As Spain encountered economic and political crises in the seventeenth century, the imagery of musical performance was invoked by the state to represent the power of the monarch and to denote harmony throughout the kingdom. Based on contemporary sources, Gonzalez is able to unravel the complex iconography of Spanish politics.

This book explores the representation of music in early modern Spanish literature and reveals how music was understood within the framework of the Harmony of the Spheres, emanating from cosmic harmony as directed by the creator. The Harmony of Spheres was not ideologically neutral but rather tied to the earthly power structures of the Church, Crown, and nobility. Music could be "true," taking the listener closer to the divine, or "false," leading the listener astray. As such, music was increasingly seen as a potent weapon to be wielded in service of earthly centers of power, which can be observed in works such as vihuela songbooks, the colonial chronicle of the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, and in the palace theater of Pedro Calderón de la Barca. While music could be a powerful metaphor mapping onto ideological currents of imperial Spain, this volume shows that it also became a contested site where diverse stakeholders challenged the Harmonic Spheres of Influence. Music and Power in Early Modern Spain is a useful tool for upper-level undergraduates, postgraduates, and scholars interested in musicology, music history, Spanish literature, cultural studies, and transatlantic studies in the early modern period.

The definitive history of a powerful family dynasty who dominated Europe for centuries -- from their rise to power to their eventual downfall. In The Habsburgs, Martyn Rady tells the epic story of a dynasty and the world it built -- and then lost -- over nearly a millennium. From modest origins, the Habsburgs gained control of the Holy Roman Empire in the fifteenth century. Then, in just a few decades, their possessions rapidly expanded to take in a large part of Europe, stretching from Hungary to Spain, and parts of the New World and the Far East. The Habsburgs continued to dominate Central Europe through the First World War. Historians often depict the Habsburgs as leaders of a ramshackle empire. But Rady reveals their enduring power, driven by the belief that they were destined to rule the world as defenders of the Roman Catholic Church, guarantors of peace, and patrons of learning. The Habsburgs is the definitive history of a remarkable dynasty that forever changed Europe and the world.

Hearing Voices takes a fresh look at sound in the poetry and prose of colonial Latin American poet and nun Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1648/51–95). A voracious autodidact, Sor Juana engaged with early modern music culture in a way that resonates deeply in her writing. Despite the privileging of harmony within Sor Juana’s work, however, links between the poet’s musical inheritance and subjects such as acoustics, cognition, writing, and visual art have remained unexplored. These lacunae have marginalized nonmusical aurality and contributed to the persistence of both ocularcentrism and a corresponding visual dominance in scholarship on Sor Juana—and indeed in early modern cultural production in general. As in many areas of her work, Sor Juana’s engagement with acoustical themes restructures gendered discourses and transposes them to a feminine key. Hearing Voices focuses on these aural conceits in highlighting the importance of sound and—in most cases—its relationship with gender in Sor Juana’s work and early modern culture. Sarah Finley explores attitudes toward women’s voices and music making; intersections of music, rhetoric, and painting; aurality in Baroque visual art; sound and ritual; and the connections between optics and acoustics. Finley demonstrates how Sor Juana’s striking aurality challenges ocularcentric interpretations and problematizes paradigms that pin vision to logos, writing, and other empirical models that traditionally favor men’s voices. Sound becomes a vehicle for women’s agency and responds to anxiety about the female voice, particularly in early modern convent culture.

What role did sacred music play in mediating Louis XIII's grip on power in the early seventeenth century? How can a study of music as 'sounding liturgy' contribute to the wider discourse on absolutism and 'the arts' in early modern France? Taking the scholarship of the so-called 'ceremonialists' as a point of departure, Peter Bennett engages with Weber's seminal formulation of power to consider the contexts in which liturgy, music and ceremonial legitimated the power of a king almost continuously engaged in religious conflict. Numerous musical settings show that David, the psalmist, musician, king and agent of the Holy Spirit, provided the most enduring model of kingship; but in the final decade of his life, as Louis dedicated the Kingdom to the Virgin Mary, the model of 'Christ the King' became even more potent – a model reflected in a flowering of musical publication and famous paintings by Vouet and Champaigne.

The Royal Armory in Madrid, assembled at a time when the Spanish Crown was at the height of its international power, is the oldest and one of the finest and largest armories in the world, imbued with great historical, artistic, and symbolic significance. Armor drawn from the unsurpassed holdings of the Spanish Royal Armory is shown in this exhibition alongside portraits of rulers dressed in the same armor, painted by such masters as Peter Paul Rubens, Anthony van Dyck, Diego Velázquez, and Alonso Sánchez Coello. Several large and magnificent tapestries from the royal collection also depict the armor in use. Together, some 75 works illustrate the use of luxurious armor in projecting an image of royal power in Imperial Spain. The exhibition includes several full suits of armor, helmets, shields, and equestrian armor--worn in battle but more often in Renaissance parades, pageants, and jousting tournaments. The works of art on view date from the reigns of the Holy Roman Emperors Maximilian I of Austria (1508-1519) and Emperor Charles V (1519-1558), to those of his successors, King Philip II (1556-1598), King Philip III (1598-1621), and King Philip IV (1621-1665). This is the first time that the armor has been exhibited together with the portraits in which it is depicted.