ABSTRACT
This introduction explores the historical nuances and multi-layered nature of premodern courts in order to highlight the different elements that both defined and shifted the public and private facets of court systems and court life. The chapter stresses how the demarcations of the private aspects and the language of privacy must be examined within the specific historical contexts of early modern courts and court cultures. Accordingly, the chapter discusses the conceptual challenges and terminological uses of ‘privacy’ in historical research, the interdisciplinary methodology of privacy studies, and how and why more precise and rigorous attention should be paid to the degrees of privacy that emerged at court. The chapter also highlights ways to examine historical privacy that can advance the field of court studies. This introduction concludes with an overview of the volume that situates each chapter within the various areas of court studies and that explains each essay’s contribution to the central argument of the book.
