Curiosa: The whores must walk!

[nebroadwe]

On April 16, 1603, the subordinates of Philip II of Naples (otherwise Philip III of Spain, for those of you keeping score at home) had a busy day, issuing in their monarch's name no less than seven orders forbidding the carrying of daggers, long swords, clubs, crossbows, blunderbusses and other arms in public; forbidding the wearing of certain sorts of sleeves and gloves and the commission of other sumptuary faux pas; forbidding the use (or possibly importation -- my Italian's not that great) of lead, iron, gravel and certain other kinds of stone; and forbidding prostitutes from riding in carriages. The good order of the city must be maintained -- if it means denying the populace their weapons or the whores their wheels, so be it.

I suppose the Conde de Venevente (under whose signature these orders were promulgated) and his secretary Andrea de Salazar went to dinner quite satisfied with their day's work, and Domenico Tabbanelli, printer, rubbed his hands together at the prospect of another fat fee for his services. Nobody thinks of the poor meretrices, dragging their illegal sleeves in the dust as they rest their aching feet, while their sfruttatori try to look menacing without swords or clubs or even lead shot to heave at gawkers.

Nobody thinks of the cataloger, either, forced four centuries later to figure out how to anatomize this stuff.

ETA: Two weeks earlier, on 31 March, Don Francisco de Castro issued an order forbidding the use of mules to draw coaches. This order was reaffirmed by the Conde de Venevente on 30 September. Coincidence?

Comments

[nateprentice.livejournal.com]

anatomizing shouldn't be too difficult when it comes to dealing with prostitution.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

The lead, gravel, etc. are a lot more difficult.

[mulzrule.livejournal.com]

*gasp!* No mules!?!?!?!*dies* Guess you'll be visiting me in jail. Oh this cracked me up.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Guess you'll be visiting me in jail.

Only if you try to pull a coach in Naples. :-)

Oh this cracked me up.

The past really is a different country. I love working with these kinds of materials, even if they are a pain in the neck to catalog.

[mulzrule.livejournal.com]

That sounds like the kind of job I could get into. I'm the only one I know who can giggle at reference materials. Hell, I even find dictionaries funny.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

That sounds like the kind of job I could get into.

Pulling a coach? :-)

I'm the only one I know who can giggle at reference materials. Hell, I even find dictionaries funny.

Oh, that job. Hey, Rare Book School will start accepting applicants for its summer courses at UVA soon ...

[mulzrule.livejournal.com]

Our town actually does have carrage rides for tourists and mom and I were just talking about getting into business with the mule. Conclusion: Jan and I would probably end up killing someone. XD

Thanks for the link. What kind of jobs would be available for this type of degree? Government? Library?

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Last I checked, RBS wasn't offering a degree in anything -- it's supplementary education for people working with rare books: librarians, but also analytic bibliographers, literary scholars, antiquarians, booksellers, historians, archivists ... My anecdata suggest that you can get into rare book work in libraries without having a library degree if you have practical experience with some aspect of rare bookmanship: a friend's sister got in by being able to arrange exhibitions; I worked my way up from stacker to cataloger, but what really tipped the scales was having the advanced degree in literature (cataloging can be taught fairly quickly, but research and language skills are a longer process).

[mulzrule.livejournal.com]

Ah, thank you.