Gender, Sexuality, and Syphilis in Early Modern Venice

This provocative book questions the assumption that syphilis (the 'French disease') became widespread in Venice because of its legendary courtesans. Using new evidence, Laura McGough reconstructs the city's sexual networks, revealing a society where sexual relations linked people of different classes, neighbourhoods and occupations. Venice's restrictive marriage customs, its role as a centre of migration, and fears of male sexual impotence brought about a sexual culture that fostered the spread of disease. To prevent the spread of disease, Venetian authorities focused on a single target: beautiful young women and girls, who were encouraged to enter walled asylums to protect their chastity. Both medical authorities and the public believed this 'routine disease' could be treated and cured: only cases that did not respond to treatment aroused suspicions that the illness was caused by witchcraft. Gender, Sexuality and Syphilis in Early Modern Venice thereby explores the medical, social, and cultural transitions that occur as a disease comes to be regarded as routine and widespread.