The Tournament and its Role in the Court Culture of Emperor Maximilian I (1459-1519)

 
 
237 
 
Yet these fortuitous historical coincidences would have remained just that, if not for 
Maximilian’s ability to harness and take advantage of them. There are several ways to interpret 
this endless quest for immortality by the emperor. Van Dyke, for one, has stated his belief that 
the primary focus of Maximilian’s literary output was bragging. Each of these works, according 
to him, only exist to show off Maximilian’s skill, education, leadership, piety, knowledge, and 
charity. Van Dyke takes the rather unforgiving and simplistic view that ‘Maximilian was firmly 
convinced that he could do almost everything better than anybody alive, better than all but a 
few of those who were dead […] Every book in which he took any interest is either a record of 
his deeds, a catalogue of his possessions or an exhortation to his descendants to base their 
greatness on his example.’
3
 This belief that Maximilian’s sole object was fame and that he 
always exclusively sought out self-glorification, is certainly justified, and this judgement could 
easily be applied to the emperor’s approach to tournaments. The primary focus of works like 
Weißkunig and Theuerdank, after all, was not to show Maximilian as he was but as he wished to 
appear to history.  
 
Yet throughout these works Maximilian shows a desire not just to glorify himself but 
to glorify his court. He did not see himself as ‘the best’ at everything he undertook to do, but 
rather he wished to convey an image of well-rounded prosperity and success, applicable to 
himself as an individual and to his court as well. These pursuits were also helped by 
Maximilian’s seemingly boundless and restless energy. He flung himself into his literary 
pursuits while surrounding himself with scholars and artists. Van Dyke relates an anecdote 
from Willibald Pirckheimer (d. 1530), a German jurist and humanist: while crossing Lake 
Constance on the Rhine in Maximilian’s company in 1499, Pirckheimer claimed that 
                                                 
3
 van Dyke, ‘The Literary Activity of the Emperor Maximilian I’, p. 16. 

---

 
 
238 
Maximilian spent the part of the voyage dictating his autobiography in Latin.
4
 Although the 
veracity of this tale is questionable, it serves as a demonstration of how, as a ruler, Maximilian 
was known to be endlessly productive. 
 
Finally, there was the fact that during Maximilian’s lifetime the tournament was at a 
critical point in its history where it was increasingly losing its relevance as a form of military 
training, but its capacity for theatre was being newly mined. In many ways Maximilian could be 
said to have used the tournament as a form of propaganda.
5
 He found various ways to use the 
tournament as a tool: a vehicle for displaying the power of his court, a unifying event to bring 
together his subjects (both noble and non-noble), and a venue for himself to show off his 
chivalric skills in the lists. As explained previously, Maximilian ruled over a vast and culturally 
varied empire, and, amongst the many devices and methods he used to maintain control over 
his territories, whether diplomatic, military, or benevolent, tournaments should not be 
overlooked as a key weapon in his propagandistic arsenal.
6
  
 
Maximilian made use of the tournament as a form of propaganda in two ways. First, he 
used the tournaments which took place in reality at his court often as a means of showing off 
both his affluence and, critically, his own virility as a competitor within them. These events 
were a chance for him to display wealth and prosperity or to portray his court as the beating 
                                                 
4
 van Dyke, ‘The Literary Activity of the Emperor Maximilian I’, pp. 18-20. 
5
 Darin Hayton, in his study of the role of astrology in Maximilian’s court, provides a clear 
explanation of the usefulness of the word ‘propaganda’ in a medieval context, before the concept had 
been explicitly defined, and justifies its use in his study. As Hayton puts it, ‘[T]he absence of the term 
[propaganda] in the early sixteenth century does not mean that early modern princes and audiences 
failed to recognize attempts at persuasion’. This same explanation applies as easily to the role of 
tournaments as it does to astrology. Hayton, The Crown and the Cosmos: Astrology and the Politics of 
Maximilian I, pp. 4-6 (4).   
6
 ‘As soon as the illiterate or the uneducated accept the basic principle that their country is 
superior to others, and that the dynasty in power is the best thing that could happen to them, 
propaganda has achieved its aim’: Gosman, ‘Princely Culture: Friendship or Patronage?’, p. 19. This 
explanation, while blunt, encapsulates Maximilian’s ultimate goal.  

---

 
 
239 
heart of his empire and him as its undefeatable ruler. By staging these events in town squares 
across his empire, and by crafting a close-knit tournament network around himself, Maximilian 
mastered the art of self-promotion. Yet Maximilian did not limit himself to tournaments in 
reality. The tournament often played a central role in his literary legacy, and fictional 
tournaments served to memorialise the emperor’s court and ensure its fame down the 
centuries. 
 
Maximilian further found new ways to utilise spectacle and pageantry in his 
tournaments. One need only look to the Triumphzug to see the obvious importance Maximilian 
placed on the tournament in the context of his court; the varieties of joust are presented there 
as of equal importance to any of his other courtly accomplishments such as music or military 
might. The clearest example of how central tournaments were to court life is the fact that 
Maximilian devised at least two court positions devoted to the tournament: Rennen und Gestech 
Meister and Turniermeister (Wolfgang von Polheim and Anthony von Yfan, respectively).
7
 Their 
presence also shows an interest by the emperor in properly cataloguing the different varieties 
of joust featured in the Triumphzug. It shows an appreciation of the importance of the language 
of the tournament and the terminology which he wished to use in memorialising these 
competitions.  
 
Evidence of his success may be found in the fact that, in his own time Maximilian and 
his tournaments had a great influence on younger rulers, especially Henry VIII of England. 
Their close relationship is reflected in a letter from the English ambassador Robert Wingfield 
to his master, King Henry. Wingfield reported Maximilian as saying to him, ‘I desire you to 
make my most hearty and affectuous recommendations unto my most dear and well beloved 
                                                 
7
 Appelbaum, ed., The Triumph of Maximilian, p. 7-8/plates 41, 44. 

---