ABSTRACT
Dancing was ubiquitous across the court of early modern Europe. Dance performances occurred in private apartments as one method of personal entertainment, and also in public before an international audience of foreign ambassadors, nobles and members of the ruling family. Whether dancing at social balls, in a court ballet or a theatrical danced spectacle, members of the court were on display as their performance was being judged and evaluated by their peers, both from their own court and those of foreign courts. Dance at the early modern court was far more, therefore, than an entertaining diversion: it was inextricably linked to domestic and foreign policy. Danced spectacles were a useful vehicle for expression of diplomatic positions, political authority, dynastic legitimisation and the prestige of the sovereign and country as a whole. These functions will be explored in this chapter, with a focus on the Ferrarese court of the 1580s and 1590s, the French court in the second half of the sixteenth century and the early seventeenth century, and the English court at the time of Queen Anne. The discussion will also include an examination of why dance was so useful for these purposes, addressing such characteristics as the identity of the performers and the amount of the time courtiers spent rehearsing and performing, the fluid division between spectators and performers, and the ability of danced theatrical spectacles to convey ambiguity in its messages.
