Description:
Looking at Catholic charity and social policy in past times, this book focuses on 'unrespectable' women and children in Italy, and their treatment at the hands of charities and the law. It looks at prostitutes and women engaged in sexual relationships outside formal marriage, and foundlings, many of whom were abandoned because they were born out of wedlock.
A wide-ranging synoptic survey, this study considers the practical complications and consequences of communities' decisions to accommodate and regulate activities considered bad but irrepressible: of the belief that licensed prostitution and controlled abandonment could be used to avert greater evils, from sodomy and adultery to infanticide and abortion. Accessibly written, Tolerance, regulation and rescue discusses social problems which are still the subject of debate, and should appeal not only to academics and students, but also to general readers.Brief description: Brian Pullan is Emeritus Professor of Modern History at the University of Manchester
Review Quotes:
'Tolerance, Regulation and Rescue is an extremely helpful overview of its subjects for early modern Italy. It will stand as a model for similar efforts for other regions.'
Thomas J. Kuehn, Clemson University, H-Italy January 2019