Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger

Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger is a preeminent German historian specializing in the early modern period, particularly the political and cultural history of the Holy Roman Empire. Her pioneering work employs methods from cultural anthropology and symbolic interactionism to analyze the rituals, symbols, and communicative practices that constituted pre-modern political order. As a professor at the University of Münster and former rector of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, she is a leading figure in reshaping the understanding of absolutism, imperial institutions, and the Ancien Régime.

Biography

Born in Bergisch Gladbach in 1955, she pursued her studies in history, German studies, and philosophy at the University of Cologne. Her academic formation was profoundly influenced by her doctoral advisor, the historian Johannes Kunisch, under whose guidance she completed her dissertation on the Estates of the realm in the Duchy of Jülich-Berg. This early work established her enduring interest in the complex interplay between symbolic communication and constitutional structures within the Holy Roman Empire. Her scholarly trajectory has been marked by a consistent interrogation of how power was legitimized and negotiated through performative acts, a focus that distinguishes her within the field of German historiography.

Academic career

Following her habilitation at the University of Cologne, she held a professorship at the University of Greifswald before being appointed to a chair in early modern history at the University of Münster in 1997, where she has remained a central figure. From 2011 to 2019, she served as the rector of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, an institute for advanced study, where she fostered interdisciplinary dialogue among fellows from the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. She has held numerous visiting fellowships, including at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study. Her leadership extends to major academic organizations, having served as president of the Association of German Historians.

Research and scholarship

Her research is characterized by a groundbreaking synthesis of historical inquiry with theoretical approaches from sociology and anthropology. She critically re-examined the nature of the Holy Roman Empire, arguing against viewing it as a weak or failed state by instead analyzing its political culture of consensus, ritual, and corporate decision-making. Seminal studies, such as her analysis of the Imperial Diet at Regensburg, demonstrate how ceremonies, dress codes, and seating arrangements were not mere formalities but essential media of political negotiation. This "performative turn" has provided new frameworks for understanding the Peace of Westphalia, the court of Maria Theresa, and the symbolic foundations of absolutist rule across Europe.

Major works

Her influential publications have been widely translated and are considered standard works in the field. *The Emperor's Old Clothes: Constitutional History and the Symbolic Language of the Holy Roman Empire* (2013) deconstructs the rituals of the Reichstag to reveal the empire's functional logic. The biography *Maria Theresa: The Empress in Her Time* (2017) offers a nuanced portrait of the Habsburg ruler, focusing on the performative aspects of her sovereignty. Other key works include *Rituals* (2013), a theoretical examination of political ceremonies, and *The Holy Roman Empire: A Short History* (2018), a concise synthesis of her reinterpretation of the empire's structure and significance from the Middle Ages to its dissolution in 1806.

Awards and honors

Her scholarly contributions have been recognized with Germany's most prestigious academic awards. In 2005, she was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize, the highest honor granted by the German Research Foundation, for her innovative research program. She is a member of several academies, including the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz, and the British Academy. In 2020, she was decorated with the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany for her services to scholarship. She has also received the Sigmund Freud Prize for academic prose and the German Non-Fiction Prize for her biography of Maria Theresa.

Category:German historians Category:Early modern historians Category:Recipients of the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize Category:Members of the British Academy