ABSTRACT
Rituals, ceremonies and performances were also translated into enduring objects, which gave permanent form to the rhetorical ideals invested in specific occasions. This chapter explores how urban festival marked both the conjuncture and disjuncture between a rhetorical ideal and the challenges inherent in its practical realisation. It focuses on the preparations before theentreein order to demonstrate the wider spatial and temporal impact of events on this scale. Issues of design, construction and project management will be used to highlight the range of social, cultural and political ideals invested in the occasion. More importantly, Paris is conceptualised, not as the ideal celebratory city found in festival literature and presentational images–the sources most often consulted in analyses of festival–but as an early modern metropolis, with other distinct, sometimes contested, uses and identities. Theechafauds, commercial or otherwise, were supporting structures that showcased the magnificently dressed spectators, who enhanced the urban environment and, the ideals of the occasion.
