In 1532, a group of Spanish conquistadores defeated the armies of the Inca Empire and moved from plundering the treasure of the region to establishing an imperial reign based on the encomienda system. The increasing demand for native labor and material goods forced fragmentation and restructuring of indigenous communities. The failure of evangelization efforts by the Spanish, the breakdown of their early bureaucratic apparatus, and the threat of the Neo-Inca State in exile generated a crisis among the Spanish in the 1560s. Concomitantly, indigenous Andeans experienced psychological and spiritual pressures found an outlet in a millenarian movement known as Taki Onqoy. This thesis discusses the Taki Onqoy in the context of the decade of crisis, and its role as a mechanism of archaism by which the Andean people endeavored to restructure their post-conquest world.

<p>As a woman who claimed to experienced supernatural phenomena, such as spiritual visions and raptures, Teresa of Ávila had to face accusations of deception while confronting her own doubts of being self-deceived. Both religious authorities and visionary women in sixteenth-century Spain used the idea of deception to either dictate or challenge the dominant religious discourse. Ultimately, Teresa succeed at convincing ecclesial powers of the legitimacy of her experiences, a mandatory step for her canonization. Other visionaries were not as successful, and I analyze whether Teresa’s rhetorical strategies played a role in ensuring her effective defense of the authenticity of her visions.</p> This analysis of Teresa of Ávila as a visionary woman who felt the need to confront the problem of deception questions the usefulness of the traditional interpretation of visionary women as either deceivers or deceived. I argue that deception has traditionally functioned as a tool of sociopolitical marginalization, and that rulers of public discourse have ignored or dismissed the voices of visionary women. This work indicates the urgency of including their stories in the larger discussion on the credibility of women’s accounts of their own life experiences.

<p>During the 1550s, a warehouse was constructed in Antwerp with funds from both the city government and a private investor. This building, the Tapissierspand, became the global center for selling and distributing tapestries of extraordinary beauty, exquisite craftsmanship, and exorbitant cost. The construction of the building indicates that the very nature of how tapestries were made and purchased was changing in the 1550s. Although Antwerp's fairs had long been convenient locations for agents to find luxury items that might please their wealthy clients, like with many luxury trades, tapestry sales were shifting from strictly commissioned sales to include on spec sales. The Tapissierspand was the ideal place for a dealer to purchase multiple already-made tapestries and load them onto the waiting ships in Antwerp's busy harbor for export and resale abroad. The city's export registers document that thousands of yards of tapestry were shipped this way. </p><p>The regulatory environment in Antwerp was much less strict than in other cities and this permitted freer interactions within guilds and across industries. The city was for this reason a desirable location for craftsmen to work and sell. But because the strict royal ordinances delivered throughout the 1530s and 1540s were frequently uninforced, workers in the industry were forced to find other ways to manage the large risk inherent in the tapestry trade. The development of the Tapissierspand in Antwerp was an effort on the part of merchants and the city to abate risk. The city could continue to entice merchants if it could provide the right opportunities and environment. However, by the sixteenth century, the constant hyper-vigilance the city had experienced throughout the fifteenth century during frequent times of war and financial difficulty shaped the way the city and its occupants viewed business. In a large sense, everything came down to risk, and how to manage it and minimize it. </p><p>At a time of upheaval and mismanagement, survival and financial success through the reduction of risk became of primary importance. Tapestry weaving carried inherent--and large--risks. Raw materials were expensive, and workshops often did not have the capital needed for on spec weaving. The purchase of on spec tapestries without any guarantees of quality or origin was risky for buyers. Thus the Tapissierspand's story is one of people seeking to maximize economic advantage and minimize risk. The Tapissierspand allowed buyers and sellers to minimize risk by facilitating exchange of knowledge, assessment of quality, negotiation of prices and commissions, and extension of credit. </p><p>This dissertation will examine the historical precedents in Antwerp that allowed the Tapissierspand to develop, and the ways in which the Pand functioned to expand trade while reducing risk for both buyers and sellers by reducing the risks inherent in the industry.</p> / Dissertation

<p>Marinus Van Reymerswaele's painting of 1542, <italic>The Lawyer's Office</italic>, was a completely new type of image in the history of art. It shows a lawyer and his assistant behind a desk strewn with briefs, wax seals and money. A complex set of historical circumstances at the interface of art, economics, and legal history in sixteenth century Antwerp explain this painting's appearance and significance. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Antwerp became a locus of unprecedented artistic production caused by the dramatic growth of its mercantile population, its highly organized commercial infrastructure, and its competitive business atmosphere. These developments stimulated a new sophistication in the art market and an energetic approach to acquiring and collecting, supported by publicly-funded venues to mass-market paintings. Over the course of the sixteenth century, artists invented new subjects to meet public demand. Many of these were radically new. One of these artists, Marinus Van Reymerswaele (c. 1490-1546) made distinctive paintings of lawyers, bankers, and moneychangers which relate to fundamental changes in the legal and commercial infrastructure in the sixteenth century. In just one generation, the Habsburg authority centralized the political and legal landscape in the Netherlands. As the prized economic and cultural center of Habsburg territories, Antwerp was transformed. </p><p>This dissertation links the development of consumption practices and the rise of new pictorial subjects introduced in Antwerp with the changing business and legal climate of the city during the sixteenth century. Through an investigation of unpublished home inventories recorded between 1528 and 1588, it clarifies the acquisition preferences of the Antwerp public at large, considering both changing preferences for panel and linen paintings as well as for novel and traditional images alike. This reassessment of painting consumption reveals a starkly more conservative approach to buying images than previously assumed, underscoring the rarity of everyday life subjects in Antwerp domestic spaces. As a painter operating within this market, Marinus van Reymerswaele invented a new brand of painting -- the new old master painting -- that not only addressed broad social concerns sparked by Habsburg political, mercantile, and legal reforms, but also built on long-established Netherlandish visual traditions. As the sixteenth century drew to a close, his paintings became more desired by collectors but lost their topicality as memories of Antwerp's political anxieties faded into the past.</p> / Dissertation

This thesis focuses on the late period mosques of architect Sinan in terms of their structural systems, the relation with their environment, and the identities of their patrons. The links amongst the role of the patron, his or her status in the state, materials used in the mosques, location choice and the spatial distribution of the mosques are researched on the bases of these six late period mosques of Sinan. In this perspective, the social background of the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth century is the first focal point of the thesis. The relations between the decadence of the institutions, the political conditions of the Ottoman Empire and the architectural production during the last quarter of the sixteenth century are examined in the second chapter of this thesis. In the third chapter these six late period mosques as the sampling case are described in detail and evaluated in terms of their bearing systems, construction materials, the site features and the relation with their patrons. Though, being one of the favorite subjects in the Ottoman architectural history, there are many research and interpretations on Sinan&amp / #8217 / s architectural style, works on late period mosques are limited and not specifically focused. In the fourth chapter of the study these limited interpretations are brought together and evaluated in the light of the background information supplied in the previous chapter of the thesis. In this framework, the aim of this study is not only to assess the late period works of Sinan as a tool to trace his architectural process, but also to unveil the relations with the identities of the patrons and locational and structural features of the mosques.

No description available.

This thesis is a study of George Gordon, sixth earl of Huntly, from July 1581 to March 1595, analysing the role he played in the confessional politics of the period (both national and internation) and how a strong Catholic magnate affected the balance of power and wider policy decisions in Scotland. The thesis is a narrative, with comentary on the political events of the reign of James VI, including the relationship Huntly had with James VI and the wider repercussions thereof. Huntly returned to Scotland from France in July 1581, becoming a courtier and an adherent of Esme Stewart, duke of Lennox. He served a political apprenticeship to Lennox and was exposed to covert Catholic politicking, as well as to the nascent Jesuit mission in Scotland. After James was captured by the Ruthven Raiders in August 1582, Huntly entered politics in his own right, becoming influential in the opposition to the rithven regime. Huntly assisted in enforcing the regime change when James escaped from the Ruthven lords in June 1583, his loyalty to the king winning James's trust and close friendship - the dividends of which he reaped throughout his life. Huntly initially supported the new administration under James Stewart, earl of Arran and assiduously attended to his duties in both the locality and the central government. Following Arran's fall in November 1585, Huntly deliberately distanced himself from the Court and the new Anglophile government. He opposed the anglo-Scottish treaty which was concluded in July 1586 and worked hard to counter the rise of John Maitland of Thirlestane. For the first time, Huntly made contact with the European counter-Reformation in Apriland May 1586. The period June 1587 to April 1589 was marked by faction fighting between Huntly and Maitland, who were both instrumental in James' pursuit of diametrically opposed policies. The discovery of Huntly's covert correspondece with Spain in February 1589 made his Catholic politicking public, subsequently colouring the conflict vetween Maitland and Huntly with confessional politics. Events excalated until Huntly mustered troops on the field of Brig o' Dee near Aberdeen, Although Huntly refused to meet the king on the field, Maitland's vitory was only parial. Brig o' Dee was not the manifestation of the politics of the Counter-Reformation in Scotland, but the productof years of faction fighting between Maitland and Huntly. The period of January 1590 to March 1595 was characterised by Hunrly's continuing influence at Court with marked favour from James and his bloodfeud with James Stewart, second earl of Moray. Huntly used his twin centres of influnce, the Court and power in the region, to fight a vivious and protacted bloodfeud with Moray and his faction. The interception of the Spanish Blanks at the end of 1592 brought confessional politics to bear on a purely secular bloodfeud. Political agitation from the Kirk and Stewarts caused James to commission an army under Archibald Campbell, seventh earl of Argyll to pursue Huntly in October 1594. The result was the battle of Glenlivet between Huntly and Argyll which came to represent the fight against Catholicism, although its root cause was Huntly's bloodfeud with Moray and the Stewarts. When James later raised his own army and marched north against Huntly, the early refused to face James on the field and in March 1595 he voluntarily went into exile abroad. This ended the most active phase of huntly's participation in national and international politics; after his political rehabilitation in 1597, he no longer played an influential role in the king's domestic or foreign policies. Overall, the thesis agues that Huntly needs to be understood as a political faction leader, whose Catholicism was a tool he eomplyed to widen his political influence but not the determinant of all his actions.

<p>This thesis explores attitudes of Christians toward Islam and Muslims in Spain in the sixteenth century and intends to destabilize Islam's traditional place as adversary in Early-Modern Spanish history. My research aligns itself with and employs new trends in historiography that emphasize dissent and resistance exercised by individuals and groups at all levels of Spanish society in order to complicate popular notions about the extermination of Islam in Spain. I argue that within Spain there was, throughout the sixteenth century and after the expulsion of the Moriscos in the early seventeenth century, a continued interest in the religion and culture of Islam. I show that, far from isolating itself from Islam, Christian Spain was engaged with Muslims on multiple levels. The voluntary and involuntary migration of Spaniards to Muslim lands, for many emigrants of Christian decent, led to the embrace of a multicultural, multireligious, polylingual and polyethnic reality along the Mediterranean that was contrary to Spanish Counter-Reformation ideology. The dissertation includes textual examples from sixteenth-century Spanish and colonial "histories," and works by Cervantes, to support the argument that this official ideology, which has dominated historiography on this period, does not reflect much of the Spanish experience with non-Christians within and without its borders. My goal is to expose a context within the field of Early-Modern Peninsular studies for alternative forms of discourse that emphasize toleration for religious and cultural difference, interfaith and intercultural dialogue and exchange, and a basic interest in and curiosity about Islamic ways of life.</p> / Dissertation

Relevant de l’histoire des mentalités, notre étude vise à cerner les croyances présentes dans les Propos de table de Martin Luther : à partir des nombreuses occurrences se rapportant au diable, aux « esprits », aux diverses créatures diaboliques, à la magie et à la sorcellerie, notre objectif a été, sous l’habillage chrétien que revêtent les récits, de reconnaître, d’identifier et de reconstituer une filiation avec des faits de croyance bien antérieurs à la Réforme. Cette confrontation des textes a permis de redécouvrir des restes de croyances ancestrales sous la forme d’entités venues de temps immémoriaux. La diabolisation systématique pratiquée par Luther n’est possible que grâce au recours à des êtres issus de la petite mythologie tels que, par exemple, les génies domestiques. En parallèle, l’analyse des manifestations de « revenants », d’« apparitions » et des esprits frappeurs ainsi que celle des actions néfastes des sorcières illustrent une certaine conception du devenir après la mort, une notion de vie post mortem et dans l’au-delà, parfois bien éloignée du dogme chrétien, ce qui permet de nuancer le portrait traditionnellement véhiculé de Luther. / Based on a choice of texts from the Table-Talk of Martin Luther, the aim of this study is to show how certain ancestral beliefs dealing with death and with life in the other world after dying are solidly anchored in the mentalities of people and of the Reformer too, in an era in which humanist thinking prevailed and in texts under the influence of the Christianity. In doing so, certain “phenomena” are portrayed such as household genies, “spirits”, “revenants” and apparitions. On another hand, we consider the “phenomena” as they relate to the behaviour of men and women taxed with witchcraft and magic, the whole instigated by the devil of course.

Notoriously, the French monarchy began to exchange judicial posts in its courts of law for cash to raise emergency funds in the early sixteenth century. The fact that all sorts of royal posts subsequently became venal or hereditary is a familiar aspect of ancien r&eacute;gime France, yet very little work exists on the genesis of this institution. This thesis traces the meanings, practices, and effects of 'venality' between 1490 and 1547. It does so by studying the relationship between the crown and the second most important law court of the kingdom, the Parlement of Toulouse. Traditional interpretations of office sale have tended to explain the phenomenon as a tale of royal hypocrisy, and have prioritised research on the Parlement of Paris. In contrast, this study argues that the study of a provincial court forces us to reconsider the chronology, techniques, and outcomes of early venality. A considerable amount of unexploited archival and printed material exists on office sale. By approaching it through the lens of legal culture, this thesis proposes an investigative model not only capable of explaining why venality emerged, but also why it was so vilified. Existing studies of office sale have tended to ignore legal talk and legislation as misleading or dissimulative. By paying particular attention to law and language, however, this study argues that the sale of judicial offices was a deeply ambiguous theme in the first half of the sixteenth-century that was open to constant interpretation. It was this very slipperiness that allowed a variety of actors to engage with it. Early office sale prolonged late medieval practices, but also heralded unprecedented changes, influencing the formation of the early-modern state. By studying the phenomenon, this thesis offers a rich and multifaceted picture of the relations and functioning of the crown and its tribunals.