A Theater of Diplomacy. Ellen R. Welch
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an opening récit in praise of Louis XIII. In the last verse, he introduces his “subjects,” promising they will pay the king their compliments “in a style as sweet as my voice.”60 The series of performances that follow develops the parallel between Orpheus and Italy by showcasing the nation’s association with music, dance, laughter, and frivolity. “Pleasingly dressed” chestnut roasters dance with such liveliness it seems they “fricasseed their legs” as well as their delicacies.61 Neapolitan “buffoons” and harlequins perform acrobatics and boast about their comedic prowess. Similarly, in the third part of the ballet, Bacchus declares in his récit: “One sees an eternal proof of my power on the banks of the Rhine.”62 The dancers in his entourage incarnate stereotypically inebriated Germans, gamboling joyfully but clumsily in such a way that “they make you burst with laughter.”63 These performances rehearse common French depictions of the Italian and German national characters familiar from countless ballets. In the Ballet des quatre monarchies, though, national traits provide the justification for their representation by a particular mythological ruler. An essential similitude connects the “monarchs” to their subjects.
The role of resemblance in the ballet’s assignment of mythological monarchs to the four Christian nations troubles the assumption that nationality had no relevance to early modern political sovereignty. Often retained within a family and underwritten by divine authority, sovereignty was most often understood as “jurisdictional,” requiring no natural connection between the sovereign and the territory or people he ruled.64 For a thinker such as Jean Bodin, a prince’s usurpation of new territory posed no problem, as sovereignty demonstrated by conquest was sufficient to justify dominion.65 For this reason, on the international stage, monarchs and princes interacted as individuals rather than as “heads of state” understood to be representing the interests, will, or character of their people.66 The Ballet des quatre monarchies, however, challenges the idea that heads of state have a purely imperial relationship to their peoples. Instead, the entertainment plays with the idea that characteristic resemblance strengthens bonds between a sovereign and his or her subjects.
The entrées of Italy, Spain, and Germany rely on symbolism, stereotype, and metonymy to make this claim. The entrée of France presents the most structurally complex version of this vision of sovereignty owing to the identity of the ballet’s performers and spectators. The French subjects need not be represented through the performance of French stereotypes because actual French subjects attended and danced, effectively representing themselves. In the fourth and final part of the ballet, Mademoiselle herself takes the stage as Minerva, France’s own figurehead. The libretto describes her as the epitome of the noble community: “This young marvel … begins to appear in the sparkle and luster of the whole court.”67 The synecdochal connection between the figurehead and the larger group becomes concrete as the entertainment concludes with a ball in which the whole assembly participates.
Throughout the final scenes devoted to the Monarchy of France, the ballet’s framing conceit breaks down to accommodate French political reality. This is especially true in the way the ballet addresses Louis XIII, who participated as a privileged spectator and dedicatee. As Minerva first enters the stage, she rhetorically cedes her authority as fictional “monarch” of France to the true French sovereign off stage. Her entrance is accompanied by the “most beautiful voices and best lutenists of Europe”68 and Mercury, who sings:
Great King, I traverse the skies
As quick as lightning
Carrying the commands of my sovereign Master:
But you know how to imitate him so well
That I can no longer recognize
Which of the two of you is the real Jupiter.69
Mercury’s confusion recalls myths about Jupiter (perhaps especially the story of Amphitryon) that depict him as a shape-shifter who enjoys masquerading as mortal creatures. In a reversal of those tales, though, Mercury represents Louis XIII as the imitator of the god. The verses highlight the French king’s divine right to rule and his supreme power. The comparison to Jupiter lifts him above the lesser mythological “monarchs” whose entrées preceded this part of the ballet.
The staging and rhetoric of these scenes clearly transfer sovereignty from the mythological figure leading the performances of France to the extradiegetic French king. Yet the principle of similitude between the divine head of the entrée and the character of the people she leads remains in place. Although Minerva has been associated with wisdom, music, and the arts, this ballet stresses her relationship to war. She presents a sword and pike to the king as symbols of his valor, as underscored by the accompanying récit:
Most glorious Monarch
Who ever walked the earth,
Just and victorious Prince,
Supporter of laws and honor of war,
The Gods, oh worthy king,
Have they more divine qualities than you?70
Echoing Mercury’s assertion of Louis XIII’s divinity, these verses imbue the king with the virtues Minerva herself embodies.
Although conceived to respond to the delicate reconciliation of Louis XIII and Gaston d’Orléans, the Ballet des quatre monarchies chrétiennes performs additional, more subtle political work in the way it figures sovereignty. It rehearses the reflection on national character typical of the ballet of nations genre, but it also extends that reflection to the person of the monarch, positing that the most appropriate leader or figurehead for a people is one who shares that people’s traits. The ballet implies that embodying the state entails not simply a contractual authorization to “speak for” the populace but also an essential resemblance to it, an ability to incarnate and do justice to its national character.
Staging Interaction
How national cultural traits (such as language or religion) should affect the government of states was a matter of debate in early modern political theory. In particular, early works on international relations considered national character an important concern in organizing the political landscape of Europe. Emeric Crucé’s Le nouveau Cynée (The New Cineas), published in 1623, Sully’s “Grand Design,” published in his Les oeconomies royales, ou mémoires d’État (Royal Economy, or, Memoirs of State) in 1638 but circulated in manuscript form as early as the 1610s, and Hugo Grotius’s De jure belli ac pacis (The Rights of War and Peace), published in Latin in 1625 delved into questions of nationality and sovereignty as they pertained to international cooperation. Most often read as providing the theoretical undergirding for an emergent “society of states” in early modern Europe (a concept to be discussed further in Chapter 5), these texts also challenge the presumption that sovereignty did not necessarily have to respect natural or linguistic borders.
Crucé, for example, argued that ambitious sovereigns trumped up cultural or ethnic rivalries between their subjects and those of their neighbors in order to fuel violent competition for territory. Such antagonism would cease, he contended, if everyone would recognize the meaninglessness of cultural differences between “nations”: “I say that such enmities are merely political, and cannot take away the conjunction that is and must be between men…. Why should I who is French wish ill upon an Englishman, Spaniard, or Indian? I cannot when I consider that they are men like me.”71 If sovereigns would only see the unfoundedness of regional and cultural enmities, perhaps they would limit the extent of their ambitions, content themselves within the borders of their existing dominions, and all of Europe could benefit from the peace and prosperity that would follow.72