This dissertation examines the relations between court and commerce in Europe at the onset of the modern era. Focusing on one of the most powerful princely courts of the period, the court of Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy, which ruled over one of the most advanced economic regions in Europe, the greater Low Countries, it argues that the Burgundian court was, both in its institutional operations and its cultural aspirations, a commercial enterprise. Based primarily on fiscal accounts, corroborated with court correspondence, municipal records, official chronicles, and contemporary literary sources, this dissertation argues that the court was fully engaged in the commercial economy and furthermore that the culture of the court, in enacting the ideals of a largely imaginary feudal past, was also presenting the ideals of a commercial future. It uncovers courtiers who, despite their low rank yet because of their market expertise, were close to the duke and in charge of acquiring and maintaining the material goods that made possible the pageants and ceremonies so central to the self-representation of the Burgundian court. It exposes the wider network of court officials, urban merchants and artisans who, tied by marriage and business relationships, together produced and managed the ducal liveries, jewelries, tapestries and finances that realized the splendor of the court. It shows how the princely court adapted to and harnessed the commercial economy of the urban network, employing nominally feudal titles and structures. Furthermore, it reveals how courtly understandings of magnificence and honor were also demonstrations of commercial prowess and acknowledgements of commercial wealth, even as these discourses were framed in terms of chivalric ideals. The princely court was neither merely a predatory expropriator of urban wealth nor a rapacious consumer of luxury goods, but also an active participant in the commercial economy. By examining the 'business' of a princely court, this dissertation seeks to contribute to our understanding of the socio-cultural manifestations of state and market formation during the late medieval and early modern era. This study is one testimony of how Europeans sought to make sense of, and more importantly, to channel and control the tides of commercialization, utilizing the institutional and cultural frameworks they inherited from their past. The intertwined relationship between the princely court and the commercial economy in the Burgundian Netherlands draws our attention to the common processes, institutions and cultures that laid the groundwork for the modern state and the capitalist economy.

Thesis--Göttingen. / Cover title. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. [164]-171).

Thesis--Bonn. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 469-486).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Friedrich Wilhelms-Universität, 1905.

Eighteenth-century paintings depicting the courtly culture of Udaipur have been widely described as iconic images representing the decadent "voluptuous inactivity" of Indian princes within idyllic palaces. More recently, scholars have interpreted such paintings as royal portraits constituting meaningful assertions of political and cultural power. Yet scholars have overlooked a topographical genre of painting in which Udaipur artists not only portrayed the ruler's face but also captured the charisma of Udaipur's urban space. This dissertation examines the means by which artists pictured Udaipur and its environs for multiple patrons and mixed audiences, thereby constructing the city's memory and mapping diverse territorial claims of regional kings, courtly elites, and merchants, as well as religious institutions and the emergent British Empire. Central to this account is a corpus of large-scale paintings, scrolls, drawings, and maps made in a time period of transitions in northwestern India, marked by several new courtly and non-courtly alliances, between the decentralization of the Mughal Empire in the early 1700s and the proclamation of British rule at the Ajmer Durbar in 1832. I argue that itinerant artists practiced their arts literally and metaphorically in between empires, and thus formulated their subjective, and, at times, subversive interpretations of urbanity, territoriality, and history as they circulated among various domains. By tracing the critical role played by artistic practices in the British Political Agent James Tod's political and historical creation of "Rajasthan"--the land of kings--this dissertation challenges the dominant narrative that has mediated this region's architecture, landscape, and history. Separate chapters are devoted to shifts in artistic practice, from the painting of genealogical and poetic manuscripts to large-scale topographical paintings, relating them to tropes of praise, pleasure, and commemoration in the court's literary culture, mediation of urban memory, emergent forms of mapping, and spatial practices of processions. Udaipur's artists like Ghasi, who was also a "native" artist-assistant to Tod, the region's first British colonial agent, rendered Tod's explorations in the form of courtly processions while also adapting drafted architectural drawings for the depiction of Udaipur's princely domains. I compare the works of Ghasi and Tod, among several others, with those of artists working for the Jain religious and mercantile community. These little-studied paintings suggest the paradigmatic ways in which local artists reevaluated established pictorial genres and tropes for the purpose of mapping environs in relation to the emerging presence of the British Empire and reconfiguration of regional polities, religious sects, and mercantile communities. The visualization of South Asia's urban environs has largely been understood through the lens of the nineteenth-century British colonial archive of images and maps. Systematic studies of alternate imaginings found in contemporaneous pre-colonial Indian art have been all but absent. Addressing this lacuna, this dissertation cumulatively highlights a largely unknown visual archive of images of pre-colonial Indian cities to examine how both Indian and British artists imagined their urban environs for varied patrons. It contributes to a growing body of scholarship on the importance of affect in understanding epistemic practices and the nature of political, cultural, and artistic transitions in the long eighteenth century in the Indian subcontinent.

This thesis examines Alexander�s conception of kingship, his relationship with royal traditions in the three great kingdoms of the Near East, and the concomitant transformation of the king�s court by which Alexander created a distinctive royal insignia and introduced new court personnel and protocol. Section I ("Alexander and Near Eastern Kingship") contains Chapters I, II, and III. Section II ("The Transformation") comprises Chapters IV to VI. In Chapter I, I examine the Macedonian background of Alexander�s court and his native conception of kingship. Chapter II is a study of the kingship of Egypt. Chapter III deals with the kingship of Babylon and Persia. I then turn to an analysis of Alexander�s policies towards the Persians and the concept of the "kingship of Asia," as this was understood by Alexander. This crucial concept is to be distinguished from the kingship of Persia, a position which Alexander supplanted and replaced with his personal kingship of Asia. In Section II, three chapters are devoted to an analysis of the transformation of Alexander�s court. Chapter IV covers the origin and significance of Alexander�s royal insignia. Chapter V examines the introduction of, and the role played by, Persians and easterners in the king�s court; and Chapter VI the significance of other Persian court offices.

This thesis examines Alexander�s conception of kingship, his relationship with royal traditions in the three great kingdoms of the Near East, and the concomitant transformation of the king�s court by which Alexander created a distinctive royal insignia and introduced new court personnel and protocol. Section I ("Alexander and Near Eastern Kingship") contains Chapters I, II, and III. Section II ("The Transformation") comprises Chapters IV to VI. In Chapter I, I examine the Macedonian background of Alexander�s court and his native conception of kingship. Chapter II is a study of the kingship of Egypt. Chapter III deals with the kingship of Babylon and Persia. I then turn to an analysis of Alexander�s policies towards the Persians and the concept of the "kingship of Asia," as this was understood by Alexander. This crucial concept is to be distinguished from the kingship of Persia, a position which Alexander supplanted and replaced with his personal kingship of Asia. In Section II, three chapters are devoted to an analysis of the transformation of Alexander�s court. Chapter IV covers the origin and significance of Alexander�s royal insignia. Chapter V examines the introduction of, and the role played by, Persians and easterners in the king�s court; and Chapter VI the significance of other Persian court offices.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Catholic University of America.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Catholic University of America.

Both Chaucer and the Gawain-poet use the Matters of Troy and Thebes as material for a critique of courtly life, applying these literary matters to the events and actions in and around Ricardian England. They use these classical matters to express concerns about the effectiveness of the court of Richard II. Chaucer uses his earlier works as a testing ground to develop his views about the value of duty over courtly pursuits, ideas discussed more completely in Troilus and Criseyde. The Gawain-poet uses the Matter of Troy coupled with the court of King Arthur to engage in a critique of courtly concerns. The critiques presented by both poets show a tendency toward duty over courtly concerns.