Theatrum Belli
Der Krieg als Inszenierung und Wissensschauplatz im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert
Abstract
The metaphor of the theatrum was a key term for early modern military literature and especially the contemporary news coverage on military actions. As theatrum belli – the theatre of war – one first of all described the very geographical space where war took place. But also the representations of the actual fighting in form of battles and sieges followed the language of the theatre. The battlefield turned into a stage, the soldiers became actors and a defeat was sometimes transfigured into a tragedy. The knowledge on war was articulated in the discursive forms of the European nobility and therefore the theatralisation of war can be read as sign of the embeddedness into the social logic of courtly representation. Geometry and a general conspectus became central axioms for the aesthetic of the art of war. Even actual military violence was taken up into the choreography of an exactly staged event. The representation of war in the order of knowledge of the theatrum had so much evidence for the contemporarys that it even survived the main era of the theatrum discourse. But during the 18th century the use of the theatrum-metaphor was successively restricted to the geographical notion of the theatre of war. Though at that time discredited as mere appearance the metaphor of the theatre celabrated a comeback in the discourse on war and the new media at the end of the 20th century. Facing the virtualised new asymmetrical wars for some critics the screen now remained the only stage left.
