The Legal Cases of Giovanni and Lusanna and Martin and Bertrande in Le Retour de Martin Guerre - Assignment Example

? The lives and legal cases of Giovanni & Lusanna and Martin & Bertrande in Le Retour de Martin Guerre Affiliation: (i) The lives and legal cases of Giovanni & Lusanna This story is a compelling account of which a wronged woman in the Renaissance Florence gives a fascinating view of the Florence society and the attitude this community has towards love, marriage, class and gender. A brief overview of the book tells that Lusanna was a beautiful woman who was from a middle-class background, of which in 1445, brought suit against Giovanni, her aristocratic lover, after learning that Giovanni had contracted to marry another woman of his own class. Blending the scholarship between the insightful narratives, the story line of this book portrays an extraordinary woman who comes out boldly to challenge the unwritten codes and some barriers of the social hierarchy and goes ahead to dare seek some measure of personal independence in the male-dominated world. This book gives a summary and analysis of the record case that is found in the Florentine archives1. In this book, the class difference is not only revelatory basing on the way that the law handled people of different social classes, but it also bases on how social class was subject in handling matters of love. Just in the same way that class played a role in affecting romance in Renaissance Florence is also evident in Giovanni’s initial pursuit of Lusanna’ love. Giovanni falls in love with Lusanna despite the fact that her husband is still alive, and goes ahead to try and start a relationship with her. Despite the fact that Giovanni is rich and many girls are after him, he only loves Lusanna. In this case, the custom was to seek to marry just for the purpose of increasing social status or tying together the important families, but not marrying each other because of love. For this, social class is evident in comparison of Giovanni and Lusanna, but Giovanni argues that he wants to marry Lusenna not because of increasing social ties, but because he is deeply in love with her. Social class is not only the difference separating the love story between Giovanni and Lusanna, but there is also an aspect of gender. Lusanna is the rare exception among many women of her time, and thus making it not possible to categorize her as in any major roles that women adopted in this community. Women of her class would be typical “chaste wives and widows or cloistered nuns,” but not passionate and driven just as Lusanna was. All through this case Giovanni was determined to prove that their relationship was strong and had started way back before the death of Lusanna’s husband Andrea, and that her willingness to not only to participate in this relationship that was making her mush happier than her marriage seizes the initiative of classifying different from the set of other women in her era, in that she participates in the illicit relationship. Another aspect that existed between these different classes of lives is the double standard existing in relation to sex. According to the social norms of the community, adultery was forbidden in the Florence play. Both the secular and religious laws also forbid and even punished adultery, such as the same case that Lusanna portrayed while married to Andrea. There is also an aspect of influence in the justice system following the class difference. For instance, Lusanna was the one who filed a case against Giovanni for attempting to marry another woman while they are married. In this society, rich people had the capacity of bribing the justice system, something that would have made Giovanni walk free. Archbishop Antoninus was the only leader with the capacity of rejecting such bribes and influence from the rich class in this society, thus suiting him to preside over this case. However, the author states that the same judge would have known of Giovanni’s influence and financial power, leading him to uphold the complaint filed by Lusanna. The status difference that was separating Lusanna and Giovanni is an ideal example in which different classes interacted in Florence and the manner of which Renaissance law was handling these differences. (ii) The lives and legal cases of Martin & Bertrande in Le Retour de Martin Guerre Culture was playing a great role in the Renaissance back in the 16th century, whereby marriages were unions of arrangement for the purposes of consolidating the land. In this case, wealth was not measured in terms of money, but rather measured in the essence of number of cattle that an individual owned, the acres of land to harvest from, and the furnishings possessed. For this case, Martin’s family receives many important items from Bartrand’s dowry, mainly as the payment of made by the woman’s family towards the family of the future husband. More so, the young couple in this community were not allowed to have their own homes, but instead lived with the husband’s family, of which the young wife was under the care and control of mother-in-law. On rare cases did anyone have the capacity of moving away and setting up their own household. Land was a property to share since it was a form of family’s wealth, reputation and pride2. The Catholic Church is responsible for playing an important role in the lives of people in this society. Even though the community members are Christians, they still had prevailing thought that magic and witchcraft are real causes of ills and misfortunes in case they occur. For case of occurrence of any disputes, the legal cases were settled by the “travelling judge” who would then arrive at the village, then listen to the testimony from everyone that is involved and then finally render their judgments. The legal system of this community required that the person who lost is the case was to repay the winner with the same amount. Only on rare occasions was the case to be heard and determined in larger city in front of the panel of judges. After the couple of Martin and Bertrande stayed for several years, they got a son and Martin ran away from his wife and son. Later, a man who was claiming to be Guerre reappeared and lived with Guarre’s wife and so for three years. The false Martin was later suspected of impersonation, was tried and executed. The real Martin returned during the trial period and this case continues to be dramatized to date. These two stories are similar in the essence of beliefs and traditions. The two communities believe in justice processes while settling disputes among community members. Both communities were similar in the manner that they both believed in religion and marriage unions. Another similarity is in the legal systems, of which are all depicted to the corrupt in one way or another and that cases usually favors those with higher social status. However, the manner of which they conduct themselves differs in one way or another. For instance, in the case of Giovanni and Lusanna, wealth was a measure by money and that the man was the one to pay the dowry to the bride. On the other setting, wealth was by measure of land, cattle and property owned by the person. Another difference comes in the manner of marriage, of which in the first setting, the couple had a choice choosing a partner for their own and stay an independent life. The latter differs in the manner of which the bride pays the dowry and that the couple have no freedom of living an independent life. In the first case, marriage was for creating social status, but in the latter, marriage was for consolidating land. All these differences are because of differences in traditional beliefs and customs set by the community. Bibliography Brucker Gene, 2nd revised edition. Giovanni and Lusanna: Love and Marriage in Renaissance Florence. University of California Press; December 14, 2004. Davis, Natalie Zemon. The return of Martin Guerre. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1983. Read More