The war of the fists : popular culture and public violence in late Renaissance Venice
The War of the Fists is a study of seventeenth-century worker culture in the city of Venice, focusing on the mock battles, or battagliole, which the town's two popular factions waged on public bridges. These "little battles" were partly festive battle, partly sport, and partly thinly veiled plebeian mayhem: they could involve as many as a thousand fighters on each side and attracted crowds of thirty thousand or more
History
vi, 232 pages : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm
9780195084030, 9780195084047, 0195084039, 0195084047
28147955
Introduction: The Chronicler's Art
1. Why Bridges? Castellani and Nicolotti. A World of Faction
2. Horatius on the Bridge. The Art of the Pugni. The Battle for the Bridge. The Lords of the Bridges
3. The Spoils of War. The Honor of Working Men. Naming and Belonging. The Pride of the Neighborhood
4. The View from the Balcony. The Pastime of Aristocrats. The Pugni Out of Control. The Ambiguities of Absolutism
Epilogue: The End of the Pugni