The Materiality of Death in Early Modern Venice

Human bodies were particularly important ‘things’ in the early modern material world. But bodies, of course, were something more than mere material things, and the nature of their materiality was contested and debated. The complexity of views of the material body was galvanized by the mutability of bodies, whether through ageing, behaviour, body care or death. Religious beliefs and religious change shaped understandings of bodily materiality. Dead bodies raised particular questions. How did the body and its meanings change after death? How could the physical place of the dead body be reconciled with religious, political, social and family needs? This