Aristocratic Groups Research Articles

BERTAHANNYA BANGSAWAN LUWU (SUATU ANALISA BUDAYA POLITIK ORANG BUGIS)

This article aims is to explain the reason of aristocratic group of Luwu still survive based on a review of political culture of the Bugis. This article presented in a descriptive analysis through the 4 (four) stages of historical research methods, namely the collection of resources (heuristic), criticism source of data, interpretation, and historiography. In addition, the technique of collecting data through interviews. The results found that the traditional political culture of the Bugis, known as siri 'na pesse make an important contribution to the survival of the aristocratic group of Luwu. This political culture present Tomanurung figure as a forerunner to the whole of kings and nobles in South Sulawesi included in Kedatuan Luwu. Luwu community believe that the descendants of Tomanurung destined to govern. If the ruling is not a descendant of Tomanurung, Luwu people believe that there will be a problem in the country. Apart from the assumption that the presence of this Tomanurung is a myth and as an invention of politics, the existences this character is the beginning of the birth of rulers / kings. The existence of Kedatuan Luwu which still exist today, although its function is not the same as in the past, as well as the elite dominated by the nobility (andi) Luwu is a picture that people still believe in the presence of royalty as the man who is destined to run the government.

Politics, Power, and the Divine: TheRex Sacrorumand the Transition from Monarchy to Republic at Rome

AbstractWhether the result of internal revolution or external factors, in the late sixth centuryBCRome underwent regime change. A king, or at least a sole ruler of some sort, was replaced by a governmental system in which power was distributed amongst a wider aristocratic group. Just what that elite group comprised at that point in time remains open to question, and the institutional reality is certainly more complicated than the simple shift from monarchy to consulship portrayed in the later literary sources;1but as part of that change, according to Roman tradition, a priesthood was instituted to perform the deposed king’s sacred duties. This priesthood provides us with an opportunity to reappraise the role of religion in the development of the Roman state, and a useful locus from which to assess changes in religious and political power in the transition from monarchy to Republic at Rome.

Sleepwalking into a New World: The Emergence of Italian City Communes in the Twelfth Century by Chris Wickham

Reviewed by: Sleepwalking into a New World: The Emergence of Italian City Communes in the Twelfth Centuryby Chris Wickham Michele Campopiano Sleepwalking into a New World: The Emergence of Italian City Communes in the Twelfth Century. By Chris Wickham. [ Lawrence Stone Lectures.] (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2015. Pp. xii, 305. ISBN 978-0-691-14828-1.) Based on Chris Wickham’s May 2013 Lawrence Stone Lectures, this volume is a study of how the commune—as a new and fundamentally autonomous form of government focused on annually changed consuls—came into existence in northern and central Italy in the twelfth century. This form of government seemed radically innovative to outsiders. One difficult issue confronted by Wickham is the definition of a commune, particularly because of the extreme variety of cases in central and northern Italy. Wickham defines an ideal type based on the following elements: a conscious urban collectivity, a regularly rotating set of magistracies, and a de facto autonomy of action for the city and its magistrates. Wickham’s approach to this theme is path-breaking in a number of ways. He specifically considers whether the development of this new form of government had programmatic and conscious aspects; as he writes, “what did they thinkthey were doing?” (p. 6, emphasis in original). Wickham has a deep knowledge of the previous literature in the [End Page 596]topic and an awareness of how this is linked to debates with broad ideological implications, such as the origins of Renaissance and of Republican forms of government and values (e.g., Quentin Skinner’s The Foundations of Modern Political Thought[New York, 1978]). It is worth noting that the three cases he chooses are Milan, Pisa, and Rome. Whereas the first two cities are usually taken into account in the general narratives of the history of the Italian communes, the inclusion of Rome in the comparison is rather innovative. Rome also represents a clear case in which the new form of administration was developed as conscious opposition to previous forms of political hegemony in the city. Wickham’s work connects in particular to two important contributions to the origins of communes: Hagen Keller’s Adelsherrschaft und städtische Gesellschaft in Oberitalien, 9. bis 12. Jahrhundert(Tübingen, 1979), and Jean-Claude Maire Vigueur’s Cavaliers et citoyens(Paris, 2003). These two volumes have been crucial to the discussion of the nature of the ruling elites of the early communes. Based in particular on the evidence of Milan, Keller had argued that this elite was divided into defined strata ( ordines) led by the military aristocracy (pp. 11–12). Vigueur subsequently argued that the political core of the commune was the collectivity of mounted knights of every city, which extended beyond a small group of feudo-vassallic aristocrats (p. 13). Wickham refers instead to three levels of elites: a richer and usually more signorial first level, a second level that was prosperous but did not own castles, and a third level of “medium elite” with fewer properties (p. 191). This second level was more clearly associated with the consuls, the main magistracy of the communes, which would have also formed the core of Vigueur’s militia. Wickham links the development of the early commune to the vacuum of power created by the decline of the public role of the Kingdom of Italy, in particular of the tradition of placitathat was connected to it (p. 28). A similar vacuum can be found also in Rome, with the decline of Roman bureaucracy and public government (pp. 122–25). This argument connects thematically to previous works by Wickham, including his Early Medieval Italy: Central Power and Local Society, 400–1000(London, 1980), in which he stressed the public function of the Kingdom of Italy. This tradition was discontinued, but it also represented a model for later polities. The early assemblies of citizens that marked the early commune period were also, to a certain extent, a form of defensive reaction against the crisis of the kingdom (p. 195). Other factors contributed to the creation of political cohesion in different areas, such as the presence of common land to manage, or the necessity of creating a common...

DO IMPERIUM AO REGNUM NA ANTIGUIDADE TARDIA: o exemplo do reino hispano-visigodo de Toledo (séculos VI-VII)

RESUMO Para o historiador, estabelecer balizas cronológicas precisas é uma tarefa de difícil realização. Mais complexo ainda se o período estudado está marcado com o selo de uma época de crise, como a Antiguidade Tardia. Denominado por alguns como "Baixo Império", para outros a "Alta Idade Média", o mundo tardoantigo (séculos II-VIII) se apresenta como portador de uma "identidade propria", como indicaram em seu momento Brown e Marrou, no qual a ideia de crise deve substituir-se por conceitos mais atuais, como os de transformação ou de readequação. Neste estudo, partindo dos elementos políticos e institucionais, analisamos como, de forma paulatina, fez-se a passagem do poder imperial romano às monarquias romano-bárbaras herdeiras da autoridade imperial no Ocidente romano. De forma particular, lançaremos um olhar especial à monarquia hispano-visigoda dos séculos VI e VII que manteve alguns importantes elementos políticos do passado imperial romano.

SÍMBOLOS E RITUAIS: OS MECANISMOS DO PODER POLÍTICO NO REINO HISPANOVISIGODO DE TOLEDO (SÉCULOS VI – VII).

A Antiguidade Tardia (séculos II – VIII) é caracterizada pela historiografia mais recente como um período histórico marcado por significativas transformações e readequações políticas e institucionais. Mudanças que foram provocadas, em grande medida, pela definitiva fixação dos grupos bárbaros na Pars Occidentalis do mundo imperial romano a partir de meados do século IV. De fato, a presença de elementos aristocráticos bárbaros e o contato destes com seus congêneres romanos provocou uma reconfiguração das relações de poder promovendo, de forma paulatina, a institucionalização da realeza entre os bárbaros. Os regna romano bárbaros, constituídos graças à concessão da autoridade romana, colocavam-se como herdeiros imediatos do passado imperial romano tardio e, ao mesmo tempo, assumiram os antigos problemas de natureza política que antagonizavam os reges e os vários grupos aristocráticos que resistiam a autoridade e poder daqueles. Por esse motivo os reis romano bárbaros lançaram mão de estratégias pragmáticas, como o estado permanente de conflito, e teórico-imagéticas, como a readequação de símbolos e rituais anteriormente existentes, para reforçarem e legitimarem seu poder e sua condição política. Como exemplo efetivo destas ações práticas e teóricas, destacamos o reino hispanovisigodo de Toledo (séculos VI –VII) no período que envolveria os reinados de Leovigildo (569 – 586) e Wamba (672 – 680).

El linaje se transforma en casas: de los Fajardo a los marqueses de los Vélez y de Espinardo

This article attempts to explain the change in the form of family and social organization of Hispanic aristocracy from the late Middle Age to theEighteenth century. It is observed that some lineages have enough power for them arise several houses settled in aristocratic group, from the foundingof primogeniture, advantageous marriages and royal favor. The study about lineage Fajardo refers much of ‘grandeza’ families that do not create second lines as expansion strategy. It was real grace that allowed the existence of two branches: the house of los Velez, elderly relatives, and Espinardo, second son house. The military services and courtiers will give an important position until the Seventeenth century, but at the end of the century the lack of marriage between the two lines will be that there is no alternative means of inheritance and diluted in other houses. The commitment to the birthright of the house of los Velez and the loss of the male line of the house of Espinardo involve the disappearance of the lineage. The surname Fajardo survived into other main houses just like a record of ancient glories.

Scotland and the ‘mystical matrix’ of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries: an exploration of religious cross-currents

At the end of the seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth century there were significant cross-currents of influence between Scotland and mystical movements in continental Europe. In particular the group of Episcopalian clergy and aristocrats in the north-east of Scotland, designated by G.D.Henderson as ‘the Mystics of the North-East,’ shows strong links with and influences from the continental spiritual writers Antoinette Bourignon and the French Quietist Madame Guyon. But the wider context reveals further links with German Pietism and others concerned with inward religion as precursors of the Evangelical Revival. This article explores the fascinating Sitz im Leben of ‘the Mystics of the North-East’.

Die Geschichte der Egiz Eriq Ḫoğilar („Hoch-Graben Ḫoǧās‟) in Qarqaš – eine orale Tradition aus Ḫotän, Süd-Xinjiang

Little research has been done so far on the subject of a group of Ḫoǧās of southern Xinjiang who claimed descent from the Prophet Muhammad and who were based in a village called Egiz Eriq in the Ḫotän region, whence they became known as the Egiz Eriq Ḫoğilar. Usually, when Ḫoǧās in Xinjiang are touched upon, two rivalling groups are referred to, namely the Aqtaġliq (“White mountain folk”; Chinese: Bai shan pai 白山派) and the Qarataġliq (“Black mountain folk”; Chinese: Hei shan pai 黑山派), all of which are factions belonging to the Naqšbandiyya Sufi network and which – in the wake of the controversial figure of Āfāq Ḫoǧā (d. 1694) – have had a decisive impact on the religious, social and political life of the population of Xinjiang from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. The article of Ǧappar Rähimi, by contrast, focuses on the small aristocratic group of Ḫoǧās who had exerted a feudalistic rule over Qarqaš in the wilayät Ḫotän and who by the evidence of their silsila (in which occurs the name of the Sufi Nağm al-Dīn al-Kubrā of Ḫwārazm [d. 1221]) have oriented themselves to authorities other than the Naqšbandiyya. The article translated into German by Bahargül Hamut in close cooperation with Florian Sobieroj may be considered the first serious study of this group of Ḫoğas in China by any Uyghur language author. It offers some valuable insights from an ethnological as well as historiographical point of view (matters discussed include the question of an involvement of the Egiz Eriq Ḫoğilar in the uprisings against the Chinese rule of the Qing dynasty and during the Republic) into a little-known area of Uyghur Islamic culture in the Chinese periphery.

Rickets in a High Social Class of Renaissance Italy: The Medici Children

AbstractExploration of the Medici Chapels in the Basilica of San Lorenzo in Florence revealed the burials of nine juvenile members of the Medici family (16th–17th centuries). The estimated children's skeletal ages ranged from newborns to 5‐year‐olds, showing a series of bone abnormalities, in particular diffuse periosteal new bone and bowing of long bones. The comparable pathological lesions, including porosity evident on the skull, orbital roofs, costocondral ribs and growth plates between metaphyses and epiphyses, enlargement of metaphyses and sternal rib ends, and long bone bending, are interpreted as the skeletal manifestation of rickets. The diagnosis of a metabolic disease linked to vitamin D deficiency would appear to be unexpected for children brought up at the court of a Renaissance elite class family like the Medici of Florence. Analysis of the historical and social background is particularly helpful to understand the causes of the onset of the disease in this aristocratic group. Documentary sources, supported by 13C and 15N bone collagen analysis, attest that weaning of these children took place when they were around 2 years old. With a prolonged breast‐feeding and a delay in introducing solid food in the diet, vitamin D deficiency is expected to rise considerably, in particular if the other main risk factor, namely inadequate sunlight exposition, is associated with this human milk‐based diet. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Trascender el espacio de poder. Hacia una caracterización de las escalas de acción en la Alta Edad Media entre las cuencas del Cea y del Pisuerga

The concepts of scale and scale change, as they have recently been introduced in Early Medieval historiography, have opened new ways for the historical understanding of medieval socio-spatial relations. Following this line of thought, this article reviews the concept of «space of power» in order to propose the idea of «scale of action» as a complementary analytical tool. The second part develops its use through the analysis of a region that has so far been only partially considered within the framework of studies on the territorial organization of the Duero plateau: the lands between the rivers Cea and Pisuerga and the area to its south in the 10 th and 11 th centuries. To do so, a selection of representative case studies will be analysed in order to identify some of the constitutive elements of the scales of action of different social agents: peasant domestic units, peasant communities, local elites, monasteries and large aristocratic groups.

O Megalexandros : Falling In and Out of Dreams

Made on the eve of Greece's entry into the European Community in 1981, Theo Angelopoulos's Megalexandros does not acquiesce to the political mood of the moment but foregrounds Greece's status as a crypto-colony or client state. Set at the turn of the century, the film reminds its viewers of the role of Great Britain, France, and Russia in the Greek War of Independence (1821–1830), as well as of their ongoing gunboat diplomacy in Greek national politics. Megalexandros is loosely based on the 1870 Dilessi Affair, which involved the kidnapping and eventual murder of a group of British aristocrats and one Italian count by Greek bandits at Marathon. Angelopoulos claims that Megalexandros is one of the simplest films he has made because it follows a linear narrative, but the interweaving of numerous citations of poems, tragedies, histories, and iconographies, as well as references to traditional oral narratives and local customs, make the film extremely complex and nuanced. Complex historical, ideological, and aesthetic references used in the film will be analyzed in order to show how Angelopoulos makes a critical contribution to the on-going debates about European identity politics.

Monasterios y redes sociales en el Bierzo altomedieval

This article analyses the influence of monasteries on the creation of social networks based on the specific case of the El Bierzo region. Six monasteries were chosen (Santa Leocadia de Castaneda, Santos Cosme y Damian de Burbia, San Salvador de Barcena, San Pedro de Montes, Santiago de Penalba, and San Julian de Samos) in order to study three different parameters: the social agents that interacted with the monasteries, the shaping of the monastical estates and the geographical scale of their domains. As a result of this analysis, a typology based on the way in which the social networks were organized (monasteries of local scale, monasteries with religious prestige, and monasteries linked to the monarchy), has been clearly identified. Additionally, it highlights the existence of a decentralized social pattern in which the different aristocratic groups coexisted without fierce competition because they developed on a local-regional scale, in which the monasteries served as stage for their power.

Simpson, F. (2007). Every note counts: The story of Nordoff-Robbins music therapy. London: James and James. 119 pages. ISBN 978-1-903942-79-6

Simpson, F. (2007). Every note counts: The story of NordoffRobbins music therapy. London: James and James. 119 pages. ISBN 978-1-903942-79-6. Every Note Counts: The Story of Nordoff-Robbins Music Therapy by Fraser Simpson may be music therapy profession's first coffee table book. That's what occurred to me as I began to skim through it although I wasn't sure if it could actually be considered the first. But as I shortly learned, Dr. Even Ruud, in his review of book in Nordic Journal, also referred to Every Note Counts as music therapy's first coffee table book. So perhaps it is. makes Every Note Counts a coffee table book? For one thing, there are lavish color photographs on almost every page, some double-paged. There are plenty of rock star supporters of Nordoff-Robbins including Paul McCartney, Ozzy Osborne, Bono, and Phil Collins among others. We see freeze-frame glimpses of children and therapists caught in rapturous moment of musicing. There are also many photos of key figures in Nordoff-Robbins history, including, of course, stars of book, Paul Nordoff and Clive Robbins. The book has numerous quick-read sidebar essays that highlight different dimensions of story such as important moments in Nordoff-Robbins history, key figure bio's, essential Nordoff-Robbins foundations such as Anthroposophy, and Meeting child where he [or she] is, as well as an abundance of compact case studies. This is a fun book that is attractive, colorful and easy to read. One can leaf through it and still come away with something of substance. For every music therapist who has earnestly attempted to respond to well-intentioned question of friends, family, and professionals who ask with more or less casual interest, What exactly is music therapy, a half hour or so with this book will give them a working idea of answer to this question as it is practiced in music-centered tradition as pioneered by Nordoff and Robbins. Every Note Counts is not an academic book. It will not provide much theory or technique that cannot be found in greater depth in other books by Nordoff and Robbins or their practitioners. But for those interested in Nordoff-Robbins history who want to delve more deeply into book, Fraser Simpson has done a comprehensive job of documenting 50 year journey of Nordoff-Robbins Music Therapy including formative years and growth in Great Britain, development of training programs, continuation after Nordoff's death, and eventual establishment of training programs and centers worldwide. Every Note Counts is also story of people behind scenes that came together to become Nordoff-Robbins Charity in UK. As a certified N-R practitioner with a decent knowledge of Nordoff-Robbins history, I still found new and fascinating information. I had not heard of formidable role played by Sybil Beresford-Peirse, a distinguished music education department head who left her post to take up cause of practicing and promoting seminal Nordoff-Robbins music therapy in Great Britain with a passionate zeal. It seems that Beresford-Peirse is not as well known, at least in United States, as some other key players, but it was her drive and commitment that first established Nordoff-Robbins Charity in UK. Pauline Etkin, current Managing Director of Nordoff-Robbins in UK, wrote in book's Foreword that motivation for commissioning this book followed death of Sybil Beresford-Peirse in 2002. It seemed vital that early history and development of charity be documented and preserved before it was lost to future generations. The eclectic and aristocratic group of supporters that became Nordoff-Robbins Charity began to form both through Beresford-Peirse's organizing talents and through their own attraction via various paths of introduction in early 70's. …

The Trouble with Painting, the Image (less) Text

This article argues that painting and its theory founds and subtends the discipline and practices of the history of art. It proposes this epistemological situation as a problem for visual culture. The article begins by locating the centrality of painting as intellection in the person and work of Leonardo da Vinci and in the writing on him by Paul Valéry and Walter Benjamin. An investigation of the inheritance of Leonardo da Vinci in the 17th century follows, in order to historicize his exemplarity both in early 20th-century art theory and in the dissipating aura associated with painting. The emergence of the ‘art book’ in the 17th century in Italy and France, particularly the first edition of Leonardo’s Treatise on Painting, is seen as significant in the transformation of the image and its power to represent through the materiality and characteristics of the book. This transformation, the basis of ‘the trouble with painting’, occurred amongst an elite group of connoisseurs, prelates, and aristocrats. Using images and subject matter drawn from early ‘art books’, the article revises the theories of representation in painting found in Michel Foucault and Louis Marin, among others, in order to understand more clearly what has been at stake in the espousal of the visual and the verbal in the genealogy of the literature on art.

Review: Power in Medieval Scotland

The perception of diametrically opposed forces in Scotland, that of a traditional, conservative and unchanging native aristocracy and an innovative, Europeanised incoming one, has long been dismissed, but the characterisation of the Scottish crown and aristocracy as 'hybrid' in the late middle ages encourages the view of two societies, 'Gaelic* and 'Anglo-Norman' existing within Scotland, (p. 19) This has done little to offer a deeper understanding of how native and incomer interacted and co-operated during the later middle ages. As Richard Oram notes, aspects of 'continuity and change' have been standard in recent Scottish historiography of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries but, for the most part, 'change' has been more closely examined. (p.46) From the beginning, the aim of the editors of this collection of essays was to examine the extent of continuity of native aristocratic power in the face of an incoming foreign aristocracy, (p. 18) In arguing for such continuity it has been acknowledged that the changes resulting from the settlement of this small group of Frankish aristocrats were heightened by more widespread changes which accompanied them. The new arrivals appeared at the same time as the creation and spread of trading centres, religious reform and the introduction of monastic orders, and a new focus on monarchical government.

Communication, Knowledge, and Memory in Early Modern Spain by Fernando Bouza (review)

REVIEWS 196 those in the lay community. In the summation of her work, Bourdua asserts that her case studies suggest fundamentally complex processes of production, and that each of the projects was the work of concerted collaboration among several groups and individuals in a given community. While there are many commonalities among the churches and their undertakings, the patterns of patronage are decidedly not standard. As the author points out, “there is a symbiosis between friars and lay people; and there are subtleties in the level of involvement” (151). This relationship fluctuated from place to place, and local craftsmen, donors, and politics certainly imparted idiosyncrasies to each particular commission. We can conclude, then, “that the mechanics of patronage in Franciscan churches followed procedures encountered in other churches and in civic settings” (154). This general theme is well supported throughout the book, and raises questions about artistic patronage in other religious orders, as well as Franciscans throughout Europe. The Franciscans and Art Patronage in Medieval Italy is a thoughtfully crafted and pointed study, effectively combining documentary evidence, Franciscan ideals, and art and architecture to support clear conclusions about the inner workings of patronage and production in the Veneto. Information on the history of the Franciscan order and aspects of the Franciscan life is smoothly integrated as necessary, and contributes significantly to the work’s relevance to medievalists across the humanities. JAMES VINCENT MAIELLO, Music, UC Santa Barbera Fernando Bouza, Communication, Knowledge, and Memory in Early Modern Spain, trans. Sonia López and Michael Agnew, foreword by Roger Chartier (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press 2004) xvi + 108 pp. Sonia López and Michael Agnew have translated Comunicación, conocimiento y memoria en la España de los Siglos XVI y XVII, first published in 1999 by Seminario de Estudios Medievales y Renacentistas, Universidad de Salamanca. Although Fernando Bouza has written extensively on the cultural history of early modern Spain, this is his first work to be translated into English.4 Bouza examines the “history of communication during the Spanish Golden Age that would bring together speech, images and written texts, presenting them as all serving the same objective: the will to know and to create memory” (107). Bouza considers a variety of documents including fiction, poetry, personal letters, journals, devotional writings, parish documents, manuals of instruction, and accounts of public festivities. The author writes that he intends his study to be rather a succinct exploration of the social practices associated with the perpetuation of memory than a comprehensive account of the history of communication in the early modern period (4). For Bouza specific information contained 4 Other works by Fernando Bouza still to be translated include Palabra e Imagen en la Corte. Cultura oral y visual de la nobleza en el Siglo de Oro (Madrid 2003); Corre Manuscrito: una historia cultural del Siglo de Oro (Madrid 2002); Imagen y propaganda: capítulos de historia cultural del reinado de Felipe II (Madrid 1998); La corte de Felipe II (Madrid 1994); and Del escribano a la biblioteca (Madrid 1992). REVIEWS 197 in these documents reveals that the history of communication in the sixteenth and seventeenth-century Spain is one in which speech and images enjoy the same status as texts (15). That is the heart of Bouza’s account and the focus of this review. Chapter 1, “Hearing, Seeing, Reading, and Writing: The Forms and Uses of Words, Images, and Writing,” opens with a metaphor that contextualizes the mutual dependence of oral traditions, visual images, and texts in the transmission of knowledge.5 Strolling along a “gallery of illustrious men” (1), a group of aristocrats come upon the portrait of a prince whose identity is unknown to them. As a courtier comments bitterly that “the cruelty with which time consumes everything is fierce, for neither strong armor nor iron walls can sustain its blows” (1), one of the prince’s former servants identifies him, and proposes to save his memory from oblivion by means of writing: A sword made from a goose’s plume and bolstered by a paper shield against time’s cruelty I shall wield, lest of his exploits it consume one tittle on Fame’s battlefield. (3) Although the anecdote suggests...

Los grupos escultóricos del Cerrillo Blanco de Porcuna (Jaén). Un ensayo de lectura iconográfica convergente

Study of the iconographical program of the sculptural complex of Porcuna (Jaen, Spain) (2nd half of the 5th. c. B.C.), closely related to the history of the aristocratic group who rules this iberian oppidum. The sculptures reflect metaphorically the mythical territory of ancient Obulco and its richness. The orientalizing past is alluded as a part of the aristocratic history. Gender and age groups reflect the oikos´ life. Hunting and wrestling show the education of the youth. The group of warriors evoques a widespread knowledge of epic motifs in the Mediterranean. A common language of nature and power is shared by the Iberian princes.

La noblesse hors d’elle-même

In sixteenth-century France, the nobility held an unchallenged and unanimous view concerning its own superior status and quality. A more critical assessment had been expressed in Italy by several Quattrocento and Cinquecento humanists, namely Poggio, Machiavelli, Nenna, Guazzo and Tasso. The arguments against the superiority of the nobility were often simply based on some ironical survey of a handful of European aristocratic groups. But, when attacking the claims to excellence of some national aristocracy, more reasoned arguments could rely on Aristotle’s Politics and its notion of arete.

Edme Gersaint and the Marketing of Art in Eighteenth-Century Paris

Edme Gersaint and the Marketing of Art in Eighteenth-Century Paris Andrew McClellan In the course of the eighteenth century, dealers became the essential middlemen in a rapidly expanding art market. As collecting increased as a form of recreation and a means of distinction, so did the need for the experts adept at evaluating paintings and managing the flow of art across national borders and through public auctions, which emerged as a crucial site of exchange. We know more about the role of dealers and patterns of consumption in England than in the rest of Europe, but with respect to France, we might begin by examining the career of the most famous dealer in early eighteenth-century Paris, Edme-François Gersaint (1694–1750). 1 We know little about Gersaint beyond the self-image he constructed for himself through a variety of innovative forms of publicity, ranging from the famous shopsign painted by Watteau, the Enseigne de Gersaint, to newspaper advertisements, tradecards, public auctions, [End Page 218] and sales catalogs; yet the sustained campaign to publicize himself and his business is in itself highly interesting and informative on a number of counts. First, the impulse to fashion a public image points to the emergence of a market of potential consumers, and the dealer’s need to foster an appetite for his goods and services. Second, by means of his various marketing tools, Gersaint aimed to define his profession and to forge a space for the commerce of art within the art world and high society more generally. Countering a negative stereotype of the dealer as a greedy man of commerce and parasite on the art world, Gersaint insisted on his status as a gentleman, worthy of comparison with enlightened art lovers while he equated his premises (the shop and auction house) with the refined space of the collector’s cabinet. His attempt to distinguish himself from other dealers and to articulate a new professional profile relied, paradoxically, on the appropriation of the familiar and distinctly anticommercial discourses of the aristocratic collector and cult of honnêteté. The conflation of private cabinet and commercial venue, of merchant and honnête homme, that were key to Gersaint’s professional image and self-esteem underpin the shopsign by Watteau (c. 1720, Berlin, Charlottenburg), painted to hang outside Gersaint’s shop on the Pont Notre-Dame in Paris. 2 The painting is not a faithful record of Gersaint’s boutique, but rather an idealized representation of his business. Against a backdrop of fine paintings, a group of male and female aristocrats are shown engaged in casual conversation and enjoyment of art, evoking the setting and rituals of the collector’s cabinet. Signs of commerce are suppressed as the dealer’s shop is transformed into a locus of elite leisure and self-display. The painting works as an advertisement promising a lifestyle that flows from possession of the objects on sale in the shop. Gersaint, as proprietor of the shop and its contents, becomes the purveyor of the good life. Elegantly dressed and seemingly at one with his noble company, the dealer is assimilated by Watteau into the class of his patrons. During the 1720s and 1730s Gersaint explored other forms of publicity to promote his business. He was the first dealer (apart from print sellers) to use newspaper advertisements. These advertisements appeared in the Mercure de France alongside other notices on the arts; to the extent that the Mercure, as a newspaper, contributed to the formation of a public sphere, in the Habermasian sense, this juxtaposition served to legitimize the commerce of art in the public’s nascent conception of the art world. 3 Gersaint was also the first dealer in France to realize the potential of public auctions (already used in Holland and England), which he organized as a kind of public spectacle and which he recommended to curieux as events both instructive and amusing. These sales were accompanied by sales catalogs, which were his most important and lasting contribution to the art of dealing. Through elaborate texts and engraved frontispieces, his catalogs carried on Watteau’s task of crafting an image of the dealer. Click for larger view View full resolution Figure...

The cavalry of classical Greece: a social and military history with particular reference to Athens

This book is the first to examine how classical Greek cavalry actually operated on the battlefield. It looks at the prime characteristics of Greek cavalry, including mobility, protection, armament, training, leadership, flexibility, and motivation. Up to now, it has usually been assumed that ancient Greek cavalry was subordinated to the infantry because it was less effective in battle. This book challenges this assumption, analysing the position of Greek cavalry, and especially the Athenian arm, not only in the battlefield but in society as a whole. It concludes that, like many modern societies, Greek states produced military arms which were moulded more by social and economic influences than by purely military considerations. Classical Greek cavalry had a high combat potential, but this was reduced by the attitudes of the rest of society towards the cavalry class - the wealthiest and most aristocratic group in most states.