Antonio (The Merchant of Venice) to an individual's sexual identity but only to specific sexual acts any individual might engage in. As Bray writes: "To talk of an individual of this period as being or not being 'a homosexual' is an anachronism and ruinously misleading. The temptation to debauchery, from which homosexuality was not clearly distinguished, was accepted as part of the common lot ... homosexuality [as understood in 15th-century England] was a sin 'to which men's natural corruption and viciousness [were] prone' " (16–17, Rainolds qtd. in Bray, 17). Antonio (The Merchant of Venice) Antonio is the title character in Shakespeare's "The Merchant of
The Merchant of Venice staged today, but is potentially troubling to modern audiences because of its central themes, which can easily appear antisemitic. Critics today still continue to argue over the play's stance on the Jews and Judaism. English society in the Elizabethan era has been described as "judeophobic". English Jews had been expelled under Edward I in 1290 and were not permitted to return until 1656 under the rule of Oliver Cromwell. In Venice and in some other places, Jews were required to wear a red hat at all times in public to make sure that they were easily identified, and had to