This cultural and institutional history explores the careers of men who served in Rome’s Office of Ceremonies during the papal court’s growth period (c.1466–1528), in order to understand how the smallest papal college stands as a model of early modern curial advancement. The experiences and textual contributions of three ceremonialists, Agostino Patrizi, Johann Burchard, and Paris de’ Grassi, show diverse strategies and origins, but similar concerns and achievements. In a period of heightened competition and increasing pressure for regularization and reform, the Office’s professionalization and their combined office-holding, networks, and textual production, reveal how early modern curialists got ahead. This study shows the complexity of successful advancement strategies that were cultivated over decades and stretched far beyond papal support.

SOMMAIRE :

Front Matter

Preliminary Material
Copyright page
Acknowledgements
Figures and Tables
Abbreviations
List of Pontificates, 1420–1605
A Note on Names

Introduction : 1–13

Chapter 1 The Curia and the Office of Ceremonies : 14–33

Chapter 2 The Development of the Office of Ceremonies : 34–72

Chapter 3 The Office-Holders: Origins and Strategies : 73–108

Chapter 4 The Office-Holder’s Great Goal: A Bishopric : 109–132

Chapter 5 Tools of the Profession: Ceremonial Diaries and Guides : 133–169

Chapter 6 Curial Authors : 170–195

Chapter 7 Clerical Ambition in the Papal Chapel : 196–217

Back Matter

Conclusion : 218–219

Bibliography

Index