The author Deborah Swift thought that setting her third Italian Renaissance novel in Venice during the Carnival would give her villain the ideal opportunity for disguise. But when she began her research she discovered that the association between mask wearing and crime in Venice was anything but straightforward.
When I decided to set a novel in Venice in the 17th century, I was aware of the carnival season and the revels and disguises, and knew that the timeline would fit neatly with the two previous books. The plot of the novel features an assassin, and I realised the masked celebrations of Carnival would be an ideal place for this character to hide in plain sight.
So I began researching everything I could about masks and criminality in Venice, and rather than it being the ‘ideal solution’ I had envisaged, it quickly became a novelist’s nightmare. Partly this is because, despite its associations with Carnival, there was no clear season when masking took place, and partly because masks were worn in all sorts of situations, not just as a disguise, and broader perceptions of their use have diminished over time.
Today, we think full-face masks are mostly used by criminals or those who wish to be in disguise, and they are heavily associated with deception. In Venice this was not the case, and, even in the 17th century, visitors from other countries never really understood the peculiar Venetian convention of mask-wearing.
The confusion was exacerbated by frequent changes in the law. For example, in 1608 it was forbidden to wear a mask in Venice except at carnival time. But by the early 18th century, according to visiting dignitary Monsignor Jacopo Oddi, even in Lent, the season of fasting and restraint, large numbers of masks were seen throughout the city. So why was this?
Every day mask wearing seemed to begin as a form of politeness in business or at the gaming table. Large amounts of money passed through Venice in the golden age of sail, as it was a centre for trade between east and west. Talk of money, and negotiations over assets, were often easier when the face could assume a neutral appearance.
Soon mask wearing in Venice became widely understood to be indicative of high status; a maintainer of propriety, a device used by the nobility which, rather than aiming to deceive, was designed to preserve the status quo.
When rich people adopt something, they soon have imitators, and the mask quickly became common attire. The exception was that masks were still forbidden in churches and convents, probably because these were the repositories of wealth, as well as being holy places.
In the early 17th century, after several incidents of murders by masked men, the Council of Ten banned carrying a weapon when masked. Town guards were asked to frisk maskers for weapons, but these searches became so common they soon became cursory, and there was no guarantee a masked man would not be armed.
In the late Renaissance, women were often masked for modesty, and this led to a law that forbade prostitutes from wearing the mask. In 1608 any ‘woman of ill-repute’ found wearing one would be chained between the columns in the Piazzetta at San Marco, whipped, and banned from the city for four years. Yet only 100 years later, when masking had become de rigueur, prostitutes were actually required by law to wear masks in public.
By the 1770s and 80s the laws on mask wearing were so unclear that compliance to the law became almost impossible to enforce. There were laws, but no-one took any notice of them. In that respect, it was like the recent Covid mask-wearing; there was guidance and advice, or soft laws, which were widely interpreted in different ways. People rebelled as they saw the enforcing of mask-wearing laws as an attempt to control the population at a time of the city’s rapid expansion.
For the authorities, controlling mask wearing was an attempt to make sure people knew who was in charge – an example of this was the State Inquisitors, who passed a law saying: ‘no patrician may enter the theatre or the orchestra seats unless masked.’ The key here is the word ‘patrician’ — as it was clearly an attempt, through masking and the sumptuary (clothing) laws, to define and reinforce the upper classes.
As for crime, money and property were the driving force behind the law. Burglary and forgery were the most common crimes, but it was by no means unusual for there to be murders over money and debts. The punishment for robbery increased depending on the quantity of property taken.
If you stole goods worth less than one lira, you could probably get away with a whipping, but woe betide you if you stole something more valuable. The penalty was the loss of an eye for goods valued between five to ten lire, and the noose awaited those brave enough to steal something worth more than forty lire.
Added to this, the law allowed for anyone who was owed more than five lire de piccola to threaten and even kill the debtor in order to recoup their money. Most assaults were subject to a mere fine of 25 lire, or banishment from the city state, but if your crime was a crime which drew blood – sanguinem fecerit – then the punishment was up to the judging council.
Proof of guilt was largely circumstantial, and it relied on the judge and jury’s instinct as to the guilt of the person involved. Obviously masking up made you less recognisable, and even if you were recognised, your masked friends in high places could be a great help.
As well as the difficulties for a novelist of when a person should be masked, and what the penalties might be for murder, the other difficulty was technical.
Most masks worn by nobles were the bauta, the full mask and tricorn. For women the moretta mask, which covered the whole face, and was held between the teeth by a button, was common. It struck me that the lack of facial expression must mean reliance on gesture must have been mandatory for most maskers. In certain situations, my protagonist wouldn’t be able to ‘raise an eyebrow’, ‘blush’ or ‘smile’.
Nevertheless, the mask phenomenon in Venice, and its connection to crime, is absolutely fascinating. I can heartily recommend the book Venice Incognito – Masks in the Serene Republic (see below) for anyone who wants to know more about masks and the class hierarchies in Venice.
The Fortune Keeper by Deborah Swift, the third in her Italian Renaissance series, was published on 24 November, 2022.
Find out more about this book.
Further reading:
Venice Incognito – Masks in the Serene Republic by James H Johnson
Working Women of Early Modern Venice by Monica Chojnacka
Law and Punishment in Early Renaissance Venice by Guido Ruggiero
Deborah’s feature on the historical background to The Silkworm Keeper, the second book in the series, is Slashing the face: punishing unfaithful women in Italy.
Images:
- Venice, the Ridotto at Palazzo Dandolo with Masked Figures Dancing and Conversing (detail) by Francesco Guardi, 1750s: Gandalf’s Gallery for Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
- Mascare usate in Veneta che tirano ovi odoriferi, etching showing five masked men with baskets of eggshells filled with rosewater for throwing during the Carnival, early 17th century: New York Public Library digital collection via Wikimedia (public domain)
- Il Rinoceronte by Pietro Longhi, 1751: Ca’ Rezzonico, Venice via Wikimedia (public domain)
- The Ridotto in Venice by Pietro Longhi, 1750s: Wikimedia (public domain)
- Casino (Il Ridotto) by a follower of Pietro Longhi, 1750s: Rijksmuseum via Wikimedia (public domain)
