A Key Tool for a New Dynasty: The Use of Royal Sites in the Habsburg Netherlands by the Archdukes Albert and Isabella

Abstract

Today, royal sites in Europe are often seen as the extravagant residences of royal families who lived isolated from society, an image created by historians and writers in the nineteenth century. Therefore, although there have been many excellent studies of the buildings with some attention to the tradition of royal hunts and urbanism, other spaces that developed around them that were also crucial components of early modern royal sites have so far been neglected. This article takes a more holistic approach to the study of these sites in order to reconsider their role in the evolution of power and the construction of European identities in the early modern period. By doing so, it brings a new approach to the study of royal sites. In particular, this article examines the programme developed by the Archdukes Albert and Isabella for the royal sites of the Habsburg Netherlands (modern Belgium) and the ways in which they used them to give structure and cohesion to their territories.