The Story of Casanova — Seducer & Legend

Undoubtedly, a trip to Venice is a 360° experience that blends history, beauty and mystery, like the one that surrounds the story of Casanova.

Giacomo Casanova is one of the most famous Venetian in history for his reputation as a traveler and great seducer. His adventures have been passed down through the centuries, in a plot that blends history and myth, but certainly his autobiography, “Story of My Life”, is a perfect picture of the eighteenth-century Venice’s customs and traditions.

A womanizer of the time, rediscovering Casanova’s life between history & legend

Son of actors and himself a man of many talents (he was a writer, actor and violinist), he lived an adventurous life that includes escapes, travels and secret loves. Among them, after the first few Venetian conquests, there was an opera singer named Teresa, known in Ancona for posing as a man in order to work in the theaters in the Church State where women were not allowed. Then a French noblewoman known as Henriette, maybe the greatest love of Casanova, whose identity is still uncertain.
Casanova returned to Venice several times as he traveled around Europe from Paris to Dresden to Vienna, but his “libertine” lifestyle attracted too much attention. Just before turning 30, he spent a brief period in the Leads, the infamous prison of the Serenissima, where – it is said – he was able to flee in 1756. Legend has it that, before fleeing on board a gondola, he allowed himself a coffee in Piazza San Marco!




Many other women studded Casanova’s life, like the French noblewoman known as La Marquise d’Urfe Jeanne Camus De Pontcarré Paris, fascinated by his esoteric sorcerer skills; a certain Sister M.M .; and the Empress Catherine II of Russia, with whom, rumor has it, he had a date! He died in Dux in Bohemia (now Duchcov, Czech Republic), writing and remembering the ups and downs of his life.

Despite the uncertainty surrounding the veracity of his adventures, Casanova with his ruthlessness mixed-in with wit remains one of the most vivid symbols of Venice Serenissima’s history. Come and explore with VeniceWelcome!