MISOGYNIST TREATISES AND CENSORSHIP IN THE 17th CENTURY. ON THE SUBJECT OF "I DONNESCHI DIFETTI" BY GIUSEPPE PASSI

Abstract

Giuseppe Passi published I donneschi difetti in 1599, at a time of great upheaval and changes in Italian society, especially as far as women were concerned. The treatise aroused strong controversy in Italy for its explicit attack on the status of women, affirming their inferiority and vile nature by describing the many defects which, according to the author, women possessed. The work was censored by the Sacred Congregation  more than two decades after its publication, in 1623, and included in the  List of Prohibited Books in 1632. That same year it was banned from being read in Spain, in the Index of Cardinal Antonio Zapata. The ban was maintained in all subsequent indexes in both Italy and Spain.

This study analyses the work, contextualising it in the period in which it was published, with a brief description of the author and his writings on themes similar to I donneschi difetti, and finally, it identifies the contents of his treatise that led to its censorship.