Taking Possession: Rituals, Space and Authority

Jennifer Mara Desilva

doi:10.21039/rsj.v3i2.109

Abstract

In early modern Europe authority over communities, both people and spaces, was visualized through ritual gestures and processions. Communities gathered to witness ceremonial entries that drew on accepted forms of gestures and speech identifying individuals and articulating their place in the urban power relationship. Ceremonial entries by rulers, ambassadors, bishops, and other office-holders drew on ritual acts projecting messages of possession in order to establish reputations of prestige and authority. This introductory essay draws on cultural anthropology and recent historiography to build a framework for understanding rituals of possession that went beyond the tradition triumphal entry to incorporate substitutes, new modes of prestigious display, and attend to conflicts. By “taking possession” of communities, offices, and spaces using accepted ritual forms, early moderns initiated conversations about authority and power that were far more flexible in their scope, practice, and participants than expected.

Highlights

In Early Modern Europe, authority over communities, both people and spaces, was visualized through ritual gestures, acts, and processions
Ceremonial entries by rulers, ambassadors, bishops, and other office-holders, sometimes called possesso, joyeuse entrée, adventus or triumph, drew on ritual acts projecting messages of possession in order to establish reputations of prestige and authority. This introductory essay draws on cultural anthropology and recent historiography to build a framework for understanding rituals of possession that went beyond the traditional triumphal entry to incorporate substitutes, new modes of prestigious display, and attend to conflicts
By employing specific words and gestures that projected images implying ownership or authority, one could take possession of cities, churches, offices, and streets in ways culturally understood and accepted in Early Modern Europe.[6]. This issue of Royal Studies Journal is devoted to examining the various ways that early modern princes and their representatives “took possession” using ritual forms

Summary

Rituals as Narrative Opportunity

The ritual act of “taking possession” could signal a transient presence (ambassadors), or one that was intermittent or distant (papal legates), or a new and continuous authority (archduke or cardinals). At every opportunity there was pressure to increase the ritual’s affect through grandeur, linking the argument for possession to a larger message of importance, often based on historicized reputation, political threat, sanctity, charisma, or wealth.[16] This could be difficult when the actor was transient or temporary, or only represented a monarch, as ambassadors, legates, and cardinals did How did these actors use ritual forms and cultural expectations to imprint themselves and their authority on spaces and minds that could soon see another actor attempt the same trick?. Ellen Wurtzel’s study of Albert and Isabella Clara Eugenia’s 1600 entry into Lille reveals how communities could use local sites and institutions to build a narrative about past relations with rulers This competition for access is linked to a competition for meaning. Ritual gestures and appropriation as a means of articulation were never the domain of a single class or group, but common actions that reveal communal development and contest

Ritual as a Symbolic Language

Conclusions

Secondary sources