İ. Metin Kunt, Ph.D. 1970

In recent decades the history of premodern states and empires has undergone major revision. At the heart of this process stood the court, encompassing the household as well as government institutions. This volume for the first time brings together the fruits of research on royal courts from antiquity to the modern world, from Asia to Europe. The authors are acknowledged specialists in their own fields, but they address themes relevant for all courts: the inner and outer dimensions of court architecture as well as staff organizations; the connections between court, capital, and realm; the relationship of the ruler with relatives and other elites. This volume pioneers comparative history combining a rich empirical orientation with a critical assessment of theoretical perspectives. 

Preliminary Material, J. Duindam, T. Artan, and M. Kunt

Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires, Jeroen Duindam

Pride, Pomp and Circumstance: Palace, Court and Household in Assyria 879–612 BCE, Gojko Barjamovic

Hellenistic Court Society: The Seleukid Imperial Court Under Antiochos the Great, 223–187 BCE, Rolf Strootman

The Roman Imperial Court: Seen and Unseen in The Performance of Power, Andrew Wallace-Hadrill

Court and State in The Roman Empire—Domestication and Tradition in Comparative Perspective, Peter Fibiger Bang

Court and Capital in Byzantium, Paul Magdalino

A King on the Move: The Place of an Itinerant Court in Charlemagne’s Government, Rosamond McKitterick

Court Historiography in Early Tang China: Assigning a Place to History and Historians at the Palace, Isenbike Togan

To Be a Prince in the Fourth/Tenth-Century Abbasid Court, Nadia Maria El Cheikh

Ceremonies and the City: The Court in Fourteenth-Century Constantinople, Ruth Macrides

The Pope’s Household and Court in the Early Modern Age, Maria Antonietta Visceglia

The Monarch and Inner-Outer Court Dualism in Late Imperial China, Sabine Dabringhaus

Turks in the Ottoman Imperial Palace, Metin Kunt

The Mughal Audience Hall: A Solomonic Revival of Persepolis in the Form of a Mosque, Ebba Koch

Royal Weddings and the Grand Vezirate: Institutional and Symbolic Change in the Early Eighteenth Century, Tülay Artan

Versailles, Vienna and Beyond: Changing Views of Household and Government in Early Modern Europe, Jeroen Duindam

Index, J. Duindam, T. Artan, and M. Kunt