Autonomous Spaces for Independent Widows: an Architectural Note from Eighteenth-Century Bologna

Abstract

While the lives of single women and widows in the early modern period have been studied, little attention has been given to their architectural contexts. This essay highlights autonomous residential solutions for widows of high social rank, focusing on examples from Bologna known as “widows’ houses.” These dwellings were intended for women who could not—or chose not to—live with their families. Particular attention is given to the Bugami Widows’ House, for which a set of eighteenth-century architectural drawings is published here for the first time.