It’s summer and what better than bathhouses and riverbanks? But perhaps not the ones the most recent “Essays and Studies” volume is looking at … :
Umberto Grassi, Bathhouses and Riverbanks: Sodomy in a Renaissance Republic. Essays and Studies, 49. Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2021. Pp. 291. $39.95.
See https://crrs.ca/publications/es49/
The book looks at sodomy (both male-male and male-female) in the Republic of Lucca from the fifteenth to the early seventeenth century. The research is based on archival documents from Lucca and is a very fascinating read (not to mention great original scholarship).