For women at the early modern courts, clothing and jewellery were essential elements in their political arsenal, enabling them to signal their dynastic value, to promote loyalty to their marital court and to advance political agendas. This is the first collection of essays to examine how elite women in early modern Europe marshalled clothing and jewellery for political ends. With essays encompassing women who traversed courts in Denmark, England, France, Germany, Habsburg Austria, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Sweden, the contributions cover a broad range of elite women from different courts and religious backgrounds as well as varying noble ranks.
- Cover
- Haft title page
- Series information
- Title page
- Copyright information
- Acknowledgements
- Table of Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Introduction
- Fashion as Meaning: ‘the pattern of your imitation’
- Women and Fashion as Tool
- Redressing Magnificence
- Sartorial Politics: Fashioning Women
- 1. Isabella d’Este’s Sartorial Politics
- Sartorial Politics and Diplomacy
- Political Statement through Sartorial Style and Symbol
- Sartorial Embassy and Trademark Styles
- About the author
- 2. Dressing the Queen at the French Renaissance Court: Sartorial Politics
- Dressing Royal Magnificence
- Dressed to Impress
- Conspicuous Consumption and Generosity
- Dressing and Depicting the Royal Majesty
- Majestic Clothing
- The Dress of the Queen in her Majesty
- The Majesty of Mourning
- Naturalising the Queen of France
- Appearance as an Object of Attention
- A Gradual Expectation that the Appearance of the Queen be Naturalised
- About the author
- 3. Dressing the Bride: Weddings and Fashion Practices at German Princely Courts in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries
- Communication Channels for Fashion in the Framework of Princely Weddings
- The Perception of Foreign Dress Styles at Court
- The Reception at Court of Noblewomen Dressed in Foreign Styles
- Conclusion
- About the author
- 4. Lustrous Virtue: Eleanor of Austria’s Jewels and Gems as Composite Cultural Identityand Affective Maternal Agency
- Marital Destiny and Maternal Models
- Maternal Self-Sacrifice in Service of the Habsburg Dynasty
- The Portuguese Dowry
- Exotic Gifts Received at the Manueline Court
- Imperial Identity and Cultural Transfer at the French Court
- Conclusion
- About the author
- 5. Queen Elizabeth: Studded with Costly Jewels
- Acknowledgements
- About the author
- 6. A ‘Cipher of A and C set on the one Syde withdiamonds’: Anna of Denmark’s Jewellery and the Politics of Dynastic Display
- The Queen’s Jeweller and the Sources
- Personalised Jewels: Miniatures and Ciphers
- A Baltic Tradition?
- Gift-Giving and Exchange
- Conclusion
- About the author
- 7. ‘She bears a duke’s revenues on her back’: Fashioning Shakespeare’s Women at Court
- 8. How to Dress a Female King: Manifestationsof Gender and Power in the Wardrobe of Christina of Sweden
- A Coronation with a Touch of French Fashion
- The Swedish Royal Wardrobe and the Everyday Clothes of Christina as a Monarch
- Manifestative Changes in Fashion
- The Importance of French Fashion
- The Abdication
- Conclusion
- About the author
- 9. Clothes Make the Queen: Mariana of Austria’s Style of Dress, from Archduchess to Queen Consort (1634–1665)
- Mariana of Austria’s Style as Archduchess (1634–1648)
- Mariana of Austria’s Style as Queen Consort (1649–1665)
- The Farthingale and Mariana of Austria
- About the author
- 10. ‘The best of Queens, the most obedient wife’: Fashioning a Place for Catherine of Braganza as Consort to Charles II
- Introduction
- The Significance of Marriage
- Living the Part of a ‘good wife’
- Dressing and the Queen’s Image
- Setting a Fashion for Women to Follow
- Being a Portuguese Wife
- Furnishing the Queen’s Apartments
- Celebrating the Royal Bride
- Being Queen
- The Ups and Downs of Being a Pious Wife
- Rejecting the Idea of the Good Wife
- Conclusions
- About the author
- 11. Chintz, China, and Chocolate: The Politics of Fashion at Charles II’s Court
- Conclusion
- About the authors
- 12. Henrietta Maria and the Politics of Widows’ Dress at the Stuart Court
- Introduction
- The Rituals and Materials of Mourning: Rules and Representation
- Widowhood: Memory, Monasticism, and Morality
- The Politics of Royal Widowhood in Early Modern Europe: Henrietta Maria’s Precedents
- Portraits of Henrietta Maria as a Widow
- Conclusion
- About the author
- Works Cited
- Index
- About the author
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