The Strait Gate by Daniel Jütte

Author:Daniel Jütte [Jutte, Daniel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 2015-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

Figure 28. De iniuriis per scripta (On wrongs committed with writing). Woodcut from Joos de Damhouder, Praxis rerum criminalium (Antwerp, 1601).

As Damhouder notes in another section of his book, it was quite common to defame a people by affixing libel as well as objects to their doors (uspiam ad valvas).61 From an early modern perspective, it was a particularly grave insult. Many contemporary jurists argued that affixing libel to doors and walls should be considered injurious not only to victims’ personal honor, but also to their “domestic peace” (Hausfrieden).62 The specific content of the libel might affect the degree of insult, but it was the act of illegally affixing it that constituted the injury to the honor and peace of the house.

The spectrum of insults and accusations contained in such defamatory texts was very broad, as was the range of situations in which verbal injuries came into play.63 Tellingly, pre-modernity had its own lexicon—now largely forgotten—for describing this phenomenon, and this is further evidence of the fundamental difference between the uses (and abuses) of door postings in that era and the predominantly commercial placarding that we see in ours.64 One term that was commonly used for certain types of defamation in the early modern period was the “pasquil.” In the English sphere, it dates back to 1533; in Italy, even a few decades earlier.65 The word refers to a statue in Rome by the name of Pasquino, on which people posted insulting texts. According to popular lore, the statue’s name derived from a fifteenth-century Roman known for his sharp-tongued verse. The term “pasquil” spread rapidly across early modern Europe, and, as the practice of the “pasquinade” became more widespread, its preferred showplace moved from statues to doors.66

Pasquils were typically motivated by various types of social transgression and deviance, proven or alleged, such as theft, perjury, personal vices (including drunkenness, miserliness, or lying), unchristian behavior, or even physical deformity. Social outsiders were often targeted, and also women. In Rome in 1559, under cover of night, the following pasquil was tacked to the door of a courtesan named Camilla: “Camilla the Sienese the thin / Has a dive for cops, for pubkeepers, / For louts to sleep in.”67 In London in 1613, an anonymous author wrote this message “at large in a peece of paper” and posted it on a woman’s door: “Within this doore / Dwelleth a verie notorious whore.”68 Verses like these do not show great poetic talent, but they served their purpose—to attract public attention in the neighborhood, disseminating accusations that in some cases have survived to this day, often without enough evidence for the historian to determine their veracity. It is noteworthy that pasquils were not limited to the lower rungs of society and were especially popular among academics. Complaints about the loose living of students were very common in early modern university cities. In 1555, the administrators of the University of Ingolstadt addressed a widespread problem when they complained that “[m]any of the students show themselves to

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