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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 May 2013
This article links the nature of commercial masked balls in Paris in the 1830s and 1840s to urban development during these decades. The raucous and often destructive character of the balls, which united elites and popular classes under the mask's anonymity, coincided with a society undergoing social and political upheaval. The dress and conduct of revellers were expressions of their ambitions, fears and resentments. Changes in the urban landscape of the 1820s and 1830s – in particular, the construction of the grands boulevards and alignment of theatres sponsoring masked balls along this axis – sharpened potential conflict at such events by placing them in one of the most socially charged corridors of the city.
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45 La Quotidienne, 11 Jan. 1836.
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