Giacomo Casanova was
born in Venice in 1725 to a pair of actors
and grew up to be a man who arguably embodied the
spirit of the Enlightenment. He was charming,
curious, directionless and usually fell for
intelligent, talented women who seduced him, just as
often as he seduced them. However, there is a lot
more to this noted lothario than his numerous love affairs. Though Giacomo Casanova lived
way back in the 18th century, his name to this
very day remains an adjective for a man who
knows his way around the ladies. Today, we're going to take a
look at a dozen raunchy stories about Giacomo Casanova,
history's most notorious playboy. But before we get started,
be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel. After that, leave
a comment below and let us know what other
famous historical names you would like to hear about. OK. Now, turn down the
lights, spark up a candle, and open a delicious
bottle of wine. You're going to love this one. When Casanova was
17, he spent his days studying to join the church. His nocturnal
activities, however, were anything but appropriate
for a future man of the cloth. In fact, it was around this time
that he lost his virginity one night to two Venetian sisters-- 16-year-old Nanetta and
15-year-old Marta Savorgnan, themselves virgins. Though Casanova remembered
his first tryst with fondness for the rest of his
life, that fondness was not shared with at
least one of the sisters. Marta entered a convent
instead of marrying and prayed for
Casanova's salvation. Based on how the rest
of his life went, we're going to guess those
prayers went unanswered. Around 1745, Casanova
attended a dinner in which a young
castrato was performing. A castrato, for
those who don't know, was essentially a
young male singer whose testicles had been removed
to preserve his high voice. Yeah, ouch, but
pitch perfect ouch. This particular castrato
was called Bellino. And he captivated Casanova. The young Venetian mused that
Bellino was actually a woman. And after a game of
identity revelation, Casanova was proven correct. Turns out, Bellino was actually
a young actress in disguise. She claimed to disguise
herself as a contralto to get roles on stage that
were not available to women. Though Casanova refers to her as
Teresa Lanti, spelled with a T, historians guess that she might
have been Teresa Landi, spelled with a D. She also may have
been Artemesia Lanti or Angiola Calori, all of whom ended
up on the London stage. Casanova and his
Bellino began an affair that ultimately produced
a child, Casanova's illegitimate son, Cesarino. Casanova's life
dramatically changed course in March of 1746. While he was in town,
celebrating carnival, he noticed Senator Matteo
Giovanni Bragadin collapse in his gondola,
suffering a stroke. Casanova took
charge, immediately directing Bragadin's
gondoliers to a surgeon. However, the surgeon's
methods, bleeding Bragadin, and rubbing a mercury-based
ointment on his chest might have killed the
poor noble had Casanova himself not intervened. He saved Bragadin's life. And the bystanders claimed
the young Venetian surely must have wielded supernatural
powers to have pulled it off. As a show of thanks,
Bragadin supposedly became a patron for
Casanova who suddenly had the wealth and
connections he so long craved. In 1746, Casanova
was in Padua, where he met a woman he calls
Ancilla, a local courtesan. Ancilla ran a gambling den. And Casanova lavished her with
his time, money, and affection. He also quickly learned
he wasn't her only lover. Count Medina was also known
as Ancilla's favorite lover. And he also excelled at cards. Casanova felt the two had
conspired to cheat him. He demanded satisfaction. So Medina returned the
young Venetian's money and then challenged him
to a duel by swords. Though Casanova escaped
the duel unharmed, he wounded Medina and gained an
enemy for the rest of his life. Casanova would go on to
have at least one more duel over the course of
his adventurous life. Casanova spent two
years in Paris, living there from 1750 to 1752. While he was there,
he devoted himself to learning French,
French kissing, meeting important people,
and getting himself into one scrape after another. Casanova was also,
probably unwisely, having an affair with a
daughter of his landlady, Madame Quinson. Sacrebleu. The teen-aged Mimi would
come down to Casanova's room on her own volition,
Casanova emphasized. And they would pass the time
in one another's embrace, amongst other things. When Mimi became
pregnant, her mother brought a suit against
the young Venetian, but the court ultimately
dismissed the charge. In 1753, the
27-year-old Casanova impregnated the 14-year-old
Caterina Capretta. Oh, my. Capretta's father quickly sent
her off to a Venetian convent. But if he thought
that was going to keep the notorious lothario
away from her, he clearly didn't know Casanova. Rather than keeping
his distance, the legendary lover
enlisted the help of nuns at the convent to pass
letters to Caterina. Meanwhile, in the course
of coming and going to the convent, Casanova had
piqued the attention of Marina Morosini, a beautiful nun,
who was already engaged in an affair with Abbé
Joachim de Bernis, a French diplomat in Venice. Morosini was so beguiled
by Casanova's figure, that she wrote him a
letter straight away. And the two soon began
a passionate affair. At one point, the couple
actually put on a public show for de Bernis, who watched their
lovemaking from a secret room. To add another
twist to the story, Morosini and Caterina
Capretta were engaged in their
own torrid affair within the convent walls. Doesn't sound like
much of a convent. Casanova was just
really being Casanova. Casanova's lifestyle attracted
attention wherever he went and not just from women. Police organizations
across Europe also meticulously
recorded his activities and considered him an
outlaw who routinely escaped one city for another. However, in 1755, his
scandals caught up with him. And Casanova was
arrested on a charge of indecency and blasphemy. Without trial, he
was unceremoniously thrown into prison. Though he was fortunate enough
to be imprisoned in the Doge's Palace, Casanova
had no intention of serving his full
five-year sentence. So Casanova decided
to fly the coop. After weeks of labor,
he filed an iron bar into a spike, which
he used to create a hole through the floor of his
cell, which he escaped through with the help of his
prison mate, a monk. I have a secret tunnel. Nova and the monk,
coming soon to HBO, fled Venice in a
gondola on the canal. Casanova sought refuge
in Paris and would not return to his beloved
Venice for 18 long years. It was said that Casanova and
his accomplice's prison break was the first time anyone had
escaped from the Doge's Palace. His escape from prison brought
him a small amount of fame which, no doubt, served
his romance game even more during his long
exile from Venice. While exiled in France in 1757,
Casanova introduced a lottery system to the country. Release the balls. The scheme, which relied on
his first-rate mathematical abilities, netted
Casanova wealth and access to the upper echelons
of French society. He met everyone from Madame de
Pompadour, the principal royal mistress at the court of
King Louis XV to Voltaire and other luminaries
of the Enlightenment. But Casanova was nothing, if not
egalitarian, with his company. At the same time, he cavorted
with working girls, dancers, and actresses because,
well, of course, he did. Soon he had squandered his
wealth and drifted into debt. In 1760, he fled Paris
to escape his creditors and began to roam around
Europe under a new name-- Chevalier de Seingalt. He spent the next
14 years jumping from one scandal
to the next as he jumped from one bed to
another, across the continent from London to St. Petersburg. In 1759, Casanova
was still in Paris. While there, he
reacquainted himself with the intelligent,
beautiful Guistiniana Wynne, a young
Venetian woman who was caught up in a
passionate affair with his friend, Andrea Memmo,
son of one of Venice's leading families. Guistiniana reached
out to her Casanova, because she had a problem. She was five months
pregnant with Memmo's baby, a circumstance that would
ruin her reputation. Memmo's family
vehemently opposed a marriage between the two. So Guistiniana felt
she had no choice but to terminate the pregnancy. Abortion was illegal
and dangerous in 18th century France. Nonetheless, they forged
ahead with their plans. They met at a masquerade so
as not to arouse suspicion and left the ball
for a few hours to visit the midwife
who would assist. To Guistiniana's frustration,
the attempt did not work. And she pleaded with
Casanova to find another way. Talk about asking the
wrong guy for help. After reading of an ointment
that would end her term, Casanova convinced
her to sleep with him, claiming that he would
apply the special ointment to his mini Casanova. And through
intercourse, it would be applied directly inside her. This method, unsurprisingly,
did not work. Without any other
options, Guistiniana Wynne had no choice but
to flee to a convent where she discreetly
gave birth to her child. Casanova never married,
but that didn't stop him from having a handful
of illegitimate sons and daughters. One of these was Leonilda,
his daughter from an affair with Lucrezia Castelli. In what must have been
an awkward moment, Casanova, almost
unwittingly, took Leonilda as his lover in 1761
when he visited Naples. But when he learned that she
was, in fact, his own flesh and blood, he wisely decided
not to sleep with her. However, things took a bizarre
twist many years later. Leonilda had been married
off to a marchese. And Casanova's old
flame, Lucrezia, invited him to visit them
at the grand new home. Lucrezia seemed to have
confessed to Casanova that their daughter was
unhappy, for her husband was not giving her the child she
so desperately wanted. So Casanova agreed
to Lucrezia's plan. He would impregnate her himself. This isn't typically the kind
of thing a man would brag about, but Casanova was no typical man. In fact, the record of this
act comes from his own writing. The unholy union had
its desired effect. And Casanova became both
father and grandfather to Leonilda's son
and/or brother. Mi casa, su inbreeding. As if his life wasn't
fantastical enough already, Casanova, much like
Madonna in 2011, also claimed to be an expert
in the mystical Kabbalah. The Kabbalah is a belief
system that pre-dates religion. A claim that, no doubt,
provided him with a way to manipulate a variety
of occult-minded people. To be fair, he was
deeply interested in it. But his claims of mysticism,
like pretty much everything else he did, were usually
rooted in questionable motives. One individual whom Casanova
used his claim to manipulate was Jeanne Camus de
Pontcarré, Marquise d'Urfé. The Marquise was a
noble and very wealthy French woman who
bonded with Casanova over their shared
love of the occult. He took advantage by
reveling in his proximity to the Marquise's wealth
and social connections. In 1763, she implored Casanova
to put his mystical knowledge to good use. The Marquise wanted him
to reincarnate her soul into the body of a baby. Oh, that's a good use. For years, Casanova strung
the old widow along, until she finally caught
on to his schemes, and the two parted ways. Casanova was more
than just a gigolo. He was also a polymath. And his diverse interests and
seemingly boundless energy led him down a number
of career paths. In his 73 years
of life, Casanova had jobs ranging from
monk-in-training to gambler, musician, spy, and soldier. Casanova also considered
himself a philosopher. And his intellectual
pursuits were just as central to his life
as his amorous ones. But perhaps the most
surprising career for the world's most famous
lothario was his final one-- librarian. In 1785, the aging
Casanova apparently had had enough of
his adventurous life and settled down as
the official librarian to Count Joseph Charles von
Waldstein, a Bohemian nobleman. Though this was not the happiest
time of Casanova's life, the job itself provided
Casanova with a steady income and his own quarters in the
count's castle in the Bohemian countryside. It also gave him time to
write his masterpiece, a 12-volume memoir of
his incredible life. Every woman, every age, every
color in every position. That is still considered one
of the most authentic sources of European social
norms and customs during the Enlightenment
period of the 18th century. So what do you think? How does your game
stack up to Casanova's? Let us know in the
comments below. And while you're at it, check
out some of these other videos from our Weird History. [MUSIC PLAYING]
