Claire Judde de Larivière – författare

The Revolt of Snowballs unpicks a rare and turbulent event which occurred in 1511 and investigates the meaning behind it. On January 27, 1511, the island of Murano was the scene of an exceptional event during which the representative of Venice, exercising power in the island on behalf of the Serenissima, was hunted by the inhabitants under a shower of snowballs and the sound of a hostile clamour. This book uses microhistory techniques to examine the trial records of the incident and explores the lives of the Murano’s inhabitants at its heart.

The book begins by providing a detailed introduction to life in Murano during the sixteenth century, including its political framework and the relationship it shared with Venice. Against this context, the political skills of Murano’s inhabitants are considered and key questions regarding political action are posed, including why and how people chose to protest, what sense of justice drove their actions, and what form those actions took. The latter half of the book charts the events that followed the revolt of snowballs, including the inquest and its impact on Murano’s society.

By putting Murano under the microscope, The Revolt of Snowballs provides a window into the cultural and political world of early modern Italy, and is essential reading for historians of revolt and microhistory more broadly.

The Revolt of Snowballs unpicks a rare and turbulent event which occurred in 1511 and investigates the meaning behind it. On January 27, 1511, the island of Murano was the scene of an exceptional event during which the representative of Venice, exercising power in the island on behalf of the Serenissima, was hunted by the inhabitants under a shower of snowballs and the sound of a hostile clamour. This book uses microhistory techniques to examine the trial records of the incident and explores the lives of the Murano’s inhabitants at its heart.

The book begins by providing a detailed introduction to life in Murano during the sixteenth century, including its political framework and the relationship it shared with Venice. Against this context, the political skills of Murano’s inhabitants are considered and key questions regarding political action are posed, including why and how people chose to protest, what sense of justice drove their actions, and what form those actions took. The latter half of the book charts the events that followed the revolt of snowballs, including the inquest and its impact on Murano’s society.

By putting Murano under the microscope, The Revolt of Snowballs provides a window into the cultural and political world of early modern Italy, and is essential reading for historians of revolt and microhistory more broadly.

Popular Politics in an Aristocratic Republic explores the different aspects of political actions and experiences in late medieval and early modern Venice.

The book challenges the idea that the city of Venice knew no political conflict and social contestation during the medieval and early modern periods. By examining popular politics in Venice as a range of acts of contestation and of constructive popular political participation, it contributes to the broader debate about premodern politics. The volume begins in the late fourteenth century, when the demographical and social changes resulting from the Black Death facilitated popular challenges to the ruling class’s power, and finishes in the late eighteenth century, when the French invasion brought an end to the Venetian Republic. It innovates Venetian studies by considering how ordinary Venetians were involved in politics, and how popular politics and contestation manifested themselves in this densely populated and diverse city. Together the chapters propose a more nuanced notion of political interactions and highlight the role that ordinary people played in shaping the city’s political configuration, as well as how the authorities monitored and punished contestation.

Popular Politics in an Aristocratic Republic combines recent historiographical approaches to classic themes from political, social, economic, and religious Venetian history with contributions on gender, migration, and urban space. The volume will be essential reading for students of Venetian history, medieval and early modern Italy and Europe, political and social history.