Venice · Diplomacy · Theatre
Antonio Foscarini: the ambassador Venice executed
Received at James’s court, accused by his own secretary, cleared, condemned—and declared innocent after his death.
On the morning of 21 April 1622, the body of Antonio Foscarini hung by one leg between the columns of Venice’s Piazzetta. The former ambassador to England had been strangled in prison. Within a year, the government that had condemned him publicly acknowledged his innocence.
Lewkenor knew him in another setting: the journeys to royal audiences, the reception of foreign envoys and the negotiation of access to James I. Foscarini’s dispatches name Lewkenor at work. The investigation into the ambassador’s conduct also preserved an unexpected part of London’s theatre history.
“Lewkenor came to fetch me”
Foscarini reached London in May 1611 after serving in France. A supporter of Paolo Sarpi, he favoured stronger alliances against Spanish power and papal interference. His English embassy lasted until 1615.
His account of a visit to Hampton Court places Lewes Lewkenor beside him throughout the journey. The business included Robert Shirley’s claim to represent the Shah of Persia:
On Saturday morning Lewkenor came to fetch me and accompany me to Hampton Court and back to London. I received marks of special favour. The question of Shirley’s audience came up. He claims to be admitted as Ambassador of the King of Persia. After many difficulties the Earl allowed him to have audience and agreed that he should go as he chose, though at first the Persian dress was vetoed. Lewkenor did all he could to help Shirley, who is a relation.
Antonio Foscarini’s dispatch concerning Robert Shirley’s audience, Calendar of State Papers, Venice.
The dispute involved the visitor’s diplomatic standing and his appearance before the King. Shirley claimed an ambassador’s reception and wished to wear Persian dress. Lewkenor intervened for his Sussex relation while conducting Venice’s ambassador to and from the same court.
A toast at Lewkenor’s dinner
Foscarini’s English embassy brought him into Lewkenor’s company away from formal audiences. At dinner with the Master of the Ceremonies and friends, the ambassador rose to drink the King’s health. The inquiry put the scene to a witness:
Asked if Foscarini had mounted on a table with a beaker in his hand to drink the king’s health, without slippers, said no, but it was in accordance with the custom of the country and he had seen him mount a chair but in his slippers. He had done this once at dinner with Sir [Lewis] Lewknor and some friends.
Calendar of State Papers, Venice, vol. XIV, Appendix, p. 605, witness examination.
Through London with music
The accusations preserve a noisy journey through crowded London: an ambassador with a guitar, a singing buffoon and a carriage drawn by eight or ten horses. Article 44 reads:
Foscarini had gone through the most crowded part of London in a carriage with eight or ten horses, and a buffoon at his side; he played a guitar and made him sing with a loud voice.
Calendar of State Papers, Venice, vol. XIV, Appendix, no. 906, article 44.
Mushroom-picking
Even his mushroom-hunting became an article in the case against him. Article 36 records:
That for a month he went to dig mushrooms and had walked alone through London.
Calendar of State Papers, Venice, vol. XIV, Appendix, no. 906, article 36.
Good Friday and the Capuchin
Article 4 supplies the clerical prank, during the Holy Week observances at the embassy:
That an English religious came in holy week to assist in the offices. On Good Friday the Ambassador Foscarini engaged in a dispute with his chaplain and in the course of it Foscarini took the chaplain’s hand forcibly and made it touch the back side of this priest, who is said to have been a Capuchin, and who was extremely scandalized.
Calendar of State Papers, Venice, vol. XIV, Appendix, no. 906, article 4.
The secretary turns accuser
Foscarini’s secretary, Giulio Muscorno, brought accusations against him. Allegations about the embassy’s secrets were mixed with attacks on his religion and private conduct, including his visits to the theatre. Foscarini returned to Venice in March 1616 and was imprisoned. His full acquittal came on 30 July 1618; Muscorno was sentenced to two years’ confinement.
The inquiry questioned people who had seen the embassy from within. The interpreter Odoardo Guatz, also called Guazzo, was examined in London on 18 April 1617. Asked about Foscarini’s theatre visits, he answered:
I believe he went twice, or three times, but I never went with him
Guazzo’s testimony, 18 April 1617, Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Inquisitori di Stato, b. 155, fol. 76v; transcription and translation by Carlo M. Bajetta, Shakespeare Documented, extract.
He explained that Foscarini went privately, expecting to pass unrecognised. The inquiry’s questions turned an ambassador’s leisure into evidence about his fitness for office.
The testimony that preserved Pericles
Guazzo also recalled a playgoing party led by the earlier Venetian ambassador, Zorzi Giustinian:
went with the French ambassador and his wife to a play called Pericles, which cost Giustinian more than 20 crowns. He also took the Secretary of Florence.
Guazzo’s testimony concerning Giustinian. Archival document and commentary.
Carlo M. Bajetta’s account in Shakespeare Documented explains the deposition and its theatrical significance; James Leeds Barroll examines the possible performance dates in Politics, Plague, and Shakespeare’s Theater. The recollection of Giustinian’s party survives among the papers of Foscarini’s case. Read the Pericles investigation →
A second arrest
Foscarini returned to public office after his acquittal. On 8 April 1622 he was arrested again, accused of illicit dealings with foreign representatives and revealing state secrets. This time the proceedings lasted days. On 20 April he was condemned. He was strangled in prison that night. The following morning, his body was hung by one leg between the columns of the Piazzetta.
The accusation had been supported by informers Girolamo Vano and Domenico de Zuane. Their testimony made the former ambassador appear to have sold the confidence of his own republic.
The Countess of Arundel refuses to retreat
Rumour drew Alethea Talbot, Countess of Arundel, into the affair. She was living in Venice, and stories circulated that Foscarini’s supposed meetings had taken place at her house. The English ambassador, Sir Henry Wotton, advised her to stay away from the city.
She refused. Instead, she demanded an audience with the Doge and required Wotton to accompany and interpret for her. The Doge denied that she had been implicated. The Senate issued a formal declaration on 28 April, and instructed its ambassador in England to defend her reputation there. At a further audience she made Wotton’s own written account of the rumours part of the public record. The woman advised to withdraw had compelled two governments’ representatives to answer her.
Logan Pearsall Smith, The Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton (1907), vol. I, chapter X.
Venice declares him innocent
The case against the informers unravelled. Vano and his accomplice were themselves executed. On 16 January 1623 the Council of Ten formally restored Foscarini’s name. The declaration was circulated so that the republic’s acknowledgment of its error would be known abroad as well as at home.
Foscarini had carried Venice’s authority into foreign courts. In England, Lewkenor had escorted him to the King; in Venice, his own government had imprisoned and killed him. The surviving dispatches and depositions return him to the audiences, journeys and playhouses of his English years.
Sources
- Allen B. Hinds (ed.), “Appendix: Miscellaneous 1616”, Calendar of State Papers Relating to English Affairs in the Archives of Venice, vol. XIV (1908), pp. 592–606: accusations and witness examinations concerning Foscarini’s English embassy.
- Antonio Foscarini’s dispatch on Lewkenor and Robert Shirley, Calendar of State Papers, Venice; the full passage appears above and on the Shirley family page.
- Carlo M. Bajetta, “A Venetian ambassador sees a performance of Pericles”, Shakespeare Documented; deposition of 18 April 1617, Inquisitori di Stato, b. 155, fol. 76v. James Leeds Barroll, Politics, Plague, and Shakespeare’s Theater (1991), p. 193.
- Roberto Zago, “Foscarini, Antonio”, Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 49 (1997), for his career, trials and rehabilitation.
- Logan Pearsall Smith, The Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton, vol. I, chapter X; “Antonio Foscarini, nobile, innocente (1622)”, with references to Venetian records and the declaration of 1623.
Pericles and the diplomatic playgoers → · The Shirley family → · Lewkenor’s Venice → · The Lewkenor Circle →