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The house of correction for boys in the hospice of Saint Michael in Rome
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2025
Extract
One of the most interesting chapters in the history of culture is that dealing with “man’s treatment of man.” It is not, in the main, a beautiful chapter. Too frequently its pages disclose a cruelty, which has not always been born of primitive conditions, but on the contrary seems to have reached its most refined development in modern times, at least so far as the punishment of criminals is concerned. There are, however, other pages in that chapter. They picture the dawn of a rising humanitarianism, conscious of the dignity of human life and expressing itself in penal treatment in an emphasis on correction instead of on mere punishment.
Information
- Type
- Première Partie: Doctrine
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © 1966 International Society for Criminology
Footnotes
(*)
Reprinted from the Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Vol. XX, n° 4, February, 1930.
(**)
Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pa.
References
(1) Throughout I shall refer to the House of Correction for Boys as St.-Michael’s for short. Whenever the Hospice is discussed that word will be employed to avoid confusion.
(2) Third ed. 492 pp. Warrington, 1784, pp. 113-114.
(3) An account of the principal lazarettes in Europe…; together with further observations on some foreign prisons and hospitals… 259 pp. Warrington, 1789, p. 58.
(4) Pp. 8-9.
(5) xii, 339 pp. T. Y. Crowell & Co., New York, 1895, pp. 121-122.
(6) Tosti, Antonio, Relazione dell’origine e dei progressi dell’Ospizio Apostolico di S. Michele, xx, 110, 95 pp. Rome, 1832, p. 4.
(7) Ibid., pp. 1-2.
(8) Querini, Quirino, La beneficenza romana dagli antichi tempi fino ad oggi. Studio storico critico. 504 pp. Rome, 1892, p. 311. The new building in Ripa was constructed °n the design of Mathias de Rossi. See Féa, Charles, Description de Rome…, publiée Par Ange Bonnelli, vol. 3, p. 83.
(9) Tosti, op. cit., pp. 5-6.
(10) Ibid, p. 13.
(11) In the author’s copy of Tosti, op. cit., a number of documents relative to the Hospice have been bound with the work proper. The translation of the Motu proprio has been made from one of them. Cerfberr has also made a French translation of it in his Rapport … sur les prisons, maisons de correction et bagnes de l’Italie. (82 pp Impr. Royale, Paris, 1839.) It contains, however, numerous grave errors.
(12) In I riformatorii governativi italiani (178 pp., Rome, 1907), p. 59, the architect’s name is given as Fenga and on the next page is a photograph of the « Sala Fenga. » Vasi da corleone, intra, gives his name as Ferdinando Fuga.
(13) The building was an old one, which had been altered. It contained forty-one cells of the same size as those in St. Michael’s.
(14) I riformatorii governativi italiani, pp. 58-61.
(15) Supra.
(16) The biographers of Clement XI, whom the author has consulted, pay little attention to his charitable enterprises, being more interested in the political and religious history of his reign. De Lafiteau (La vie de Clément XI, souverain pontile.
2 vols. Padua, 1752) gives two and a half lines to St. Michael’s. J. G. Buder (Leben und Thaten des klugen und berühmten Pabst Clementis des Eilfiten. 3 vols. Frank furt, 1720) never even mentions it.
In Buder’s first volume there is reproduced a collection of medals struck off in commemoration of various incidents in Clement’s life. One of these (No. 23) represents on one side « Ihre Heiligkeit im Rocchetto und Mütze » and bears the inscription
Clemens XL Pontificatus Maximi Anno IIII. On the other side is « a church in which, judging from appearance, Jews and others present are instructed in Christianity. Above is the inscription ut ervantur a via mala; that they may turn from the evil way. » Buder believes that this medal refers to an event on March 12, 1704, when the Pope personally baptized a Jewish family from Leghorn (cf. Loevinson. E., Judentauilen von Papst Klemens XI, 1704, in Eigener Person vollzogen. Monats, f. Ges. u. Wiss. d. Judentums. 72 : 395-401, July-Aug., 1928; abstract N°. 973 in Soc. Sci. Abstr., 1 : 151, Apr., 1929). The interior of the church which Buder mentions closely resembles, as ct matter of fact, the interior of St. Michael’s. This, the motto and the date suggest the possibility, at least, that this medal may have been struck off in commemoration °t the establishment of the house of correction.
(17) This is probably an error. See mofu proprio.
(18) See motu proprio.
(19) At that time a Papal seaport near Rome, where the galleys were anchored.
(20) LABAT J.-B., Voyages du P. LAB AT de l’ordre des F.F. Prêcheurs, en Espagne et en Italie (8 Vols. Paris 1730), Vol 3, pp. 96-100.
(21) RODOCANACHI E., Les voyageurs français à Rome de Montaigne à Stendahl. 26 pp. Pavia, 1910.
(22) Travels through Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, Switzerland, Italy and Lorrain. Transi, from the 2nd ed. of the German (4 Vols. London, 1756-7), Vol. 2, p. 130.
(23) Relazione del pio istituto di S. Michele a Ripa Grande eretto della santa memoria di PP Innocenzo XII. 1 XV pp. Rome, 1779.
(24) About half a pint.
(25) Cerfberr (Op. cit.) presumably visited the institution in the later 1830-ies. He intimates that the same system of classification was maintained at that time, in spite of the fact that Saint Michael’s was no longer occupied by juvenile delinquents (!). His statement is probably based on Vai’s book, which he draws on for a great deal of his material.
(26) MORICHINI D. Carlo Luigi, Degl ‘ istituti di pubblica carità ed istruzione primaria e delle prigioni di Roma (2 Vols, Rome, 1842).
(27) MOREAU-CHRISTOPHE L. M., Du problème de la misère et de sa solution chez les peuples anciens et modernes (3 Vols, Paris, 1851), Vol. 3, p. 38.
(28) KRAUSS F. A. K., Im Kerker vor und nach Christus. Schatten und Licht aus dem profanen und kirchlichen Cultur und Rechtsleben Verganger Zeiten. (380 pp. Mohr, Leipzig, 1895), p. 363. See also Sellin, Thorsten, (Dom Jean Mabillon—a prison reformer of the seventeenth century). Jour of Crim. law and Criminology 17 : 581-602, Feb., 1927, for a discussion of monastic prisons.
(29) PASSERINI (Luigi), Storia degli estabilimenti di beneficenza e d’istruzione clementare gratuita della città di Firenze (962 pp., Le Monnier, Florence, 1853), p. 626.
(30) Quoted in SELLIN (Thorsten), Filippo Franci—a precursor of modern penology.
Jour, of Crim. Law and Criminology 17 : 104-112, May, 1926.
(31) For a discussion of Franci’s work in greater detail see SELLIN, op. cit.
(32) STROOBANT (L.), Le Rasphuis de Gand…, Annales de la Soc. d’Histoire et ¿’Archéologie de Gand 3 : 191-307, 1900, p. 261. For a critical discussion of Mabillon’s Place in historical penology see SELLIN, supra.
(33) Op. cit., p. 7.
(34) Op. cit., p. 5.
(35) Op. cit., p. 363; See also NOPPEL (C.), Jugendliche Rechtsbrecher unter der Herrschaft der Päpste. Stimmen aus Maria-Laach 87 : 311-20, 1913-1914.
(36) Op. cit., pp. 5-6.
(37) Op. cit. p. 229.
(38) Op. cit., p. 286.
(39) See HIPPEL (R.) von, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Freiheitsstrafe. Zeits. f. die ges. Strafrechtswiss. 18 : 419-494. 608-666, 1898.
(40) Two beautiful prints one of the « Porto di Ripa Grende », showing the Hospice as seen from the Tiber, and another of the « Carceri per le Donne » seen from Piazza Portese, can be found in Vol. 3, Plates 21 and 97, of VASI DA CORLEONE (Giuseppe), Delle magnificenze di Roma antica e moderna, 5 Vols, Rome, 1754.
In Tosti’s book will be found floor plans of the entire Hospice. Howard, as has already been mentioned, gives in his State of Prisons both a side-elevation and a floor plan of the house of correction for boys. The official publication, I riformatorii governativi italiani, gives on pp. 58-60 photographs of the exterior of the old « Carceri per le Donne », and of the interior of the boy’s and the women’s houses of correction.