A family at the opera: the Bolognetti as an audience at the theatres of Rome (1694–1736)

The article looks at theatrical life in Rome by analysing one local aristocratic family’s presence as audience members at the city’s theatres. The Bolognetti family came originally from Bologna but established itself (also) in Rome in the seventeenth century. They were not major direct patrons of musical events, but did frequent the theatres as spectators. By looking at this aspect of the nobility’s involvement with operatic and theatrical activities in Rome, the article provides a different point of view on the well-known topic of music and theatre in Baroque Rome. On the basis of fifteen volumes of payment records from Ferdinando Bolognetti and his son Giacomo, spanning the period from 1693 until 1736, the article partially reconstructs the family’s presence at the city’s theatres. The payments show the different financial arrangements for hiring full or partial seasonal boxes, repairs and decorations carried out at the family’s boxes at the Tordinona and Capranica theatres, the buying of individual tickets, and other expenses. A singular cross-section of theatrical life in Rome thus emerges that, at one point or other, includes virtually all of the city’s theatres and a range of different theatrical genres.