Navigating Ambiguities

Abstract Early modern galley crews were made up of three categories of rowers: the free rowers, called buonavoglia in the sources; the convicts, known as forzati ; and, finally, the slaves, most of whom were prisoners of war from the Ottoman Levant and, for this reason, were generally referred to as “Turks”. Legal status, duties, as well as actual distinguishing marks such as mustaches, a shaved head or a red cap, distinguished the three categories of oarsmen. Yet, archival sources show how the boundaries among these legal status were as a matter of fact blurred and nuanced, and how, onboard galleys, the distinction between free/convict/slave, and thus between free and un-free rowers, was essentially leveled in the name of a marginality arising from the mere fact of being deployed as a rower on a galley which, by definition, involved some degree of deprivation of liberty.