Society: Identities Florence and Venice in the Renaissance

2  What factors influence a person’s identity and sense of place in society?  How far are they determined by the state, the law, cultural and social norms?

 Marin Sanudo on Venetian Society (late 15 th century): “There are three orders of inhabitants: the patricians who govern the city and the Republic..., the citizens, and artisans, or the lower class”

 c. 4% of population, defined by the Serrata  equality or oligarchy?  competition from below  1506 Libro d’oro Patricians

 5-8% of population  Cittadini originarii  3 generations resident, no manual trade  Libro d’argento  de intus (15 years); de intus et extra (25 years) Tintoretto, Andrea Frizier, Grand Chancellor of Venice (C16th)

 c. 90% of population  Many foreign born  Belonged to guilds, confraternities, parishes

8 Florence  core of elite families  popolo (grasso)  popolo minuto  increasing stratification

9 Gender  influence of the Church  reinforced by law  patriarchal structure of household and state  Joan Kelley: “Women did not have a Renaissance, at least, not in the Renaissance”

Elite Women  preserving lineage  married young  economic transaction  chastity

11  Dianne Owen Hughes: “The conduct of wives and daughters was not a private matter. Men supervised it closely precisely because a woman’s private shame, which might make her a public woman, could destroy a man’s public honour.”

12 Andrea del Verrocchio, The Death of Francesca Pitti Tornabuoni after Childbirth, C15th

13  1416 Francesco Barbaro: “what is the use of bringing home great wealth unless the wife will work at preserving, maintaining and utilizing it... [she should] imitate the leaders of bees, who supervise, receive and preserve whatever comes into their hives, to the end that, unless necessity dictates otherwise, they remain in their honeycombs, where they develop and mature beautifully.”

14 Widows  Caught between natal and marital families  financial power?  testamentary bequests  informal sottogoverno  Alessandra Strozzi

15 State intervention  private affairs = public importance  problem of rising dowries  Florentine monte delle doti 1425

16 Nuns  Forced monacation  Restrictions or opportunities? Francesco Guardi, The Convent of San Zaccharia, 1745

17 Arcangela Tarabotti ( ), author of Paternal Tyranny

Lower Class Women  freer to move, marry, work  role in the bottega  low-level professions  vulnerability

19 The ospedale degli innocenti in Florence

Masculine Identity

21 Foreigners  Expanding population  Openness to foreigners  Economic considerations  Times of crisis  1516 creation of Ghetto

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