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Accepted Paper:

Gods and Monsters: Representations of Water in the Royal Entries of Henri II and Charles IX of France  
Linda Briggs (University of Manchester)

Paper short abstract:

This paper will demonstrate that water iconography in the royal entries of Henri II (1548-1550) and Charles IX (1564-1566) closely mirrored the changing territorial priorities of the French Crown.

Paper long abstract:

Water was fundamental to the performance of royal entries in sixteenth-century France. It functioned as a path into the city, the stage for naumachia, and as a source of imagery with which local authorities could communicate to the new king their perceptions of his reign. Neptune was habitually deployed in ephemeral architecture and dramatic performances to signify that French Kings were destined to rule empires that traversed the oceans, bolstering narratives that France was the successor to the Roman Empire and the emperor's power as dominus mundi had transferred to the kings. During Henri II's entries, for instance, an actor dressed as Neptune offered Henri his trident before leaping into the water, symbolizing the passing of dominion over the seas from one authority to another. Nearby, a Brazilian village had been recreated, in which 50 of the 300 "inhabitants" were natives shipped over from the New World. Viewers understood that these scenes articulated the territorial ambitions of the Crown and its intense rivalry with Spain and Portugal. Water represented a means to prosperity and an opportunity to be seized. This changed, however, in the reign of Charles IX. Depictions of sea monsters devouring Andromeda dominated, and Neptune was forced to send winds to calm the raging seas. Waters became a peril and a metaphor for civil conflict, as the king struggled to contain internal turmoil caused by the French Wars of Religion. In short, water iconography mirrored the determination of the French Crown to expand or protect its borders.

Panel P03
A donde Neptuno reina: water and gods in the iconography of power during the Modern Era (XVI-XVIII)
  Session 1