A Lady’s Man, 2014
The Cicisbei, Private Morals and National Identity in Italy
Genders and Sexualities in History Series

Three people in a marriage: a woman and two men. This was the eighteenth-century Italian aristocratic model of marriage, characterized by the presence of the cicisbeo, the escort of another man's wife. Was it a brazen depravity or a complex and refined social institution, revealing aspects of Italian civilization in the Age of the Enlightenment?

1. Introduction: Who were the Cicisbei? 2. In the World of Enlightenment 3. In the Eighteenth-Century Society 4. The Geopolitics of Cicisbeism 5. The Erotic Implications of Cicisbeism 6. The Cicisbei Banned

Roberto Bizzocchi teaches Early Modern History at the University of Pisa, Italy. Among others, he has written In famiglia. Interessi e affetti nell'Italia moderna (Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2001), and Genealogie incredibili. Scritti di Storia nell'Europa moderna (Bologna, il Mulino, 2009 2nd. ed., French translation: Paris, Editions Rue d'Ulm 2010).