In the Labyrinth: Italian Expressions

I have been reading Thomas V. Cohen's Love and Death in Renaissance Italy, a fascinating study of crime reports, for the information they reveal about life and language in the 16th century (the setting of my WIP). Detailed handwritten depositions of criminal cases recorded the testimonies of everyone from the kitchen boy, the serving girls, maids-in-waiting, pages, the knights, and the aristocracy. These depositions offer a wealth of information on the crime and the formulaic language used by all witnesses when speaking about the crimes. There were competing considerations for everyone involved. The serving women tried to be loyal to their Lady but recognized the higher authority of the Lord to whom they were obliged. The criminal and the aggrieved party engaged in tense discussions to find reconciliation. The law scribe transcribed the different voices into a legal process that would move toward appropriate compensation and resolution, thus ending the potential for future retribution and violence.

To maintain a reasonable chance of peace after a heinous crime (especially among the aristocracy and on which the lower classes depended for their survival), a codified language was used to satisfy the law's requirements and distance all parties from the threat of additional violence. Arriving at proper justice required a lexicon of acceptable phrases to describe the drama in "words and ceremonies that could channel the pain and convert catastrophe into something that is, because encoded, bearable."

These are a few research notes of mine, as well as Italian vocabulary and phrases that are new to me. As I am still reading through Cohen's work (so well written), there will probably be more of these notes as I gather ideas and thoughts about the new novel.

"Scannare": the ritual slaughter of cattle through the neck, though occasionally used against unfaithful wives. Since adultery is a crime, a husband would have been obliged to murder his wife if caught indelicate to preserve the honor of the family and its position.

"Ah, traitorous, this is the honor you do the Savelli house; you have cut off the nose of the Savelli House!" A transcript of the Massara, the senior servant to the Lady of the House. Cohen explains it: "Nose cutting, in Renaissance Italy, was a gesture of extreme contempt, a permanent disfigurement penalized in codes of law and signaled in local speech and custom. As an act, as a notion, it is often attached to adultery and cuckoldry... Victoria's (the wife) treason had afflicted her husband, her brother (with whom she was having a sexual affair), and the whole Savelli House. "

Once the killing is done, there begins a dialogue on the propriety of events: honor lost and then restored by specific acts and words, which, if done according to the ritual, invites a legal restoration of honor and the rights of those dishonored. From the deposition in the case files:

"Signor Luovico (Albano family) turned to Signore Giovanni Battista, asking who killed the signora. Signor Giovanni Battista answered, "I killed her with my own hands." Then Signor Ludovico answered, "If you had not killed her yourself, I would have killed all three of you (the wife, the brother, and Stefano, the Albano cousin charged with looking after the sister.) At this point, Stefano, who was present, said to Ludovico, "Signore, nobody laid a hand on the signora except Signor Giovanni Battista, but as Triano (the brother), I'm the one who killed him because I loved Your Lordship and because Signor Giovanni Battista commanded me to."

Cohen then takes apart how this script both exonerates the brutal murders and returns both families into an accord: honor restored to both houses rather than vendetta or revenge: "In all this discussion, probably only the husband spoke the single truth, Ludovico and the two servitors said what the situation demanded...Stefano's improbable declaration of love reached out to make Ludovico complicit, a putative advocate of killings done on his behalf. Here, Stefano's amore was of the instrumental variety, not expressive passion but a social obligation, tagged in the language of effect...As for Ludovico's blood-curdling declaration, it at once sanctioned and hedged the double murder. The weight of his mock threat gave the killings gravitas and underlined its propriety."