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9 - Diplomacy in Renaissance Europe

from Part I - International Law in Renaissance Europe (1492–1660)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2025

By
Dante Fedele
General editor
Randall Lesaffer
Randall Lesaffer
Affiliation:
KU Leuven and Tilburg University
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Summary

This chapter charts the profound transformations undergone by diplomacy, both secular and papal, in an age of dramatic intellectual, political and military upheaval. Considering both scholarship and practice, the chapter assesses the rise of ‘resident diplomacy’ and highlights the new structures that were put in place in order to manage longer missions. The investigation of the right to send ambassadors reveals persistent traits of pluralism in early modern Europe, while the plurality of diplomatic envoys and roles is taken into account to make the complexity of the notion of diplomatic status more apparent: this status, in fact, cannot be reduced to that of a fully fledged ambassador exclusively committed to the object of their official mission. Information-gathering, negotiation and mediation are singled out as the most significant diplomatic functions. Changes in the conception of diplomatic inviolability and immunity are also considered, and include the emergence of the idea of extraterritoriality concerning both the person of the ambassador and diplomatic premises.

Keywords

Renaissance Europelaw of nationsdiplomacydiplomatic lawjurisprudenceimmunity
Type
Chapter
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The Cambridge History of International Law , pp. 301 - 328
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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References

Further Reading

Adair, Edward A., The Exterritoriality of Ambassadors in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (London: Longmans Green 1929).Google Scholar
Anderson, Matthew S., The Rise of Modern Diplomacy, 1450–1919 (London and New York: Routledge 2013).Google Scholar
Andretta, Stefano, Péquignot, Stéphane and Waquet, Jean-Claude (eds.), De l’ambassadeur. Les écrits relatifs à l’ambassadeur et à l’art de négocier du Moyen Âge au début du XIXe siècle (Rome: École française de Rome 2015).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barbiche, Bernard, Bulla, legatus, nuntius. Études de diplomatique et de diplomatie pontificales (XIIIe–XVIIe siècle) (Paris: École des chartes 2007).Google Scholar
Bazzoli, Maurizio, Stagioni e teorie della società internazionale (Milan: LED Edizioni Universitarie 2005).Google Scholar
Bély, Lucien, L’art de la paix en Europe. Naissance de la diplomatie moderne XVIe–XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Presses universitaires de France 2007).Google Scholar
Bély, Lucien (ed.), L’invention de la diplomatie. Moyen Age – Temps modernes (Paris: Presses universitaires de France 1998).Google Scholar
Blet, Pierre, SJ, Histoire de la Représentation Diplomatique du Saint Siège des origines à l’aube du XIXe siècle (Vatican City: Archivio Vaticano 1982).Google Scholar
De Giudici, Giuseppina, legatorum, Sanctitas. Sul ‘fondamento’ dell’indipendenza giurisdizionale in età moderna (Naples: Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane 2020).Google Scholar
Ebben, Maurits, and Sicking, Louis (eds.), Beyond Ambassadors. Consuls, Missionaries, and Spies in Premodern Diplomacy (Leiden and Boston: Brill 2020).Google Scholar
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Mattingly, Garrett, Renaissance Diplomacy (Boston: Houghton Mifflin 1955).Google Scholar
Résidences d’ambassadeurs et immunités diplomatiques (XVIe–XXe siècle), special dossier of Mélanges de l’École française de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée, 119/ 1 (2007) 5–123.Google Scholar
Sabbatini, Renzo, and Volpini, Paola (eds.), Sulla diplomazia in età moderna. Politica, economia, religione (Milan: Franco Angeli 2011).Google Scholar
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Visceglia, Maria Antonietta (ed.), Papato e politica internazionale nella prima età moderna (Rome: Viella 2013).Google Scholar
Wijffels, Alain, ‘Early modern scholarship on international law’ in Orakhelashvili, Alexander (ed.), Research Handbook on the Theory and History of International Law (2nd edn, Cheltenham and Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar 2020) 19–57.Google Scholar

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