Giustina Renier Michiel

Giustina Renier Michiel (1755–1832) was an aristocratic woman who helped intellectual and social Venetian life flourish.

She was born on 14 October 1755 to Andrea Renier, later Doge and son of Paolo Renier (penultimate doge), and Cecilia Manin, sister of Ludovico, the last doge, in Venice. She learned English, French, Music, Art, Math and Natural History when she was sent to a convent of Capuchin nuns at Treviso at the age of three. She was brought back to Venice at the age of nine and placed in a fashionable boarding school kept by a Frenchwoman. She was considered a bookworm and a woman with an independent mind.

At the age of 20 she married Marc Antonio Michiel on 25 October 1775. They followed her father to Rome, not long after, where he had been named the Venetian ambassador to Pope Pius VI. Though she only stayed one year she made a profound impression on the Roman society and was given the nickname Venerina Veneziana, Venetian Venus. It was during this trip that Giustina gave birth to a daughter in 1776, Elena. They had two other daughters who were born over the course of the next two years, Cecilia and Chiara (died at age ten). She was often left alone with her children while her husband traveled and so she was unhappy and ended up getting a divorce from her husband on 4 August 1784 Their divorce left her free to enjoy an active social life, which had been something her husband did not approve of.

When she came back from her yearlong stay in Rome, her father’s brother was elected doge. Because the people refused to accept his wife Margherita Delmaz, a dancer, as a dogaressa, Giustina Renier Michiel had to step in. She served as first lady in all official ceremonies when necessary between the years of 1779 and 1789 while also pursuing her intellectual passions and hosting a literary salon.

Giustina Renier Michiel’s salon was considered one of the two most in vogue salons of Venice, the other being that of her friend . There was a particularly Venetian character to her salon and it was frequented by well-known literary figures such as Ippolito Pindemonte, Marina Querini Benzon, Ugo Foscolo, Giustiniana Wynne (Countess Rosenberg), the French Madame de Staël and the English Lord Byron. She built connections between people, introducing scholars to one another, and promoted socializing and intellectual conversation. Her salon was not all about intense intellect; it had a good stream of recreational pleasure. Vittorio Malamani had said that her guests often arrived after midnight once the theater finished in order to discuss the works that they had just seen and to play “society games.”

...
Wikipedia