Giacomo Casanova most famous and representative citizen. Casanova was cared for by his grandmother Marzia Baldissera while his mother toured about Europe in the theater. His father died when he was eight. As a child, Casanova suffered nosebleeds, and his grandmother sought help from a witch: "Leaving the gondola, we enter a hovel, where we find an old woman sitting on a pallet, with a black cat in her arms and five or six others around her." Though the unguent applied was ineffective, Casanova was fascinated by the incantation. Perhaps to remedy the nosebleeds (a physician blamed the density of Venice's air),
Giacomo Casanova escaped by gondola. Eventually, Casanova reached Paris, where he arrived on the same day (January 5, 1757) that Robert-François Damiens made an attempt on the life of Louis XV. (Casanova would later witness and describe his execution.) Thirty years later in 1787, Casanova wrote "Story of My Flight", which was very popular and was reprinted in many languages, and he repeated the tale a little later in his memoirs. Casanova's judgment of the exploit is characteristic: He knew his stay in Paris might be a long one and he proceeded accordingly: "I saw that to accomplish anything I must bring