Exotic animals in the art and culture of the Medici court in Florence / by Angelica Groom.

• VerfasserIn: Groom, Angelica,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden ;, Boston : : Brill,, [2018]
• Year of Publication: 2018
• Language: English
• Series: Rulers & Elites 16.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (360 pages) :; illustrations (some color).

The book examines the roles that rare and exotic animals played in the cultural self-fashioning and the political imaging of the Medici court during the family's reign, first as Dukes of Florence (1532-1569) and subsequently as Grand Dukes of Tuscany (1569-1737). The book opens with an examination of global practices in zoological collecting and cultural uses of animals. The Medici's activities as collectors of exotic species, the menageries they established and their deployment of animals in the ceremonial life of the court and in their art are examined in relation to this wider global perspective. The book seeks to nuance the myth promoted by the Medici themselves that theirs was the most successful princely serraglio in early modern Europe.

Table of Contents

Front Matter -- Copyright -- -- Contents -- Introduction and Global Perspective of Animal Collecting and Menageries -- Cultural Uses of Animals at the Medici Court -- Zoological Collecting: Practices of Exchange and Processes of Procurement -- Menageries and Aviaries in Medicean Florence -- The Sport of the Chase: "Exotic Hunts" -- Spectacles of Slaughter and Courtly Pageants: Exotic Beasts as Symbols of Power and Colonial Ambitions -- Exotic Animals in the Art of the Medici Court -- Animal Imagery in the Service of Political Imaging -- Medici Patronage and Early Modern Naturalism: Tensions between Scientific and Decorative Naturalism -- The Ambrogiana Series of Animal Paintings -- Conclusion.