Una gentildonna davanti al Sant’Uffizio: Il processo per eresia a Isabella della Frattina, 1568–1570 by Federica Ambrosini (review)

This book presents an edition of the voluminous documents of the trial for heresy of the noblewoman Isabella della Frattina by the Venetian Holy Office and an historical introduction. Although few women were tried by Italian inquisitions, this useful book tells us a good deal about how they presented themselves to inquisitions.

Isabella da Passano was born in Padua, the daughter of a Genoese noble couple. She married another noble, Marco della Frattina from Portogruaro in Friuli, where they lived. In 1559 she was denounced as a heretic because she was seen with an unnamed heretical book in her hands, and because she ate meat on days of abstinence. The local inquisitor did little. However, in 1568 her mother, then living in Mantua, in response to intense questioning from an inquisitor investigating a group of Protestants there, mentioned Isabella as a possible heretic. The mother said that she feared that Isabella might have contracted heretical ideas from learned men who came to the Passano house in Padua. Federica Ambrosini speculates that the mother may have implicated her daughter because she feared for herself if she did not offer some names. Because of the mother’s statement, plus evidence that a man hired to teach the Frattina children in Portogruaro had read from heretical books to Isabella and her husband, Isabella (now a widow) was arrested and brought to Venice for trial in 1568. She was about thirty-six years of age.

A long trial from June 1568 to May 1570 followed, during which Isabella was confined to a female convent. The Venetian Holy Office followed its customary practice of carrying on several trials simultaneously, which meant that Isabella or witnesses were questioned only once a week or every fortnight. Isabella, a strong personality, immediately admitted having looked at heretical books for reasons of curiosity in the past. But she denied any adherence to Protestant ideas, the customary defense of those accused. She adopted the stance that as a woman she did not think about theological matters. That was for men. Even though she was Latin literate, she claimed to be a devout and conforming woman who read only the Little Office of Our Lady, a popular devotional work, and prayed the rosary. Ambrosini points out that this position enabled her to avoid any potential doctrinal traps and was consistent with contemporary attitudes concerning women and religion. On May 11, 1570, the Venetian Holy Office absolved Isabella della Frattina for lack of evidence.

The decision was expected, because no heretical books were found, because the titles of works that she might have read or heard were not identified, and because she practiced all the daily actions and rituals of Catholicism. Ambrosini comments that people often revealed their heterodoxy by their failure to do ordinary Catholic actions, such as attending Mass and observing the rules of fast and abstinence. Ambrosini opines that there are three possible conclusions about Isabella. She might have been telling the truth. Second, she and her husband had been philo-Protestants nourished in a Protestant conventicle in Padua of which her mother was part. But then the couple rejected Protestantism and became exemplary Catholics. Or, third, that Isabella was a Nicodemite, one who conformed outwardly to Catholicism, while holding heretical views in secret.

This is an excellent book. In her long introduction, Ambrosini provides a balanced assessment of heresy in the Veneto, the operations of the Venetian Holy Office, and analysis of what the trial revealed. Most important, the trial documents have been carefully edited and provided with extensive notes. It is sometimes forgotten that the accused had the right to defense counsel in Italian inquisition trials. The surviving documentation of this trial is very unusual in that it includes the text of the twenty-pages-long impassioned and...