Illicit Sex in Early Modern Venice

From the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Venice maintained a special tribunal focused on sin and immorality, called the Esecutori contro la bestemmia. While its original focus was blasphemy, the Esecutori soon had jurisdiction over a wide range of moral offenses, including gambling, scandalous behavior in sacred spaces, offenses against clergy, the movement of foreigners, and a host of sexual offences like rape, prostitution, defloration, seduction, and adultery. This paper will examine the court’s treatment of illicit sex and sexual violence, arguing we can better understand the court’s (and by extension the Venetian government’s) priorities and concerns through the ways the Esecutori treated both victims and perpetrators of sexual offenses.

From the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Venice maintained a special tribunal focused on sin and immorality, called the Esecutori contro la bestemmia. While its original focus was blasphemy, the Esecutori soon had jurisdiction over a wide range of moral offenses, including gambling, scandalous behavior in sacred spaces, offenses against clergy, the movement of foreigners, and a host of sexual offences like rape, prostitution, defloration, seduction, and adultery. This paper will examine the court’s treatment of illicit sex and sexual violence, arguing we can better understand the court’s (and by extension the Venetian government’s) priorities and concerns through the ways the Esecutori treated both victims and perpetrators of sexual offenses.

From the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Venice maintained a special tribunal focused on sin and immorality, called the Esecutori contro la bestemmia. While its original focus was blasphemy, the Esecutori soon had jurisdiction over a wide range of moral offenses, including gambling, scandalous behavior in sacred spaces, offenses against clergy, the movement of foreigners, and a host of sexual offences like rape, prostitution, defloration, seduction, and adultery. This paper will examine the court’s treatment of illicit sex and sexual violence, arguing we can better understand the court’s (and by extension the Venetian government’s) priorities and concerns through the ways the Esecutori treated both victims and perpetrators of sexual offenses.

From the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries, Venice maintained a special tribunal focused on sin and immorality, called the Esecutori contro la bestemmia. While its original focus was blasphemy, the Esecutori soon had jurisdiction over a wide range of moral offenses, including gambling, scandalous behavior in sacred spaces, offenses against clergy, the movement of foreigners, and a host of sexual offences like rape, prostitution, defloration, seduction, and adultery. This paper will examine the court’s treatment of illicit sex and sexual violence, arguing we can better understand the court’s (and by extension the Venetian government’s) priorities and concerns through the ways the Esecutori treated both victims and perpetrators of sexual offenses.