CASANOVA, GIACOMO. - Adventurer, born in Venezia on 2 April 1725, died on 4 June 1798 at Dux (Boemia), where he had withdrawn to the castle of Count Waldstein as librarian and wrote his Mémoires, reliving his thousand erotic and business exploits, his travels, his gambling and courtly adventures. He had been in Francia, at Dresda, Vienna, Praga, Pietroburgo, in Olanda and Svizzera, everywhere engaging in ruinous commercial enterprises and amorous adventures. In 1755 he was arrested and tried on charges of Freemasonry and magic, but after fifteen months in prison he succeeded in escaping from the Piombi (see the Histoire de sa fuite, Lipsia 1788).
Despite certain open declarations of reverence for religion (“chaque chose qu'il avait faite c'était par l'ordre de Dieu,” he had the prince de Ligne say), C. was a man exclusively thirsting for worldly life. His wandering existence by expedients, his libertine esprit, are of interest to the history of eighteenth-century manners, of which he, together with Balsamo, is the most spectacular representative. The Mémoires were published posthumously in 1822.