referring to. Consequently, we can assume that “The two Gentlemen of Verona” was written in 1577, without fear of being accused of recklessness.
On his arrival in Milan, Proteus foolishly falls in love with the beautiful Silvia, a love that leads to the betrayal of his friend. In Act 4, Scene 2, after delightful confusion (Julia, disguised as a boy, hears her boyfriend Proteus sing a love song to Silvia, the girlfriend of his best friend, accompanied by minstrels, in the employ of Thurio, the man to whom the Duke, her father, has promised Silvia’s hand...) Proteus suggests “Saint Gregory’ s Well” as the meeting place for a midnight tête-à-tête with Thurio, just for the sake of being rid of the fool.
This meeting place has caused a lot of frowns. Some people are pleased to see that the working man from Stratford has, once again, pulled something amazing out of the hat, others scour the pages of “Piccata Milanese” looking for disused wells in Milan. The American, Richard P. Roe shows us that “St. Gregory’s well” means the “Foppone di San Gregorio”, a cemetery situated next to a quarantine station, known as “Lazaretto”.
Franciscus Schott writes in the year 1600: “San Gregorio is the refuge for plague victims. It covers an area of 4.800 Ellen (2,800 yards) and is surrounded by flowing water. The area is enclosed by a pillared wall. It has countless bed-rooms and is adequately equipped for all of the community’s needs. This location lies outside the Porta Orientale.”
The German travelogue writer, Schott, (Itinerarii Italiae rerumque Romanarum Libri tres) wasn’t exactly zealous when it came to accuracy. He recorded the length as being 700 yards, instead of the more generally accepted 440 yards, and he gave the name “San Gregorio” to the entire complex, instead of just the graveyard.
Il Lazaretto and Foppone di San Gregorio (1629)
The “Lazaretto” was built in 1488 outside the city walls of Milan. The main function of the 288 cells was to isolate the potential contagious disease carriers from the rest of the community. Surrounded by the walls and the moats, those from whom the town wished to protect itself, were left to rot. The dead were carted out and dumped in a mass grave. This mass grave was given the name “Il Foppone” or “Il Pozzo di San Gregorio”.
Why does the author speak of “Saint Gregory’s well” when refering to such a dreadful place?
“Il Foppone” is a langobardian expression, commonly used colloquially in Milan and Bergamo, it means the ditch - pit, pool, cavern, hole, slot or, also, the well. In 16th century, the Foppone from Bergamo was a stone quarry, later used as a mass grave for the plague victims.
“Saint Gregory’s well”, this hell-on-earth was the place where Proteus arranges to meet the gullible Thurio for a tête-à-tête. A macabre insider-joke from the author, hardly comprehensible for anybody in England.
The author names “Milan. An abbey” as the scenario for act 5, scene 1, Silvia and her protector, Eglamour meet there to flee to Mantua together. The author informs us that the abbey is in Milan and that Silvia is not out of danger. “I fear I am attended by some spies” cries Silvia, but there is a secret passage into the city, just close by “at the postern by the abbey wall”. In other words, the abbey is not far from one of the gates in the city wall. Such an abbey can, in fact, be found in a place that fits this decription. “Il Convento di San Dionigi” (as one can see in the above illustration). It adjoins the city wall, not far from the “Porta Orientale” otherwise known as “Porta Venezia” (the gate that one would use to leave the city to travel to Venice or Mantua via Brescia.) Eglamour urges the young woman to rest assured: “Fear not. The forest is not three leagues off; / if we recover that, we are sure enough.”
On one thing we can also rest assured: Shakespeare knew a lot more about Milan than a man in England could have read in books.
3.3 Romeo and Juliet
When Shakespeare wrote this most comical tragedy, he already had four Italian, one French and two English sources for material. It has been proven that he drew inspiration from Clitia [Gerardo Boldieri] (1553), Matteo Bandello (1554), Pierre Boaistuau (1561) and Arthur Brooke (1562). The genius required no further research and a trip to Italy was unnecessary. However, the author was not satisfied with literature alone. Surprisingly enough, although it was not mentioned in any literary works, he knew about local sycamores (“the grove of sycamore / That westward rooteth from the city’s side”, I/1) and, more surprisingly still, he knew about the small Franciscan church, situated between Juliet’s house and the Franciscan monastery “San Francesco al Corso”; “Saint Peter”, where Juliet used to go to confession.- Richard P. Roe discovered that marriage ceremonies had been performed for six hundred years in “Saint Peter’s” or “San Pietro Incarnario”.
LADY. Marry, my child, early next Thursday morn
The gallant, young, and noble gentleman,
The County Paris, at Saint Peter’s Church (III/5).
Shakespeare knows more: For instance he knows that the name “Romeo” has its roots in the late middle ages (Romaeus= he who pilgers to Rome). That explains why Juliet responds to his first advances with the words (I/5):
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.
Again, thanks to the research of Richard Roe we know that the dramatist was an expert in Italian history. According to the Italian source, the story is set in and around Verona during the rule of Bartolomeo della Scala (“Escalus”) i.e. between 1301 and 1304. Bartolomeo, who was a friend of Dante, resided in the Palazzo del Commune on the Piazza dei Signori; however, he conducted legal hearings ten miles south west of Verona in the Castello Scaligero of Villafranca (English-Freetown- so called because of tax exemptions). In 1357 the legal hearings of the area were transferred from “Freetown” to the newly completed Castelvecchio di Verona, but at the time in which the story is set, they were still held in Villafranca.
Bartolomeo della Scala appears early in “Romeo and Juliet” under the name of Prince Escalus in the role of mediator between the “two households, both alike in dignity” and puts an end to their quarrel with mandatory words:
PRINCE. You, Capulet, shall go along with me;
And, Montague, come you this afternoon,
To know our farther pleasure in this case,
To old Freetown, our common judgement place. (I/1)
Shakespeare was the only author who knew which function and person “Freetown” was to be allocated to. Matteo Bandello (Novelle, 1554) names Villafranca as the place where Giulietta is to become acquainted with Count Paris de Lodrone against her will: the wrong groom. Pierre Boaistuau (Histoires tragiques, 1561) names Villefranche the place where Juliette is to be married to “Comte Paris”. Arthur Brooke (Romeus and Juliet, 1562) follows in Boaistuau’s suit but substitutes the elder Montague’s castle for „Freetown”. Brooke’s blustering old bone-breaker does his best to make his daughter do as she’s told: „Unless by Wednesday next thou bend as I am bent, and at our castle called Freetown thou freely do assent To County Paris’ suit, and promise to agree...“
Villafranca di Verona, Castello Scaligero
The author of “Romeo and Juliet” did things differently: he declared “Old Freetown” to be the “common judgement place” of Bartolomeo della Scala alias Escalus. With that he hit the nail on the head. He was better informed than his Italian and English colleagues.
3.4 The Merchant of Venice
Shakespeare’s Venetian plays