ABSTRACT
The alliance of the two dynasties must have proved eminently satisfactory to both parties since it continued as late as 1651 with the wedding of Emperor Ferdinand III and the daughter of Duke Carlo di Rethel and Maria Gonzaga, Eleonora Gonzaga II. Ferdinand requests that Giovanni Battista Buonamente should be exempted from wearing his friar's garments while playing in public, mentioning other occasions when such a dispensation had been granted. The activities described in the letter relating to the occasion may well be taken as indicative of Buonamente's activities for the duration of his stay at the imperial. The musicians travelled to Prague at the end of September and on 23 October Buonamente complained that his luggage had not yet arrived for the fifteen days he had already been entertaining the Emperor. No other collections of dance music survive from the 1620s in Vienna and Buonamente's must therefore be taken as the only extant guide to court practice.
