venereous

will not even speak of 'Catharine d' Medices Queen Mother and monster of France', and, of course, Henri II, 'a grievous oppressor of the Church', was killed in a joust, Francois II died young, an earlier duc de Guise was assassinated, and Anjou was felled, some say, by a 'venereous contagion', which means syphilis (sig.

Although he sternly admonishes the reader, "As for thine eyes, shut them and turne them aside from these venereous Venetian objects" (406), he provides a picture that may be gazed upon at length.