Nobility, delights and state formation in the sixteenth-century Netherlands (case studies: Flanders and Brabant) (FWOAL733)

When it comes to the relationship between nobility and state in the Netherlands during the transition from a feudal to an early modern state organization dominates the image of an nobility that was domesticated as loyal servants of the monarch. As strong and independent as they were in the feudal system of the Middle Ages, so weak and dependent were they in an early modern state structure in which the monarch brought more and more income and power under his control. Over the past decades, however, a great deal of research has been done internationally on the relationship between nobility and state, which has led to discussion of the above-mentioned performance. These studies have shown that the nobility managed to maintain itself as a social group, in particular by using the fortified state to their advantage. This project aims to review the relationship between the sixteenth-century Habsburg state and the nobility in the Low Countries from a social point of view. The central question is whether changes within the nobility as a social group have led to an altered relationship with the royal administration? In the search for answers the emphasis is placed on the management of goodies. As the basic ingredient for noble status and the power base of noblemen, glories are an important part of the research into state formation and elite. There are indications that from the late fifteenth century a concentration process started, so that more and more delicacies came into the possession of an ever small group of men. From this follows the working hypothesis that the families excluded from the group of men tried to bypass the common association between the possession of glories and social status by appealing to the royal administration as an institution for the attribution of nobility as a legal statute.

Keywords:history

Disciplines:Socio-economic history, Other philosophy, ethics and religious studies not elsewhere classified