Luxembourg Courts And Their Soundscapes c. 1300–1450

The lecture Luxembourg Courts And Their Soundscapes c. 1300–1450 of prof. Karl Kügle (Faculty of Music, University of Oxford) will be held on 2 April 2025 from 12:30 in the room 201 at the Faculty of Arts (nám. Jana Palacha 1/2, Praha 1).

Invitation

This lecture surveys the sonic cultures of key Luxembourg courts through five gene­ rations, from Count Henry VII of Luxembourg (1275–1313, Emperor between 1308– 1313) to his grand­grand­son Sigismund (1368–1437, Emperor 1433–1437) and his progeny. While the Luxembourgs are associated with some of the most famous names in late­medieval literary and music history – Guillaume de Machaut, Jehan Froissart, Geoffrey Chaucer, Oswald von Wolkenstein, Johannes Brassart –, they also pose a his­ toriographical quandary. This is due to the very uneven survival of sources relevant to the repertories they patronized in combination with the nation­state­driven agendas of the humanities in their traditional, late 19th and early to mid­20th­century discipli­ nary incarnations, which worked strongly against capturing, and understanding, the Luxembourg legacy from a holistic, hence more historically informed perspective. In an attempt to redress the balance and rectify our own cultural bias favouring vision over hearing, in my lecture, I introduce some of the sounds and musical repertories that were encountered at various Luxembourg courts and discuss their relevance for constructing and projecting religious, social, and political identities in the broader context of sound­ and music­based cultural practices in late­medieval Europe.

Karl Kügle is Director of Research in the Faculty of Music at Oxford University and a Senior Research Fellow of Wadham College. Until 2023, he also held the Chair in the History of Music before 1800 at Utrecht University where he is now an emeritus.

Organisation:
Mgr. Jana Fantysová Matějková, Ph.D.
Prof. PhDr. Lenka Bobková, CSc.

Contact: fantysova@hiu.cas.cz

The Votive Image of Archbishop Jan Očko of Vlašim was used with the kind permission of the National Gallery in Prague. Fotografie © Národní galerie v Praze 2024.