CHAPTER X
EXAMPLES OF CENSORSHIP OF THE STAGE IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
1. In Italy 2. In Spain 3. In France
The scope and plan of this treatise do not permit any general consideration of so complex a subject as the censorship of the stage. In the present chapter, I am submitting merely certain examples of attempts at such censorship in Italy, Spain, and France in the 16th century, which it may be interesting to compare with the supervision that was being exercised in these countries at the same time over the production and distribution of literature.
=1. The Theatre in Italy, 16th Century.=--The action taken in regard to the censorship of the stage varied materially in the different localities. St. Charles Borromeo prohibited in Florence, in 1565, theatrical performances during the time of religious fêtes. Later, he secured the suppression altogether of the presentation of the drama of the Passion. Gregory XIII, as the result of an appeal made to him by St. Charles, prohibited dramatic performances in Rome on holy days. The influence of the saint secured similar action in Verona and in Bologna, and, in 1577, Venice banished the comedians altogether.
The Church as a whole, however, avoided being drawn into the consideration of the control of the drama; it made absolute prohibition of but two things: the presentation on the stage of ecclesiastical dress and the use of female actors.[152]
The Jesuit Ottonelli, writing in 1640, condemns “immodest” dramatic representations, of which he demands the complete suppression. He contends that there should be on the stage no scenes of love between a man and a woman left alone. He is willing to concede the communication, in connection with a proposition of marriage, by the father of the lover to the father of the girl, of the sentiments of the young man.[153]
=2. The Theatre in Spain.=--In Spain and in Italy the clergy undertook during the 16th century to repress or to restrict the license of the stage, and in Spain, at least, the clerical control of the drama was complete. The seven centuries of contest against the Moors had, among other results, served to associate indissolubly the Catholic faith with the cause of patriotism and nationality, and with the daily life of the people; and yet in Spain a large respect and an ardent devotion for the Church were not felt to be incompatible with a large indecency on the stage.
In Spain, the Inquisition, in place of being detested as in France, or dreaded as in Italy, was really a popular institution. Lope de Vega, who entered the priesthood after the birth of two illegitimate children which had come to him during his second widowhood, displayed at the head of his most indecent comedies his title of “Familiar of the Sacred Office.” His plays present alternate examples of passages of real piety and of verses the most obscene.
In 1548, however, as a result of a petition of the Cortes to Charles V, vigorous measures were taken against indecent performances; and between 1587 and 1600, such effective destruction was made by the clerical commissioners of dramatic productions that of a series of forty-three volumes, there remained copies of but ten.[154]
=3. The Theatre in France, 16th Century.=--The French Church of the 16th century did not manifest antagonism to the stage. The edict of 1548, which, for the purpose of protecting religion against indignities, ordered that dramatic performances should be restricted to subjects that were “profane, decent, and free from scandal,” emanated not from the divines, but from the Parliament of Paris. The Church councils of the provinces restricted their interference to the prohibition of the use for such performances of consecrated buildings.[155]
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