Politics and the arts in Lisbon and Rome

Dealing with a complex king, this edited collection elucidates a monarch's vision of Rome that deeply affected his political choices and cultural policy during the first half of the eighteenth century. John V of Portugal became king in 1707 in a pivotal moment for the European balance of power. The kingdom of Portugal was still demanding the same privileges as its powerful neighbours, and the relation with Rome was considered a vehicle to obtain them. The arts and music had a special and unprecedented place in the king's plans, and this book approaches that dynamic from several interdisciplinary perspectives.

The unifying thread across this book's articles remains the omnipresence of Rome as a paradigm on several levels : political, religious, intellectual, artistic and musical. Rather than providing an exhaustive analysis of the period as a whole, this study offers a fresh approach for English readers to this classic, but little-known, topic in Portuguese national historiography.