The social historian, searching for the basis of a culture, often turns to a study of ordinary people. Perhaps one of the most revealing places to find them is in a court of law. In this presentatoin of nine criminal trials of sixteenth-century Rome (1540-75), where magistrates kept verbatim records, Thomas and Elizabeth Cohen paint a lively portrait of a society, one that is reminiscent of Boccaccio. These stories, however, are true.

Each trial transcript is followed by an essay that interprets the beliefs, codes, everyday speech, and personal transactions of a world that is radically different from our own. The people on trial include assassins, a spell-caster, an exorcist, an adulterous wife, several courtesans, and the peasant cast of a bawdy, sacrilegious play. Out of their often pognant troubles, and their machinations, comes a vivid revelation of not only the tumultuous street life of Rome but also rituals of honour, the power and weakness of women, and the realities of social and economic hierarchies.

Like cinema-verite, Words and Deeds in Renaissance Rome gives us an intimate glimpse of a people and their world.

Elizabeth S. Cohen teaches in the Department of History and in the Division of Humanties, York University.

Elizabeth S. Cohen's profile page

Thomas V. Cohen is Associate Professor in the Department of History and in the Division of Humanities, York University.

Thomas V. Cohen's profile page

'These fascinating snapshots of Renaissance Rome and its population are illuminating on many counts; they shed light, for example, on one of the most interesting aspects of the past, the relationship between the sexes, which is often difficult to retrieve from other official documentation. Men and women interact in these pages in ways that seem very familiar to us: they make friends, move house, go shopping, have sex, joke and argue in a seemingly contemporary fashion.'

Canadian Journal of Urban Research

'It is indeed a worthy piece of investigation and scholarship.'

The Literary Review of Canada

'Words and Deeds in Renaissance Rome is designed as a textbook of source materials which will be of great use to teachers and students of Renaissance Italy and of interest to the general reader.'

Quaderni d'italianisctica

'Highly recommended for anyone interested in the Renaissance.'

Choice