Virgins Of Venice: Female Experience In An Age Of Religious Reform, 1500-1650

Renaissance Venice had a convent on every canal front, and nuns loomed large in the city's daily life. Far from being places of religious devotion, the convents were often little more than dumping grounds for unmarried women from the upper ranks of Venetian society.

Supported by their private incomes, the nuns ate, dressed and behaved as gentlewomen. They followed the latest fashions in hairstyles, wore high-heeled clogs and gold-embroidered stockings, gave parties for their relatives, and schemed to influence the running of the city's affairs.

But at the beginning of the sixteenth century this pleasant lifestyle came under threat. As the Protestant Reformation unfolded throughout Europe, the Catholic Church took fright and set about reforming its own institutions. Convents, traditionally viewed as places of vice and sexual corruption, were at the top of the list. Stiff penalties were introduced for those who illegally breached convent walls. Nuns were forbidden to leave their convent. And then the visitations began.