ABSTRACT
The work of Norbert Elias 1 has played an important role in the scholarship on the history of emotions, sensibilities, and mentalities, either as an inspiration or as a point of departure, inspiring some and irritating others. Along with Johan Huizinga and Lucien Febvre, he argued vigorously for the importance in social science of taking sufficient account of human psychology and subjective experience, and one way or another it is difficult to engage in the history of emotions without at least referring to his ideas and arguments. 2 For many cultural historians his work on court society and the civilising process is a useful stimulus to their own particular concerns. 3
