Liturgical Travels Through France

<p>From France's 130 cathedrals 1500 monasteries and hundreds of collegiate churches- served by over 10000 canons alongside thousands of minor clerics and laymen-and from their ancient choir schools famous ensembles of choristers and musicians and grand organs the sacred ceremonies of the Ancien Régime unfolded in a vast and intricate rhythm. Daily life was punctuated by the ringing of bells; regular cycles of processions around the city by the clergy religious and confraternities; feast days; pilgrimages to local shrines; and other fiercely guarded local rituals. From the king's magnifi cent chapel at Versailles to the fi elds of the humblest rural parish the Church's calendar and ceremonies formed a sacred landscape in which every Frenchman's life unfolded shaping his experience of time and place reinforcing personal local and national identities and binding together the stratifi ed society of early-modern France with a common ritual life. It is this charming and long-vanished world that the fi rst-ever translation of Le Brun's <em>Liturgical Travels Through France </em>brings to modern English readers accompanied by copious notes and an extensive introduction that provide context for the original work and show its (at times surprising) relevance to current debates.</p>