Diplomatic Ceremonial

Abstract

Since late antiquity, diplomacy has been subject to various protocols governing the treatment of ambassadors and their behavior. With the gradual spread of new ways of doing diplomacy, and the increasing correlation of diplomacy with sovereignty during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, questions of diplomatic ceremonial in Europe became paramount. Diplomatic ceremonial accordingly developed both as a mechanism for regulating diplomatic interactions, but also the focal point for intense intersovereign competition. It was not until the nineteenth century that diplomatic ceremonial began to decline as a point of intense international controversy, though it still remains an element of practice in contemporary diplomacy.