Prostitution in Early Modern
Europe
Heather Hoyt
Ashley Turpin
Katharine Lorden
Kyle Anderson
Cristi Casey
Prostitution & Religion
• A theory about prostitution is that it thrived because it was politically useful to
the ruling class.
• Unemployment, underemployment, and inadequate wages pushed many
women into prostitution.
• Prostitution itself was an important part of the city’s moral system.
• According to Fransisco Farfan, a sixteenth-century cleric of Spain, recognized
the upside-down morality of prostitution.
– He recognized the weakness of flesh and believed the only way to deal with it was
to divert human behavior away from moral sins.
– Prostitution could support the moral order, but only if it were closely regulated (by
city Fathers)
Prostitution & Religion
• Confining prostitutes in licensed brothels prevented some property damage,
and it also protected the interests of those who owned the property used as the
city brothels.
Historian Fransisco Rodriguez Marin concluded
that the property used as city brothels was
owned by city officials and religious corporations,
including the Cathedral council.
City fathers who owned brothels did argue
that these brothels benefited the entire
community because they provided a livelihood
for otherwise destitute women.
• To most city fathers, prostitution was
not only thinkable, it was practical.
Prostitution & Religion
• Prostitution strengthened moral attitudes that supported the
city’s hierarchy of authority, and it permitted the city
oligarchy to demonstrate its authority to define and confine
evil.
– To city fathers in Seville, prostitutes were lost women, however, historical
evidence presents a picture of prostitutes who were an integral part of their
community.
* “Lost Women” in Early Modern Seville: The politics of Prostitution. By
Mary Elizabeth Perry
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Economic Need of Prostitution
Although prostitution may be associated with the
idea of easy money and fast women, further
examination developed a serious reason for
prostitution: economic need.
The economic distress in the Seventeenth century,
that hit female artisans particular in Seville, was the
cause of many social changes. 21
Laws that prohibited clothing of silk and brocade,
limited gold and silver embroidery, and fixed a
permissible number of domestic servants
compounded the problems of inflation and foreign
competition which resulted in unemployment and
reduced earnings. 21
In 1685, a royal minister wrote this was “the most
miserable state” of the area where people were
dying from hunger. Women begged from door to
door “because the work of their hands could not
sustain them, and other women retired into their
houses without having clothing to even attend
mass.” (Perry, 21).
Economic Need of Prostitution
- The economic decline in the seventeenth century directly hit abandoned wives
and daughters and single mothers. 151
- The declining marriage rates began to disturb those who saw that the lower
wages offered to women meant that those without husbands could not support
themselves with just their own labor. 16-17
- Poverty was now seen as a social problem, yet people began to make the
distinction between immoral women who were willfully promiscuous and
those who lost their virtue as a consequence of poverty. 49
- Soon there was a close relationship drawn between poverty, lack of
supervision for females, and their loss of virtue. 53
- Later in the century economic essayists warned that failure to marry had
resulted in many impoverished women. Charitable appeals emphasized the
need to protect the poor women as victims of circumstances and recognized
these women were exceptionally vulnerable to exploitation and the loss of
virtue. 146
Economic Need of Prostitution
- Now it was established that poverty and prostitution went
hand in hand.
- Prostitutes were seen as victims of circumstances and their vulnerability to
sin increasing with their economic situation meaning the more poor they
were the more likely they were to prostitute. Clerks portrayed prostitutes
as sinners to redeem, rather than necessary evils. 146
- With the French competition underselling local silk weavers, Cadiz
replacing Seville as primary port for transatlantic shipping. While prices
rose while real wages fell, women found prostitution one of the few ways
that they could earn money. 151
Economic Need of Prostitution
Beyond women attempting to survive by
prostituting to make money, the chapels,
hospitals, churches, and other religious
foundations began to make money and
income from the brothel property where
prostitutes worked. 149
The brothels began to lose support and soon
the preachers and pious laymen had
effectively closed the city brothels in the
1620, which meant the income to the
churches, hospitals, and chapels also ceased.
149
By1621, however, the city government
decided to support the brothel padres and
approved new regulations for the brothels to
abide, which began to give money back to the
many factors which depended on the income
from the brothels to effectively operate. But
by 1623, Philip IV formally prohibited
brothels in all of his kingdom. 149-150
Economic Need of Prostitution
• Prostitutes did not disappear by the closing of the brothels, for their economic
situation had not improved. These women were forced to work on the streets
without supervision becoming susceptible to disease to support themselves and
their children. 150
• Women who sold themselves on the streets of Seville chose to do so not out of
female perversity, but out of necessity. 151
• These women transformed their governing ethos from male honor to human
survival, and they broadened the sexual economy from brothel to streets. 151
*Perry, Mary Elizabeth. Gender and Disorder in Early Modern Seville. New Jersey:
Princeton University Press, 1990.
Regulation of Brothels
- The brothel, to medieval society was the locus of evil.
- Europe recognized the social value of prostitution but tried to keep it as unobtrusive as
possible, placing it under strict control without abolishing it totally.
- In many parts of Medieval and early modern Europe this meant establishing licensed, or
even municipally owned brothels or official red-light districts.
- The philosophy behind the official establishment and regulation of brothels in France and
Germany, followed church doctrine in treating prostitutes as degraded and dishonored but
tolerated their activity because of male demand.
- European towns that licensed or sponsored brothels did so not for the protection of the
prostitutes but for the maintenance of social order.
- Regulated brothels included in Florence, Seville, Dijon, Augsburg and the towns of
Languedoc in the medieval and early modern periods agreed that regulated brothels were
seen as a foundation of the social order, preventing homosexuality, rape and seduction.
Regulation of Brothels
- Also, brothels were considered important
sources of income for the town itself or in the
case of licensed brothels, for wealthy
individuals or institutions within the town.
Prostitutes were required to wear some sort of
distinguishing clothing and forbidden to wear
certain types of garments or jewelry.
In many places they were forbidden to attend
church with or speak to respectable women.
Men wanted to protect bourgeois wives by
labeling prostitutes and restricting them to
brothels.
Regulations generally gave the brothel
keepers a great deal of control over the
prostitutes.
Prostitutes paid the brothel keeper for room
and board, not according to the number of the
customers they had, but in Germany the
payments from the prostitutes might vary
according to their income.
Regulations of Brothels
• Some regulations specifically authorized the brothel keeper to imprison a woman for
debts she owed him.
• When she had no customers, the prostitute might also have to perform other work for
the profit of the brothel keeper.
• In most cases the prostitutes were required to live in the brothel and usually had to
board there too.
• In some towns the regulations protected the prostitutes from physical abuse, but in
others, particularly in Italy, the brothel keepers were allowed to strike the prostitutes.
• Regulations from municipal brothels in Languedoc and in Germany provide that the
houses should not be open for business on holy days or that the women should all
leave the brothel during the holy week.
• Some towns had restrictions on who could visit the brothels- no clerics, no married
men, no Jews ( not well enforced).
Regulation of Brothels
- Officially regulated or municipally owned brothels in many continental towns
took away the prostitutes mobility and their ability to set their own working
conditions, restricted their right to leave the profession. Yet, they provided a
roof over their head and reduced the need for them to seek out their own
customers.
*Source: “The Regulation of Brothels
in Later Medieval England”
By: Ruth Mazo Karras,
Database: JSTOR pgs. 399-433
University of Chicago Press
Year: 2000
Volume: 14
Prostitute Regulations
• Many prostitutes in Early Modern Europe did not have a choice whether or not
be be in the sinful practice. "Many women were not able to marry--because of
the lack of dowries, because of sex ratios, because too few men were in a
position to marry." And to add to this, the workforce had very little room for
women.
• Prostitution was legal in towns. Authorities all over Europe saw the social
value of prostitution but tried to keep it "unobtrusive as possible, placing it
under strict control without abolishing it totally."
• Many people had to get licenses or municipally own brothels. Sometimes
these brothels would even form into a "red-light district."
Prostitute Regulations
• The creation of these brothels help maintain social order by eliminating rape,
homosexuality, and seduction.
• The reasoning behind the regulation of prostitution in Early Modern Europe was to view
the prostitutes as degrading to society, yet needed because of the male demand.
Although the regulations on prostitution varied across Europe, most cities had a
designated area for prostitutes.
• You could tell a person was a prostitute by the distinguishing clothing which made them
stand out. The regulations however, were not necessarily all bad. Some laws may seem
harsh, but it is for the sole protection of the prostitutes themselves.
• One interesting fact is that some money generated from prostitution went to the church.
And the church also demanded that the brothels should be evacuated during Holy Week,
and that they should not be open during holy days.
Prostitute Regulations
• The regulations of Early Modern Europe also included who could visit the brothels and
who could not.
• Most towns had restrictions that excluded married men, clerics, or Jews from engaging
with their prostitutes. In the towns where prostitution was prohibited, local officials
were the authoritative figure who patrolled the cities. They had their own court systems
(secular and ecclesiastical) with fines and punishments. Discovered brothels were fined
on a regular basis and would just continue fining until the brothel keepers would cease
their actions.
• The Regulation of Brothels in Early Modern Europe Ruth Mazo Karras Signs, Vol. 14,
No. 2, Working Together in the Middle Ages: Perspectives on Women's Communities.
(Winter, 1989), pp. 399-433. Stable URL:
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0097-
9740%28198924%2914%3A2%3C399%3ATROBIL%3E2.0.C
Veronica Franco
(1546-1591)
“The Honest
Courtesan”
Background on Becoming a
Courtesan
• Venice’s women could be one of two things: a wife who
lead a sheltered and constricting life or an independent
women
• And becoming an independent woman meant the only way
for survival was prostitution.
• A women who was in this line of work had the ability to
become educated as well as acquire a fortune.
Being a Courtesan
• The Courtesan was the highest level a prostitute could
achieve.
• A women of this caliber had to be able to hold the attention
of her clients both sexually and intellectually
• The best would be taken on by full time patrons, and the
very best would engage in “honest” activities with these
patrons
• This ultimately moved these women up in class and in
social standing
Veronica Franco’s Life
• Daughter of a former courtesan, Paola Fracassa
• Married at an early age to Paolo Panizza, a doctor, in an
arranged marriage in the early 1560’s
• Franco separated from him soon after, through that she
became a courtesan
• She bore six children from different men, but only three
survived beyond infancy
• For most of her life she supported herself and a large
household of children, tutors and servants
…continued
• She excelled immensely at her profession
• Veronica became allies with very powerful men
• Her intellectual life began with sharing her brothers’
education by private tutors
• She became involved in the 1570’s with Domenico
Venier’s renowned literary salon in Venice
• Venier allowed her to become an honest courtesan and
eventually an honest women by funding her creative
achievement
Franco’s Literary
Achievements
• From 1570 to 1580 Franco created and published poetic
works as well as a collection of letters
• 1575-published the Terze Rime, a volume of poems
(represented and transformed her life as a courtesan)
• 1580-published her fifty Familiar Letters in Venice (the
letters show her in a range of daily activities-playing
music, sitting for a portrait, making dinner for friends,
engaging in literary projects)
Wealth
• Veronica’s published works eventually made her
wealthy
• This allowed her to give up the life of a courtesan
• She achieved a level of fame and social standing
that few ladies ever have
• After she gained her wealth she built a halfway
house for courtesans and their children
Later in Life
• In 1575 the plague hit Venice and Franco escaped the city
for two years
• During this time her possessions were stolen from her
home in Venice
• 1580-She was brought to court facing acquisitions of
witchcraft
• Even though the charges were dropped her reputation was
ruined
• She died sometime in 1591
“Women have not yet realized the cowardice that
resides, for if they should decide to do so, they
would be able to fight you until death; and to
prove that I speak the truth, amongst so many
women, I will be the first to act, setting an
example for them to follow.”
-Veronica Franco