UC Berkeley

This dissertation describes the culture and practices of Early Modern European diplomats in their work, their travels, and the personal networks they developed to help them with both. The protagonist of this study is Johannes Dantiscus, Polish-Lithuanian ambassador to the Court of Charles V in Spain; his experience shows the integration of Eastern Europe into the Northern Renaissance and its diplomatic culture. Because of a shared concern about Ottoman power—for Poland this threat was located in the Balkans and the east, for Spain and Italy, it was in the Mediterranean—Dantiscus participated in an influential circle of courtiers around Imperial Chancellor Mercurino Gattinara which developed a vision of empire for Charles V that began in opposition to the perceived Turkish menace and expanded to include the whole world. Early modern advancements in organization and communication allowed one ruler, for the first time since the fall of Rome, to reach that far. The language these diplomats used in the imagination of such a universalizing polity came from both the classical Roman and Medieval Christian traditions. However, the other European powers, especially King Francis I of France, opposed it, preferring to ally with the Muslim Turks than to support Catholic Charles. In the following centuries, both the desire for far-flung empires and the mutual rivalry of European rulers shaped the development of statecraft and global history of the modern age. Therefore, the Early Modern State—from sprawling empires to circumscribed city-states—had roots in a pan-European, Renaissance humanist culture and also a Christian effort that minimized borders aiming at the triumph of a shared Christendom united behind the emperor.