Suchergebnisse

The practice and composition of music require patronage and institutional support, and they require it in a different fashion from that found in other forms of art. This collection of essays brings together the most recent and important contributions by leading scholars in the field to this crucial aspect of Renaissance musical culture. The articles approach the topic from a number of perspectives and consider the institutions and individuals engaged in supporting music; the systems of employment, benefices and sponsorship put in place to facilitate the support; and where, how and why music was sung and played. Taken together, these articles enable conclusions to be drawn about the interests of patrons and about the social and artistic status of musicians and composers within the courtly and urban context. - Publisher

The century following Duke Humphrey's death has transmitted an image of "the Good Duke" that modern historiography may find misleading. Contemporary scholarship is interested in his role as the promoter of humanism in fifteenth-century England; yet, though in the course of his life there were acknowledgements of his patronage, the years immediately following his death saw his image undergo a metamorphosis. His role as a proto-humanist was quickly forgotten, while the political resonance of his death made later scholars overlook his unsuccessful career as a politician. Humphrey's death created a major sensation, and after the fall of the Lancasters it was quickly exploited for propaganda purposes by the York faction first, and by the Tudors afterwards. Humphrey haunts Elizabethan drama and Ovidian epistles, appears as an improbable Wycliffite in Foxe's "Acts" and as a wise man of the world in More's "Dialogue Concerning Heresies". The present article takes Duke Humphrey and his afterlives as a case study for the examination of the role of propaganda in literary/political biography.