wayfarers in wonderland 561
san Basso... in santa Margarita... at san sebastiano... in san Barnabà in
the calle longa, and in san stae in the calle del forno.”37
in all, 31 locations are mentioned, suggesting strongly that the ideal of
limiting prostitution to one area of the city out of public view was no
longer working, if it ever had. Moreover, if continuing legislation passed
regularly over the 16th century that aimed at securing the same end is any
indication, it remained a dead letter.38 another indication of the failure of
such attempts is the decline of the public brothel itself. across our period
it was rented out to a series of noble Venetian families who ran it and
paid taxes on their profits, most notably the colorful Malipiero clan. Their
revenues had sunk so low by the early 1500s that dionisio Malipiero tried
to sell his family’s rights to it but could not find a buyer. and in 1537 his
son Priam lamented to authorities that in the best of times he only had
ten to 15 prostitutes working for him there and more usually only three or
four.39 his complaints need to be taken with a grain of salt, however, as
they were part of a petition to reduce the taxes on his family’s monopoly
rights; but again they suggest that the public brothel was no longer the
place where prostitution was centered in the city.
Their bordello’s decline was probably predicated on competition from
other forms of prostitution. unregistered and untaxed part-time workers
were probably less expensive and thus undercut business. There are occa-
sional references also to private brothels and casinos where prostitutes
worked, although it is not clear what went on at the latter.40 registered
prostitutes who worked independently or for pimps (ruffiani or ruffiane)
were probably more costly, but also more competitive for clients. in a lit-
tle known 16th-century Venetian comedy, La Bulesca, Marcolina a young
prostitute who has left a privately run bordello to practice independently
explained to her sister the benefits of practicing independently, “if i had
remained [in the bordello]... i would never have had more than a little
money... it is good to be one’s own master, to live in one’s own house
rather than to have to screw this one and that in the bordello. if you earn
a dress, it is yours, while there [in the bordello] you must pay a third
of your earnings for expenses and constantly sweat under this one and
37 a.s.V., signori di notte al civil, capitolare i, fol. 113r; published in lorenzi, Leggi e
memorie, p. 92; see also discussion in ruggiero, Binding Passions, p. 49.
38 ibid.
39 ruggiero, Binding Passions, p. 236 n. 51.
40 ibid., pp. 43–44, 235 n. 40.