Ducal patronage and performance as a power expression in the conquered cities: the case of the Burgundian Low Countries

Abstract

At the end of the fourteenth century the county of Flanders held by Luis of Male was inherited by his daughter Margaret and her husband Philip the Bold, duke of Burgundy. The new sovereigns had to prove their authority against the strong privileges previously gained by the cities of that county, one of the most developed territories in Europe. The revolt of Gent and the Battle of Roosebeke (1384) won by the ruler, confirmed the control of the Valois Burgundy dynasty on the recently acquired lands. The conflict between cities and the political aspirations of dukes of Burgundy would be a constant problem throughout the fifteenth century in the Low Countries as showed many other riots and revolts in Gent and Bruges. Every conflict between the city and the sovereign inspired the court to celebrate the victory and to applaud the ducal control on Flemish cities. Ducal control was expressed by the iconography of art works, emphasised during the spectacular entry of the duke to the humiliated city.

The aim of this paper is to investigate and describe the construction of the visual glory of the duke by the analysis of chronicles that describe celebrations of the ducal entry to the city. The comparison between the iconographical analysis of the manuscripts, tapestries and other pieces from the collection of the duke and the chronicles of Jean Froissart, Georges Chastellain and Enguerrand de Monstrelet allows a deep understanding of the image of mightiness created by the court around the figure of the duke of Burgundy in relations to the collapsed cities. The result will finally show how was constructed the image of the early modern city in peace with a sovereign dominating it and if it corespond to the ducal ideology of justice, equity and common good.