wayfarers in wonderland 563
observed in his famed discussion of the practices of prostitutes in his Dia-
logues. But even as a fantasy, this vision was significant.44 for in many
ways, sex and especially its illicit world in the renaissance were driven
by imagination and fantasy; and thus both must be taken seriously if we
wish to understand their meaning and practice.
The noted meeting between the future king of france, henry iii, and
the famous courtesan/poet Veronica franco is perhaps the most notable
example of the elite and refined reputation that the topmost ranks of pros-
titutes could command. When henry visited the city in 1574, he cut a por-
tion of the elaborate public ceremonies the city had devised to celebrate
his visit and win his favor to enjoy her reportedly more interesting and
refined favors.45 again we are in a Venetian wonderland with what might
seem a private, even secret, moment between the future king of france
and the current queen of courtesans being celebrated publicly afterwards
by both henry and Veronica. at a just slightly more prosaic level, the
marriage of the courtesan andriana savorgnan with the Venetian noble
Marco dandolo reveals how refinement, selectivity, and love all figured
centrally in her practice. court testimony that grew out of the claim by
the dandolo family that andriana had used love magic to bind Marco’s
love to her and ultimately force him to marry her against his will—a claim
that he vehemently denied, affirming that his love was real—emphasized
that he was just the last in a long line of her noble lovers, several of whom
had also attempted to marry her. significantly, this testimony came from
a number of those nobles themselves and demonstrates that before her
marriage she had been the darling of a select group of some of the most
important men in Venice.46
The dandolo family’s claim that andriana had used love magic to bind
Marco’s love was, in the context of the time, a good one, as love magic was
often associated with a courtesan’s arts and prostitution well down the
social scale, again suggesting how important a role love was seen to play
in prostitution. in fact, it appears that in Venice, prostitutes—along with
44 see my discussion of this in Binding Passions, pp. 41–43.
45 Margaret rosenthal describes this encounter briefly in her important study of
franco, The Honest Courtesan: Veronica Franco, Citizen and Writer in Sixteenth Century
Venice (chicago, 1992), pp. 102–11, along with giving an excellent account of the cultural
world and life of the most famed of Venetian courtesans. on this more generally, see
the essays in feldman and Gordon, The Courtesan’s Arts, and the forthcoming volume
by courtney Quaintance tentatively titled Gentleman’s Club: Masculinity and Collective
Identity in Sixteenth Century Venice.
46 ruggiero, Binding Passions, pp. 28–29.