statut du voyageur, les sources mettent en lumière le rôle discriminant de l’infrastructure du voyage, ainsi que l’importance des procédures d’accueil public dans la reconnaissance collective de l’officiel. L’enquête conduit à souligner la dimension à la fois protocolaire et populaire de ce type de déplacement dont le caractère spectaculaire contribuait à assurer le retentissement exceptionnel pour en faire un [événement] local de grande ampleur. Manifestation de souveraineté, le voyage officiel s’inscrivait dans un processus de légitimation du pouvoir et constituait le cadre privilégié de la mise en scène de la personnalité politique : l’apparat et la théâtralisation du voyage autant que ses enjeux politiques majeurs peuvent être considérés comme des caractéristiques déterminantes du déplacement officiel. Cette réflexion pose également le problème de la pertinence de la dichotomie public/privé. Celle-ci n’est opératoire qu’à Rome où le concept de voyage fonctionnel est attesté, mais où l’on peut néanmoins observer une confusion entre la sphère de l’officium et celle de l’otium dans le cadre des déplacements des imperatores qui étaient l’occasion de démarches touristiques, culturelles ou religieuses révélatrices de la curiosité intellectuelle de ces personnages dont les séjours d’études puis les voyages officiels en Orient permettaient de satisfaire le philhellénisme. / Through the analysis of the travels of the hellenistic kings and the roman imperatores in the East, this work intends to throw light on the modern concept of official trip and to demonstrate the validity of this category to characterize the travels of these ancient political personalities. Beyond the criterion of the status of the traveller, sources bring to light the discriminating role of the infrastructure of the trip, as well as the importance of public reception in the collective recognition of the official. The inquiry leads to underline the formal and the popular dimension of this kind of trip whose spectacular character contributed to ensure his exceptional impact and turn it into a large-scale local event. As a demonstration of [sovereignty], the official trip was part of a process of legitimization of power and provided the privileged framework for the staging of the political personality : the pageantry and dramatization of the journey as much as [its] major political stakes can be considered as distinctive characteristics of the official trip. This study also raises the problem of the relevance of the public/private dichotomy. The latter is only effective in Rome where the concept of functional trip is attested, but where a confusion of the sphere of the officium and the otium can nevertheless be observed within the travels of the imperatores which were the opportunity of touristic, cultural and religious initiatives revealing the intellectual curiosity of these characters whose study tours and official trips in the East made it possible to satisfy their philhellenism.