Religious Ceremonials and Images

Religious ceremonies embodied expressions of power in the widest possible sense, and even those staged by civil authorities incorporated a sacred dimension. All of them were drawn from a common European cultural mold which produced multiple original variations of expressing one's place in the world, signified to spectators who were expected to show admiration and obedience. Therefore the contributions to this volume fill a void and introduce an indispensable comparative method in order to improve our knowledge of Western civilisation at a crucial moment of its development. Beneath conflicts lay shared forms. Ceremonies offer excellent tools for locating some of them and grasping their changes