Hostname: page-component-84b7d79bbc-2l2gl Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-29T21:38:39.407Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Orphans and Ladies: The Venetian Conservatoires (1680–1790)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 1962

Get access

Extract

The Peacefulness and longevity of the Venetian Republic prove that it had solved one of its greatest problems—that of poverty. Not that it was rid of its poor even in times of prosperity: but at least they were cared for by a wealth of charitable organisations, and that desperation which leads to civil insurrection never gained a hold. The chronically sick, the girls having no dowry, the orphans and the beggars were each helped by various confraternities which were supported by the more fortunate. Some of these were specifically for members of a trade who had fallen on difficult times, like that founded in 1340 by a German cobbler called Henry, who left money to help infirm and needy shoemakers. Others, looked after ‘widows without male issue’; and old people attracted a great deal of money to provide homes for them.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Musical Association, 1962

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Rossi, Bibl. Marciana MS. 9286, p.29.Google Scholar

2 Ibid, p. 34.Google Scholar

3 v. B. Pullan, ‘Poverty, Charity and the Reason of State’, Bollettino dell’-Istιtuto di Stona della Società e dello Stato II (1960) p. 23.Google Scholar

4 Ordinι et capitoli della compagnia dell'oratono, ιl quale nell'Hospιtale de gli Incurabili in Venetιa, Venice 1568.Google Scholar

5 Sansovino, Venetia città nobιlιssιma (1663 edition) p. 90.Google Scholar

6 Ospedali, Busta 892, entry for 20 November 1632.Google Scholar

7 Ospedali, Busta 687, f. 51.Google Scholar

8 The regulations are dated 31 December 1684. Ospedali, Busta 687, p. 141f.Google Scholar

9 Ospedali, Busta 687, p. 54.Google Scholar

10 Ibid p. 123.Google Scholar

11 Ibid, Notatorio ‘D’, p. 19.Google Scholar

12 Ibid, Notatorio ‘E’, p. 186.Google Scholar

13 v. Bontempi, Hιstoria Musica, Perugia 1695, p. 170.Google Scholar

14 Ospedali, Busta 688, Notatorio ‘G’, f. 102 v.Google Scholar

15 Ibid, f. 181.Google Scholar

16 Ospedali, Busta 690, f. 171 v.Google Scholar

17 Ospedali, Busta 658, entry for 28 July 1730.Google Scholar

18 Ospedali, Busta 860, f. 53, records the payment of his salary in October 1733, but he may have been appointed any time before then.Google Scholar

19 Ospedali, Busta 853, entry 7 August 1740.Google Scholar

20 Ospedali, Busta 654, entry 27 August 1741.Google Scholar

21 Ospedali, Busta 654, entry 25 February 1744 (M. V. 1743)Google Scholar

22 see Ospedali, Busta 692, Notatorio ‘R’, f. 126 v; and F. Walker, ‘A chronology of the Life and Works of Nicola Porpora’, Italian Studies VI (1951) P. 53.Google Scholar

23 A great deal of the Ospedaletto collection is still intact in the library of the Conservatorio Benedetto Marcello in Venice. Other pieces can be found in the Biblioteca Marciana; while much of Porpora's Venetian church music is preserved in British Museum manuscripts.Google Scholar

24 v. Travels, ed. Scholes, London 1959, Vol I, p. 113 ff.Google Scholar

25 Marciana MS 10777.Google Scholar

26 Marciana MS 10693.Google Scholar

27 published by Ricordi, Milan 1959.Google Scholar

28 Marciana MS 10692.Google Scholar

29 Ospedali, Busta 693, Notatorio ‘S’, f. 152.Google Scholar

30 Samuel Sharp, Letters from Italy, 2nd. edition, 1767, p. 28.Google Scholar

31 v. Pincherle, Vivaldi, English edition, London 1958, pp. 20 and 26.Google Scholar

32 Ibid, p. 54.Google Scholar

33 Marciana MS 9314, pp. 8991. Of this sum, 5615 lire were expenses incurred at the concert.Google Scholar

34 Molmenti, P., Epistolari Veneziani del Sec. XVIII Venice, n.d., p. 67.Google Scholar

35 Ibid p. 78.Google Scholar

36 Marciana MS 9286, pp. 40 ff.Google Scholar

37 v. L. Simond, A tour in Italy and Sicily, London 1828, p. 59.Google Scholar

38 Ospedali, Busta 922.Google Scholar