ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the forms of sensory recognition that emerge at the turn of the seventeenth century in descriptions and imaginative reconstructions of metropolitan and theatrical environments. It seeks to understand the senses in relationship to the demands of cultural and social adaptation that accompanied the growth and early Stuart dislocation of metropolitan and playhouse environments. It would begin to emerge as 'dramatic' beyond the context of the stage when it registered the confusion, ambiguity. As the novelties of urban environments found their place on stage and shaped elaborate dramatic fantasies of the city, the outdoor theaters were beginning to experience their own forms of dislocation through successive rebuilding. The motley and heterogeneous human traffic in the city was another source of visual distraction. After 1560, Antwerp declined rapidly as the leading port of North Atlantic overseas commerce due to successive religious wars in the Low Countries.
