Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy
    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy
    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy
    Ebook305 pages6 hours

    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy

    By Thomas V. Cohen

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Gratuitous sex. Graphic violence. Lies, revenge, and murder. Before there was digital cable or reality television, there was Renaissance Italy and the courts in which Italian magistrates meted out justice to the vicious and the villainous, the scabrous and the scandalous. Love and Death in Renaissance Italy retells six piquant episodes from the Italian court just after 1550, as the Renaissance gave way to an era of Catholic reformation.

    Each of the chapters in this history chronicles a domestic drama around which the lives of ordinary Romans are suddenly and violently altered. You might read the gruesome murder that opens the book—when an Italian noble takes revenge on his wife and her bastard lover as he catches them in delicto flagrante—as straight from the pages of Boccaccio. But this tale, like the other stories Cohen recalls here, is true, and its recounting in this scintillating work is based on assiduous research in court proceedings kept in the state archives in Rome.

    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy contains stories of a forbidden love for an orphan nun, of brothers who cruelly exact a will from their dying teenage sister, and of a malicious papal prosecutor who not only rapes a band of sisters, but turns their shambling father into a pimp! Cohen retells each cruel episode with a blend of sly wit and warm sympathy and then wraps his tales in ruminations on their lessons, both for the history of their own time and for historians writing today. What results is a book at once poignant and painfully human as well as deliciously entertaining.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateJan 15, 2010
    ISBN9780226112602
    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy

    Related to Love and Death in Renaissance Italy

    Related ebooks

    European History For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      A Genius Builds a Dome

      Sep 1, 2020

      A Genius Builds a Dome
      2 min read

    • Article

      Dreaming in Italian

      Sep 2, 2021

      Dreaming in Italian
      6 min read

    • Article

      Daughters Of The Storm

      Aug 15, 2019

      Daughters Of The Storm
      11 min read

    • Article

      Baron Corvo’s Grave

      Jan 6, 2022

      Baron Corvo’s Grave
      3 min read

    • Article

      Whatever Floats Your Boat

      Nov 18, 2019

      Whatever Floats Your Boat
      5 min read

    • Article

      NORTHERN Lights

      Feb 13, 2020

      NORTHERN Lights
      8 min read

    • Article

      Beyond the Palio

      Oct 19, 2022

      Siena: The Life and Afterlife of a Medieval City By Jane Stevenson Apollo £20 The best place to watch the Palio di Siena is by the start. For my first time – decades ago – I secured a good vantage point at that spot, by clambering on to a fence that

      3 min read

    • Article

      Dear Italy...

      Feb 23, 2020

      Dear Italy...
      10 min read

    • Article

      Trieste

      Feb 13, 2020

      Trieste
      9 min read

    • Article

      Lake Orta

      Aug 5, 2021

      Lake Orta
      9 min read

    • Article

      I’m the Quentin Crisp of Deal

      May 4, 2022

      Young people like to embrace the mantra ‘Be kind’. We’ve seen a great display of kindness in the many, many offers to host Ukrainian refugees in the middle of the tormenting war they have experienced. I wished I could invite a refugee into my abode i

      3 min read

    • Article

      OVER THE BRIDGE TO San Polo

      Nov 3, 2022

      OVER THE BRIDGE TO San Polo
      8 min read

    • Article

      Floating BEAUTY

      Oct 19, 2018

      Floating BEAUTY
      4 min read

    • Article

      Puglia In Six Days

      Nov 23, 2023

      Start in Bari by visiting the Centro Storico neighbourhood, watching the nonnas roll out their pasta in the narrow lanes leading off it and exploring the Romanesque Basilica di San Nicola and Cattedrale di San Sabino. Next, head to the seaport town o

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Venetian Islands

      Aug 5, 2021

      The Venetian Islands
      11 min read

    • Article

      A Roman Holiday

      Jan 7, 2021

      A Roman Holiday
      5 min read

    • Article

      Stories From The Sea

      Jun 5, 2019

      It’s somewhere between the sea and Savoca that I first start questioning Italy’s identity. Travelling inland from Sicily’s volcanic-grey shore, my guide rattles through the various civilisations that have all, at some time or another, vied for this M

      6 min read

    • Article

      Venice THROUGH A LENS

      Jan 9, 2020

      Venice THROUGH A LENS
      11 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Love and Death in Renaissance Italy

    4/5

    12 ratings2 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Professor Cohen is a master of “microhistory”, the study of records of small places or small events to illuminate larger themes. This book is an excellent example of just such an endeavor. Professor Cohen traces six court cases through the Renaissance courts of Rome. In doing so, he gives the reader insight into the justice system, the agency of ordinary women, the ups and downs of paper court life, etc.Some of the stories are heartbreaking, like “Lost Love and a Handkerchief”, which is about the desire of a young man for a girl who may—or may not—want to become a nun. “The Lady Lives, the Pigeon Dies” is an example of early forsenic science in the court system. Was someone poisoned? Only the pigeon knows!
    • 4/5
      Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney make mention of two facts in the beginning of "Willpower": One, the two personal qualities that predict "positive outcomes" in our lives are intelligence and self-control. Two, researchers have concluded that we spend a quarter of our waking hours resisting desires. This book is meant to improve the first (self-control) while making the second (resisting desires) easier. They achieve their aim with the use of solid research, effective story telling and varied examples to drive their points home.After an early examination of the sense of willpower through time, the authors use interesting studies like the"marshmallow" and "radish" experiments to show how researchers have attempted to prove brilliant theories that helpus understand where willpower comes from and how to improve it. They give good, quick advice in recommending that we focus on one project at a time for the simple reason that ourwillpower can only go so far and it is better to give all our focus on changing one thing than a multitude. Hence,their specific instructions to never make New Years Resolutions. Showing the best ways to increase willpower - proper diet, setting clear goals and monitoring behavior - the authorsgive vivid examples as varied as Drew Carey getting organized, Eric Clapton getting dry or Lord Stanley shavingevery day to make it out of Africa to show the different tools we can all use to increase our willpower.They go on to show how making multiple decisions affects our willpower (why do they put the sweets near the checkout line?)to willpower workouts and Bright Lines and other tricks to strengthen our willpower muscle. Raising children & dieting chapters end the book and give further stories and research into bringing willpower to bearon these most important subject areas.In sum, "Willpower" is chock full of valuable advice based on scientific research and actionable material that the average reader will surely find useful in some area of their life they are trying to improve through the applicationof willpower. A definite must read.

    Book preview

    Love and Death in Renaissance Italy - Thomas V. Cohen

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1