The broader configurations of provincial politics do not completely explain the splits within companies or the factionalism and rivalry which characterized our period. There was another dimension to political activity – the hidden play of personal connections – which was also important and which needs to be explored further. Authority under absolutism was diffuse and very personal. Family ties, corporate pressure groups, and client systems were all central to the functioning of the early modern state, but exactly what the relationship was between these forces and political action is often difficult to determine. This chapter explores that relationship, using the available genealogical information and the vast number of references to personal ties in the sources. The idea is to start with what can be learned of personal relationships and look from there for connections which may illuminate the political activities already discovered. I should stress that the emphasis here is not on the nature of the patron–client bond, which is a subject in itself, but on the implications of such bonds for provincial politics.

THE IMPORTANCE OF PERSONAL INFLUENCE

One fascinating thing about seventeenth-century government was the way institutional processes and personal networks intermingled and influenced each other. Government was articulated first through royal institutions, but while institutional channels were established firmly enough that they deflected and modified the nature of personal influence, personal forms of power, which were themselves evolving, still played a central role in the decision-making process.