Utility of Splendor Ceremony, Social Life, and Architecture at the Court of Bavaria, 1600-1800

The grand palaces and princely villas of the Bavarian Wittelsbach dynastyNymphenburg, Schleissheim, the vast Residenzschloss in Munich, and othersimpress visitors with their great halls and intimate cabinets, dramatic stairhalls and seemingly endless rows of sumptuously decorated rooms. But these dazzling residences did not exist solely to delight the eye. InThe Utility of Splendor,Samuel John Klingensmith discusses how, over the years, successive rulers reshaped the internal spaces of their residences to reflect changes in the elaborate ceremony that regulated daily life at court. Drawing on a broad range of sources, including building documents, correspondence, diaries, and court regulations, Klingensmith investigates the intricacies of Bavarian court practice and shows that Versailles was only one among several influences on German palace planning. Klingensmith offers a cogent, detailed understanding of the relations between architectural spaces and the ceremonial, social, and private life that both required and used them. Handsomely illustrated with photographs and plans,The Utility of Splendorwill appeal to anyone interested in how life was lived among the nobility during the last centuries of the old regime. Samuel John Klingensmith (1949-1986) was assistant professor of art history at Tulane University.Klingensmith, Samuel J. is the author of 'Utility of Splendor Ceremony, Social Life, and Architecture at the Court of Bavaria, 1600-1800', published 1993 under ISBN 9780226443300 and ISBN 0226443302.