The Perfume Poisoner Who Killed 500 Men

Summary

After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal

Episode: The Perfume Poisoner Who Killed 500 Men
Hosts: Anthony Delaney & Maddy Pelling
Date: November 3, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Anthony and Maddy wade into the shadows of 17th-century Rome to explore the infamous story of Julia Tofana, the alleged poisoner behind the deadly “Aqua Tofana.” Legend claims this concoction was responsible for the deaths of 500 men and operated as an invisible lifeline for women trapped in violent or oppressive marriages. Through historical investigation, the hosts dissect fact from folklore, consider the broader context of women’s roles and powerlessness in early modern Italy, and critically examine the lasting legacy and myth-making around Tofana.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Stage: 17th-century Italy

• Society & Politics
  • Italy was a mosaic of city-states and foreign-controlled territories (not yet unified).
  • Papal States in central Italy dominated by the Catholic Church; Spain ruled the south; Holy Roman Empire controlled parts of the north.
  • [06:35] Anthony: "You're not talking very much about things that women are necessarily being part of that ruling papacy, et cetera, et cetera. So what is the status of women during this period?"
• Women’s Position
  • Society deeply patriarchal: women were the property of fathers or husbands, with almost no avenues for divorce or recourse against abuse.
  • Education for women was extremely limited, mostly for aristocrats and generally performative.
  • Domestic violence was a private matter largely ignored by authorities.
  • [07:53] Maddy: "If you're not married, arranged marriage is completely normal. So society is dominated by these big Catholic families and women are traded between them as chattel, essentially. There's no divorce."

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2. The Rise of Julia Tofana: Legend & Speculation

• Elusive Biography
  • Identity is shrouded in speculation; much of what’s recorded was written by later church authorities with clear agendas.
  • Julia possibly came from Palermo, Sicily, and may have been lower class.
• A Family Business in Poison
  • It’s speculated her mother, Tofania d’Adamo, was a known poisoner, executed in 1633 for her crimes.
  • The connection between mother and daughter is possible but not proven: "…again, the connection is very, very loose. So bear with." [13:08]
  • Julia moved to Rome after marriages and possibly after criminal suspicions.
• Name & Legacy
  • The surname “Tofana” may have been assigned retroactively to link her with Tofania d’Adamo.

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3. Aqua Tofana: The "Silent Killer"

• Nature of the Poison
  • Marketed as perfume or even holy water; actually a lethal mix of arsenic and lead, clear, odorless, and easily ingested.
  • [16:59] Maddy: "The liquid is clear, odorless and looks like water. So it is going under the radar...you want someone to consume."
• How It Worked
  • Sold to clients (mainly women) who could slip it into food or drink.
  • Effects could mimic natural illness or death, making detection extremely difficult.
• Business as Cover
  • Julia operated as a healer/perfumer, a legitimate female-held role, but hid poison sales beneath this façade.
  • Surrounded by an underground network—perfume shop in front, lethal trade in back.

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4. Gender, Power & Justice

• Poison as Agency
  • For women with no legal escape from abuse, poisoning became a desperate exercise of agency.
  • [10:04] Anthony: "...poison as an outlet for that power that they're otherwise denied."
• Male Authority & Historical Bias
  • Most documentation comes from Church or male writers, eager to craft a cautionary tale.
  • [32:23] Anthony: "I cannot emphasize enough how untrustworthy church sources, in the main, not always are, particularly when they're narratively driven."

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5. The Numbers: 500 Victims?

• Legend vs. Reality
  • Later sources—often from the Church—inflate numbers for dramatic effect ("some historians estimate...500 men").
  • “500 is a lovely round number.” [26:05]
  • The reputation of Aqua Tofana outlasts Julia, becoming cultural shorthand for “widowmaker” well into the 19th century.

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6. The End & Aftermath

• How Was Julia Caught?
  • Story goes: a wavering client confesses intent to her husband, who informs authorities.
  • Julia flees to a church but is dragged out by papal forces and (allegedly) confesses under torture.
• The Sparna Prosecution
  • Concrete trial in the next generation: the "Sparna prosecution."
  • Multiple women arrested, a few executed; demonstrates an underlying network but further blurs the line between reality and fable.

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7. Motive & Morality: Victims or Villains?

• On the Women Who Used Poison

  • Example from trial: Anna Maria Conti, forcibly married to a violent older husband.
    • [30:23] Maddy (quoting trial): “Although I was pregnant with Simon’s child, he threatened me with a knife... once he laid hands on my throat so violently to strangle me that he left bruises...”
  • Poison becomes survival, not ambition.

• Myth Versus Social Reality

  • [33:04] Maddy: "I think the question is not, is she a serial killer or a heroine, but did she exist at all? And what can this history tell us about women's lives in the past?"
  • Church narratives focus blame on an individual “corruptor” instead of acknowledging systemic oppression.

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8. Cultural Echoes

• Aqua Tofana in Popular Culture
  • Referenced for generations—so notorious that Mozart, dying in 1791, claimed he had been poisoned by it.
    • [33:40] Maddy: "…when Mozart, the composer, was on his deathbed, he was telling people...that he was dying because he’d been poisoned by Aqua Tofana."
• Modern Mythmaking
  • Tofana lives on in popular imagination, including social media “dark history” content.
  • Caution against glamorization or “girlbossification” of legendary poisoners without understanding actual circumstances of desperation and abuse.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Women’s Plight and Poison as Agency
  Anthony: "Or wield power or. Yes, you know, that's not. And then this is where this conversation comes in and we've spoken about this before on After Dark, about the idea... of poison as an outlet for that power that they're otherwise denied." [10:04]

• On Historical Sources
  Anthony: "I cannot emphasize enough how untrustworthy church sources, in the main, not always are, particularly when they're narratively driven." [32:23]

• On the Nature of the Legend
  Maddy: "I think the question is not, is she a serial killer or a heroine, but did she exist at all? And what can this history tell us about women's lives in the past?" [33:04]

• On the Myth's Endurance
  Maddy: "…the infamy of Aqua Tofana was such that... when Mozart, the composer, was on his deathbed, he was telling people...that he was dying because he’d been poisoned by Aqua Tofana." [33:40]

• Anthony Calls Out the Round Number:
  “500 is a lovely round number.” [26:05]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Historical Context & Women’s Status: 05:00–10:00
• Julia’s Mysterious Origins & Family: 13:00–15:30
• Aqua Tofana – Composition & Usage: 16:30–18:30
• Cultural Depictions & Symbolism: 21:50–24:20
• Famous Victim Numbers & Doubt: 25:00–26:10
• Tofana’s Downfall & Prosecution: 26:35–29:00
• Personal Motivations for Poisoning: 29:44–31:19
• Legacy, Sources, Gender & Myth: 31:50–34:15

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Tone & Style

The podcast is both irreverent and thoughtful, blending vivid storytelling with historical investigation and dark humor. The hosts riff off each other, sometimes wandering into modern cultural references or personal asides, but always circling back to critical analysis of legend, gender, and agency in a patriarchal world.

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Conclusion

The legend of Julia Tofana and her lethal “Aqua Tofana” unearths much about the historical realities of women’s desperation and resourcefulness in early modern Italy. While her exact biography remains unprovable and likely aggrandized, the myth’s endurance reflects society’s uneasy reckoning with both male violence and female resistance. The hosts urge listeners to read past simple dichotomies—serial killer or heroine—and use these stories as a lens to examine broader historical injustices and mythmaking.

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If this summary intrigued you, check out After Dark’s earlier episodes diving deeper into tales of historical poisoners and dark deeds. For further commentary or discussion, find Anthony and Maddy on their YouTube channel or podcast community.

Transcript

[Anthony Delaney]

Hi, we're your hosts Anthony Delaney and Maddy Pelling. And if you would like After Dark, Myths, Misdeeds and the Paranormal ad free and get early access.

[Maddy Pelling]

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[Anthony Delaney]

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[Maddy Pelling]

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[Maddy Pelling]

They say she helped kill some 500 men. They say her lethal concoction flowed through 17th century Rome like a secret river, carrying away schools of abusive husbands. The poison was simply known as as Aqua Tofana, the Silent Killer. And behind it stood a specter, Julia to Fana, Apothecary, perfumer, poisoner. But was Julia an angel of the alleyways or the architect of a quiet massacre? Join Us as we follow the supply chain of a legend. From the deadly recipes and a network of helpers to the papal courts where her name was recorded before the Roman Inquisition from the poisonous underworld of 17th century Rome. This is after dark.

[Anthony Delaney]

It's a dark December night in Vienna, 1791. And while the wind rattles outside, inside candles flicker in windows, lighting the face of a fevered genius, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart clutches the bedsheets, eyes burning with a terror no music can resolve. I am poisoned. He murmurs with Aqua Tofana. Whether or not he was the victim of the infamous poison, one thing is certain. Its name coils through time like a slow invisible venom. Aqua Tofana, a widowmaker's weapon, the whispered signature of a shadow merchant, Julia Tofana. But was she a myth, a legend, a serial killer? Or was she something far more unsettling to those in power? A mirror, invented to be held up to the society highlighting the poison of the patriarchy.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Its.

[Anthony Delaney]

Ciao tutti.

[Maddy Pelling]

Always gone Italian.

[Anthony Delaney]

That's the shout.

[Maddy Pelling]

Is that the extent of your Italian?

[Anthony Delaney]

Hello, my name's Anthony.

[Maddy Pelling]

And I'm Maddie.

[Anthony Delaney]

And today we are talking about a woman who has become the stuff of legend. As Maddy said. Strangely, you can even buy her perfume, which is ironic given what we're about to talk about. We see her shadow in the history books, in trial records. Yet what do we actually know about Julia Tofana? The woman who provided poison to kill what some historians estimate is 500 people in 500 men. 500 men, specifically men are people too in 17th century Rome. So what does her story tell us? Why does it endure? And why is it one that has been told again and again over the centuries and in various different ways? Let's delve into it and find out more. Over to Maddy, had you ever heard of this book? Yeah, but surface level, like I've done literally no research apart from look at my notes for this.

[Maddy Pelling]

He's super profesh. I'm give you a little bit of context first. So in terms of what's going on in this moment, we're kind of looking really at about 1630 to 1650. That's the period our story is set in. Although even that is a little bit woolly because as we're going to find out, we don't know a huge amount of specific detail about her. It's really hard to pin her down and who she was, where exactly she came from.

[Anthony Delaney]

Can I just say on that point then I was surprised that this is such a relatively late history, given that that we know so little. Because actually by now we know a lot about. Things are formalized. There's writing, there's documents, there's records to be had. So the woolliness is interesting in itself. I'll just bench that idea. But I just thought it was interesting.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, I think bear that in mind.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

So in terms of what's happening in this moment, of course, we have the English Civil War. Not very relevant to Italy, but that is happening. Charles I, of course, executed 1649. The Thirty Years War was happening largely in central Europe. This is ongoing conflict between the Catholics and the Protestants. Millions die in this conflict. And it really does reshape Europe. So this is a significant moment of turmoil, of conflicting ideas about what the world.

[Anthony Delaney]

Everything we always do is a significant moment.

[Maddy Pelling]

I know. When do we do, like super chill actually?

[Anthony Delaney]

There's nothing else going on.

[Maddy Pelling]

It's all fine. This is not one of those.

[Anthony Delaney]

No, none of them are, I suppose.

[Maddy Pelling]

In terms of Italy itself. So Italy was not a unified state. Yes. So it's a patchwork of different states and kingships, largely controlled actually by foreign powers, primarily by Spain, which ruled the south, and Milan in the north. Have you ever been to Italy?

[Anthony Delaney]

I have, but I want to go more. I have been to Rome.

[Maddy Pelling]

She's a basic bitch.

[Anthony Delaney]

I know. That's what I mean.

[Maddy Pelling]

And then we have the Holy Roman Empire, which has kind of nominal authority over the northern territories as well. There are the Papal States in central Italy, which of course are ruled over by the Pope, including Rome. And then we have the Republic of Venice, which is its whole other thing. Whenever I talk about Venice, I just think of the really great Casanova film with Heath Ledger in.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, do you think that's a great film? We need to do more film stuff. When we get to bonus content.

[Maddy Pelling]

We are going to do bonus episodes at some point and there will be films in there because. Oh, we should. Oh, I love.

[Anthony Delaney]

I like Heath Ledger.

[Maddy Pelling]

I think I saw it at a sweet spot of teeth.

[Anthony Delaney]

And then if you watch it now, though, you'll be like, oh, God, yeah.

[Maddy Pelling]

I'd be like, this is appalling. But loved it at the time.

[Anthony Delaney]

Now, one of the things that you are talking about here, you're talking about papal states, you're talking about monarchies in Spain, ruling parts of Italian states. You're not talking very much about things that women are necessarily being part of that ruling papacy, et cetera, et cetera. So what is the status of women during this period?

[Maddy Pelling]

Yes, this is very much a patriarchal society. I'm Joking what? Not only this, but the Church in this moment really makes sure that women are not included in these kind of public forums. Let's not forget that the Roman Inquisition, much like the Spanish Inquisition, is happening in this moment. There are tribunals set up by the Catholic Church all across Italy to combat things like heresy. And women very much fall into these categories because women be doing naughty things in terms of women's status in 17th century Italy. And of course this might depend slightly based on state to state, you are the property of your husband or your father. If you're not married, arranged marriage is completely normal. So society is dominated by these big Catholic families and women are traded between them as chattel, essentially. There's no divorce. Of course, under Catholic law there can be legal separation, for example, in cases of impotence. So if the marriage can't be consummated, that can be a means where you could escape domestic abuse in this moment is considered a private matter and not of interest to anyone outside the home. So you have nowhere to go if you're abused by your husband. And very much bear that in mind as we go through this history, because this is going to be the motivation for a lot of what happens. Education is really limited in this moment. So lots of women are sort of semi literate, especially in the lower classes, are become literate kind of by happenstance as they come into contact with different printed texts, they might be able to read and write or for example, keep the books of their businesses or the husband's businesses. But largely women have very little education unless they are in the aristocracy, in which case it's very much kind of like performative education. Like you might be able to read some poetry, language, Play the lute or something.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, play the loot.

[Maddy Pelling]

That's the poshest thing I think of. But.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, but true though, right? It's this performance of womanhood, like you're saying, it's like this is what women.

[Maddy Pelling]

Do in a performance of a particular kind of womanhood, where you are on show, you are literally performing to visitors who come into your home. You are there to make your husband proud, to bolster his status in the world or your family's status, you know, if you're not married within your father's household, you are not there to have an independent life or any kind of independent thought or creativity. Not for you, babe.

[Anthony Delaney]

Or wield power or. Yes, you know, that's not. And then this is where this conversation comes in and we've spoken about this before on After Dark, about the Idea. And we'll come to Julia herself now in just a second. But I just want to insert this here of poison as an outlet for that power that they're otherwise denied. That they, being women, are otherwise denied.

[Maddy Pelling]

And we associate that with deadly wielding.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah. But we also know that men poisoned people, particularly by the time we come to Victoria.

[Maddy Pelling]

It's a very kind of 19th century Victorian concept of like, you know, arsenic is the lady's choice kind of thing. But poison in this moment is going to be helpful to women.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yes. So that is a real thing that we're about to see in this case, at the very least. Yes.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, yeah, Julia, go on. So Julia Tofana is her name, potentially.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, one of these.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yes. We don't know when she's born, but we know she's likely born in Palermo in Sicily. We know a few early biographical details, but again, they're very vague. There's a lot of editing in the centuries that have followed, kind of changing the details.

[Anthony Delaney]

Is she noble or is she. What do we know her class status?

[Maddy Pelling]

Lower class. We.

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay, so that.

[Maddy Pelling]

Okay, so she really has no power in this society.

[Anthony Delaney]

I'll buy that then. Because, you know, we talked earlier about me being a little bit suspicious about how little we know about her, but given that she is.

[Maddy Pelling]

She's not an aristocratic woman.

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay, that tracks there.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, exactly. There was a tradition at the time in Italy of taking your mother's first name as your surname.

[Anthony Delaney]

Taking your mother. Oh, okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

I imagine this is if you are not married but you're going out into the world. Right.

[Anthony Delaney]

What would your first name be?

[Maddy Pelling]

My mother's surname was Fawkes.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh.

[Maddy Pelling]

So, yeah. Which is a sort of bastardization over time of Fawkes. And we have lots of connections to Warwickshire Fawkes and maybe.

[Anthony Delaney]

Jesus Christ, my family tree is boring.

[Maddy Pelling]

I imagine yours is just very island based.

[Anthony Delaney]

That's me.

[Maddy Pelling]

You said that, not me.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, I said it. I can say that. But yes. So you would have been folks Foukes Fawkes.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. What would you be?

[Anthony Delaney]

Boogie.

[Maddy Pelling]

Boogie, yeah. That's a great name.

[Anthony Delaney]

It's a bit weird. God, I mean, Boogie Delaney. All right, I'll go with that. I'll tell her she missed a trick.

[Maddy Pelling]

The 1920s American gangster.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bugsy Valone.

[Maddy Pelling]

Do you remember Bugsy Valone?

[Anthony Delaney]

I do, actually. It's true.

[Maddy Pelling]

Buggy Delaney's in town.

[Anthony Delaney]

Anyway, sorry, I derailed. She. She.

[Maddy Pelling]

I'm expecting the ship print from Buggy Delaney anytime now.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, my God, I love that. But she. Okay, There custom that you're taking.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. And so there's speculation that her mother is this person who was well known at the time called Tifania Dadamo. And who is she, you might ask? She is a poisoner in her own right. So this is potentially a family business, but I'm saying potentially because the connection between them is very, very loose. So bear with. But she was a Sicilian woman who moved to Palermo, so she's in the right place to have Julia.

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

There are things that potentially add up.

[Anthony Delaney]

I know.

[Maddy Pelling]

And she is supposedly the inventor of this concoction called Aqua Tofana.

[Anthony Delaney]

The Damo woman, or whatever her name is not Julia de Damo. Okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So this woman, she is the mother, is executed on the 12th of July, 1633. So Julia herself would have been a child at this point. And she's executed for poisoning her own husband.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah.

[Maddy Pelling]

And for trafficking illegal, lethal poison, so selling it to other people as well. There is a suggestion that she's the mother because of this connection with poison, because of the name connection, and because Julia herself goes into the family business. The family business being healing or apothecary work with a side of murder.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah.

[Maddy Pelling]

Or simply supplying a murder weapon to other people who then go and do the crime. So that is potentially a little bit of her background. Now, we do know that Julia is married twice.

[Anthony Delaney]

Julia's married twice. Okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

And I will say that a lot of the information that we have about her comes from publications after her own lifetime written by men of the church. So again, agendas. Agendas. We do know that Julia is married twice. So she's married the first time. We don't know who her husband is, but her surname in this moment is Mangiani. We know that he dies because she is married a second time. So he must have popped his clogs. And is he murdered? We don't know.

[Anthony Delaney]

We don't even know what her name is. So who knows?

[Maddy Pelling]

Well, Also, this is 17th century Italy, so he probably just like tripped over, got cut and got sepsis.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. Yeah.

[Maddy Pelling]

But we do know that she's married again in 1624. Whether the marriage actually takes place in that year, we're not sure. And by 1624, they have children and stepchildren, so it's a bit of a blended family. And they move to Rome. Some historians have said that they are fleeing because she has been caught poisoning a man in Genoa, others unclear. So there's just so much speculation. Yeah, it's really woolly. It's really Hard to get to who she is. Some people think that her surname of Tifana, who she's known by as, you know, as Julia Tofana, is actually a fabrication and it's a 19th century invention to link her to that earlier woman. So.

[Anthony Delaney]

Right, okay.

[Maddy Pelling]

Who this woman, Julia Tofana actually is, is so hard to get to, because.

[Anthony Delaney]

At first I was thinking, no way she's related to that other woman. Then I was thinking, but they have the same surname, they're from the same area.

[Maddy Pelling]

But that just could be a.

[Anthony Delaney]

But now that. Yeah, Jesus.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So what we do know is that she goes into this business of creating perfumes, creating concoctions to heal people and also, crucially, poison.

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay. So we do know that she is into perfumery, poisonery, unofficially, and healing, you know, unctuous potions and all that kind of thing.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. And, you know, this is, on the one hand, work that is available to women in this period, but also puts you under the spotlight of the inquisition of the Church. You know, you're a woman dealing out life, health, potentially death and justice without the control of institutions like the Church. You're a little bit dodgy. She has like networks of trade. Yes, she does have a shop, we believe.

[Anthony Delaney]

And skill.

[Maddy Pelling]

Right, and skill. But she's what is visibly being sold in the shop and what is actually being sold to customers.

[Anthony Delaney]

Could be different.

[Maddy Pelling]

Could be two separate things. Yeah, yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

So talk to me then a little bit about the skill and the trade. Yeah, talk to me about what that looks like. What's the crossover between perfumery poisoning? I can imagine it's like mixing shit together, basically. But, like, is that what we're looking at here?

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So she creates her famous poison, Aqua Tofana, which may have been created by her mother before her. It may have already existed and she is simply harnessing this existing.

[Anthony Delaney]

But just to recipe be clear, because for me, I mean, on the surface of it, Aqua Tofana is a perfume.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So this is bottled as a perfume. It's bottled liquid.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yep, yep, yep.

[Maddy Pelling]

It's sometimes bottled as holy water as well, ironically, it's in disguise, but it is definitely a poison. It's made up of ground arsenic and lead that are boiled together. So not something that's going to make you smell nice, not something you want on your skin that's going to take.

[Anthony Delaney]

A while to kill you. But arsenic will do it pretty quickly.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, exactly. And the idea is that she's selling this to clients, whoever. We'll go on to talk about who her clients are and that they can then take that back to their own domestic space and they are most commonly slipping it into food or drink of their victims. So this is something that you want someone to consume.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh wait, she's supply. She's not doing the poisoning necessarily. Although she may have had killed a couple of people and been on the run and we don't know. But she is selling this purposefully to people.

[Maddy Pelling]

She's just the supplier, my friend. She's not taking responsibility. She's like you. Do you?

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[Anthony Delaney]

I've made my magic arsenic lead concoction.

[Maddy Pelling]

Roll up, roll up.

[Anthony Delaney]

This is for rats.

[Maddy Pelling]

Exactly.

[Anthony Delaney]

Perfume for rats.

[Maddy Pelling]

This is totally legit. This isn't for husbands. The liquid is clear, odorless and looks like water. So it is going under the radar. Unless you know what you have purchased and you know how to use it, nobody's gonna know what it is. Also, if it is administered a little bit consistently over time in something like food or drink, it can mimic a natural death or an illness leading to death.

[Anthony Delaney]

What's left? The lead maybe?

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, I suppose it must be. Or just in a fasting start.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah. You feeling sick or whatever?

[Maddy Pelling]

So essentially she's handing out something that is not detectable as a poison and that can convincingly make a murder seem like a natural death. Yeah, there's not really a way to detect this or trace it.

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[Maddy Pelling]

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[Maddy Pelling]

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[Paige DeSorbo]

Hey, I'm Paige desorbo and I'm always thinking about underwear.

[Hannah Berner]

I'm Hannah Berner, and I'm also thinking about underwear, but I prefer full coverage. I like to call them my granny panties.

[Paige DeSorbo]

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[Maddy Pelling]

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[Hannah Berner]

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[Anthony Delaney]

It's kind of bizarre in a way, because we don't encounter this very often. We encounter poisoning all the time. We don't really encounter a supply chain that's not coming just from a pharmacy. And, you know, they're putting it in their poison books. I know we're talking about a different century here, but, like, this isn't how these poison stories go usually.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, I know. It's unusual. So there's an image. It's a later image, Admittedly, it's a 19th century image, but of a bottle of Aqua Tofana, which was infamous in the centuries after Juliet supposedly lived, if she did at all. Again, this is all kind of a little bit of speculation. So Aqua Tofana was so notorious in the centuries. Well, first of all the generations, then the centuries after Julia's death, that it was still in the 19th century in the popular imagination. And we have here an image of a bottle of it. Please describe.

[Anthony Delaney]

So this is. There's a lovely little scene in the background of a man in what looks like. Like an apothecary's workshop.

[Maddy Pelling]

Women have been written out of this history by the 19th century, even by.

[Anthony Delaney]

The poisoning histories that you'd expect to see them in it's very cutesy. It's very like, you know, there's loads of herbs and bottles and receptacles and there's a man grinding something and there's a book or some kind of recipe book there. And there's kind of Bunsen Burnery type things, except in a 17th century context. And a big fireplace. And then in the centre of that, over us we have a bottle which is distinctly not very 17th century looking. And on it it says Mana di San Nicola. And it is a picture of a man who we know is St. Nicholas Santa. Basically, it's giving St. Patrick. He's got the crook and he's got that little hat.

[Maddy Pelling]

I love that you read it that way.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, it looks like St. Patrick to me. And then bizarrely, there are three babies in a tub in a bathtub thing, but like it's a wooden bathtub reaching up to him. No idea what the hell that's about. And it's kind of weird. Two of them look like they've got holes in their heads, which is weird.

[Maddy Pelling]

This has gone so funny.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah. It's a very strange thing. It's not the Santa we know and love. And yet here we are.

[Maddy Pelling]

What is Santa doing in this? As we say, this is a much later 19th century kind of depiction of this. But what's interesting is that Aqua Tofana becomes associated with St. Nicholas.

[Anthony Delaney]

How?

[Maddy Pelling]

We think of Santa as delivering presents at Christmas, making everything magical for children. But in the 17th century he's associated with the protection of girls who are being trafficked or abused in some way.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, wow.

[Maddy Pelling]

So, yeah. Which is kind of an interesting pre present Santa. Yeah, it kind of ties into this idea that the Aqua Tofana is being sold to protect women and that it sort of has this seal of approval from ol St. Nick.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, that's interesting.

[Maddy Pelling]

And this is an idea that obviously has survived until at least the 19th century.

[Anthony Delaney]

And by protect women you mean in order to poison the men that they're pissed off with.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

Or that have wronged them legitimately in some way.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, exactly.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh, that's interesting.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So we think kind of like pepper.

[Anthony Delaney]

Spray in that sense. Like you need this because you're in trouble.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, it's like it would be nice to not need the pepper spray or the Aqua Tofana. Men don't be abusing the wives.

[Anthony Delaney]

That's interesting.

[Maddy Pelling]

So we think, and this is based on accounts that come just after Julia's life, but also a real life trial that happens in the generation afterwards as well, that Aqua Tofana, during Julia's lifetime, was used to kill at least 500 husbands, at least 500 female clients of hers who came to her.

[Anthony Delaney]

But the clients are women, then.

[Maddy Pelling]

The clients are predominantly women, if not exclusively, and they are taking this stuff home. And there is an understanding, I suppose, that we can never get to the true number because most of these deaths appeared natural, and so there's no record of them. They wouldn't have been flagged. But how many men across these Italian prince ships are dropping dead because of this?

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay, I'm gonna exclusively reveal the answer here today, not 500.

[Maddy Pelling]

I know.

[Anthony Delaney]

This is some Victorian bloke.

[Maddy Pelling]

See? No, I don't even think it's Victorian. I think it comes from the church. In the panic after her lifetime of, like, look what women have been doing even that quickly. Like, we haven't paid any attention to them. And look what they've been doing behind our backs without our consent. They've been plotting against us, killing us and bringing down the paper.

[Anthony Delaney]

Either way, it's not true like this. It's not ringing true, much of this.

[Maddy Pelling]

I mean, surely that's a lot of presumably youngish men dropping dead. Yeah, that would get noticed.

[Anthony Delaney]

500 is a lovely round number.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, it is. Yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

You know what I mean?

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. Some estimates are at 600, so could be somewhere in between. I don't buy it.

[Anthony Delaney]

Let's stick with potentially Julia. We know that she's moved around. We know that she's married a couple of times. She has children and stepchildren. Yeah, we sort of know that she has this business selling to mostly women in order that they might be able to kill their husbands. How does this story, choosing my words purposefully, come to an end, then?

[Maddy Pelling]

Okay, so Julia's downfall, if she existed, comes when one of her clients buys Aqua Tofana from her, takes it home, is going to kill her husband. But she panics at the last second, like, get it together.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah.

[Maddy Pelling]

And she tells her husband what's going on. She confesses everything to him.

[Anthony Delaney]

She's like, brian, I never meant to do it, Julia.

[Maddy Pelling]

So I just wish you'd pick the wet towels up off the bathroom floor. Like you just. You've taken me to the edge.

[Anthony Delaney]

Personal insight into Maddie's life there.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. So the husband inevitably goes to the authorities, and she, Julia, this is, seeks sanctuary in a church nearby. She rushes there and hides there. There is a rumor that when she's in sanctuary in this church, that she poisons the water supply there, which I think is just such Nonsense like why would she do that? Because then sure would die. But I suppose this idea of like a vindictive, moral less woman who just wants to poison the heart of society like this has taken root out this story. Papal authorities though are like, we gotta nail this bitch. Like she has got to go down for something. And they break the sanctuary, the sacred.

[Anthony Delaney]

Can you do that?

[Maddy Pelling]

Well, if you're the papal authorities, you can, sure. For a woman, nobody's going to stop you. And she's arrested in around 1659 and she is taken into custody. We do know her name appears in Roman Inquisition and ecclesiastical records of the time. So someone with this name is arrested for this crime.

[Anthony Delaney]

Okay, that's something.

[Maddy Pelling]

So she is arrested by the papal authorities, she is supposedly tortured and she is executed. There is an anecdote that she confesses to having supplied poison that kills over 500 men. Again, it's really unclear now. A more concrete bit of history happens. Just after her supposed death in 1659, there's a trial called the Sparna prosecution trial. And this is a trial that supposedly the central figure of this is a woman called Jeronima Sparner, who is the stepdaughter of Julia. Like again, we're getting this idea, I suppose, with Julia's own mother as the inventor of it and stuff. This idea of kind of female lineage and poison being handed down. Exactly. It's like women are bad and they pass bad things down and not good. So it's very like the antithesis of the patriarchy. I don't buy for a second that this is necessarily her actual daughter. But this trial really did happen. And over 40 people, including sellers and clients who'd been using poison were arrested. Some were members of the aristocracy. This ran the gamut of society. And this was in Rome at the time. And this huge trial takes place. Murders are proved, this network of sale is proved. All these women who are trading this silently and secretly. And the punishment for these 40 people ranged from some were exiled and some were put in lifetime house arrest, which don't forget, if you have attempted to poison your husband and now you're in house arrest for the rest of your life. Not great.

[Anthony Delaney]

Did those husbands die?

[Maddy Pelling]

Some did, some did not. There were five main figures in the trial who were executed, including Sparner, who's the supposed stepdaughter of Julia. And they were either women who had killed men with poison or who had supplied it and were known to supply it to vast numbers. In Sparna's case. So there is a little bit of tangible history There's a couple of cases in particular that come out of this. So there's one woman called Anna Maria Conti, who. She's 19. She's married off the second time to a French painter who's twice her age and he is violent. And there's a quote here that says, this is from her, supposedly from the trial. She said, although I was pregnant with Simon's child, he threatened me with a knife, even with the baby I was carrying. Once he laid hands on my throat so violently to strangle me that he left bruises and went after me with a naked sword, I. E. A sword taken out of its scabbard. So let's just circle back to the motivation of some of these women for killing the men in their lives. Did she exist? What do you think?

[Anthony Delaney]

I don't like her, Maddy.

[Maddy Pelling]

It's frustrating history. I feel like it's too woolly, like we're saying at the beginning. But she has a long legacy, or rather the Aqua Tofana has a long legacy.

[Anthony Delaney]

It's weird, right? Because I've heard of this person, as I say, you see it referenced on social media quite a lot.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah, she's quite a popular kind of TikTok. Dark history.

[Anthony Delaney]

Yeah, yeah. And also goes into. And we talk about this sometimes, this kind of girl bustification thing of certain figures in the past.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah. And it's easy to be like, you go girl, killing your 500 abusive.

[Anthony Delaney]

And yet, though, if people are drawing naked swords on you, do what you need to do to survive. You know what I mean?

[Maddy Pelling]

And that's the thing that bothers me about this. There is actually at the center of it a really grim actual history of male violence, domestic violence, the oppression of women in this period. And that is Julia Tofana, therefore, a kind of folk hero who's grown up in this context in her own lifetime, or the lifetime of the women who believed in her. Aqua Tofana was clearly a thing that existed, that was sold and used to kill people. It really was a poison that was available. And I think there's something as well to be said about the fact that the Church is the Church who give. This history of most of what we have comes from papal record.

[Anthony Delaney]

This is my problem.

[Maddy Pelling]

And there's a kind of like, I suppose an attempt to say, here's this one woman who did this and she was the problem. She was the poisoned apple. Rather than be like, oh, this is a systemic issue in society, that women feel the need to do this in order to escape the terrible circumstances that they find Themselves in and as a means of survival that's not acknowledged by the church. Instead, it's like, there's one woman, she's corrupted all the others. This is bad.

[Anthony Delaney]

I cannot emphasize enough how untrustworthy church sources, in the main, not always are, particularly when they're narratively driven.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

We know the church lies throughout history and today. We know that they fabricate neat narratives in order to control narratives. Yeah, yeah. Like, so they're not a trustworthy institution. They are powerful. They are domineering. They. They control so much of what we know of the Middle Ages and into the early modern era. And then that starts to loosen its grip on, you know, by the time we get to the 18th century, which is good for us. But I don't trust this shit. Like, it annoys me, actually.

[Maddy Pelling]

It's frustrating. It is frustrating. And, you know, the question that's often asked of her, and there's so much online about her is, you know, is she a serial killer or a heroine? Is she existed? But I think this is the thing. I think the question is, did she exist? And why do we want to pin this on one figure rather than looking at this wider problem? What I will say this is a nice little anecdote, is that the infamy of Aqua Tofana was such that in the 18th century, when Mozart, the composer, was on his deathbed, he was telling people as they came into his bedroom that he was dying because he'd been poisoned by Aqua Tofana.

[Anthony Delaney]

Oh.

[Maddy Pelling]

And he did not have a particularly great relationship with women, and.

[Anthony Delaney]

No, he didn't.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

And he was very dramatic as well.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

So, again, do you trust him?

[Maddy Pelling]

But, like, the fact that that is.

[Anthony Delaney]

I like him.

[Maddy Pelling]

But still in popular imagination, over a hundred years later. Yeah, yeah. That he's lying there, his deathbed, going, oh, my God, I've been poisoned by women. Yeah, women have got me, finally. So, yeah, I think the question is not, is she a serial killer or a heroine, but did she exist at all? And what can this history tell us about women's lives in the past?

[Anthony Delaney]

And I think that is how it's useful.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yes.

[Anthony Delaney]

Right. Now, listen, off you go and do some Googling on that and tell us what you think in the comments, either on the podcast, on the Spotify, or on wherever you're watching this on YouTube. That's annoyed me now.

[Maddy Pelling]

Yeah.

[Anthony Delaney]

Just because anytime the church comes into it, I just get annoyed. That's just my personal gig, guys. Sorry to bring that to the table. Look, if you have enjoyed this episode do go back and listen to some of our other poisoning episodes. We've got Palmer the Poisoner.

[Maddy Pelling]

We have.

[Anthony Delaney]

We've got loads others. I can't think of them right, but they're there and they're more factually grounded than this is. So if you enjoy a bit of poison, go and look at those. Thank you so much for listening to this episode or watching. If you're watching on YouTube, if you haven't already, take a migratory break, trip over to YouTube and you can discover us there. We're now in full 4K. I don't know, HD. We need all the filters, but we're over there and we're talking on sofas today and it's very comfy and we're enjoying it. We will see you again next time After Dark, when we'll be talking about more grim, dastardly and dark deeds from the past. Until then, see you soon.

[Maddy Pelling]

Foreign.

[Paige DeSorbo]

Hey, I'm Paige desorbo and I'm always thinking about underwear.

[Hannah Berner]

I'm Hannah Burner and I'm also thinking about underwear, but I prefer full coverage. I like to call them my granny panties.

[Paige DeSorbo]

Actually, I never think about underwear. That's the magic of Tommy John.

[Hannah Berner]

Same. They're so light and so comfy. And if it's not comfortable, I'm not wearing it.

[Paige DeSorbo]

And the bras? Soft, supportive and actually breathable.

[Hannah Berner]

Yes. Lord knows the girls need to breathe. Also, I need my PJs to breathe and be buttery, soft and stretchy enough for my dramatic tossing and turning at night. That's why I live in my Tommy John pajamas.

[Paige DeSorbo]

Plus, they're so cute because they fit perfectly.

[Hannah Berner]

Put yourself on to Tommy John.

[Paige DeSorbo]

Upgrade your drawer with Tommy John. Save 25% for a limited time at tommyjohn.com comfort See site for details.

[Anthony Delaney]

Right across America, people listen to the Tony and Ryan podcast every day. I'm Ryan. This is my best friend, Tony.

[Maddy Pelling]

Howdy.

[Anthony Delaney]

No, we're Australian. They're from the U.S. g'.

[Hannah Berner]

Day.

[Maddy Pelling]

Perfection.

[Anthony Delaney]

But don't just take our word for it. Andrew's in Washington. Why do you love the podcast, Andrew?

[Maddy Pelling]

Well, I do love some hot fun garbage. And you're a big member of our podcast community as well. Feel like you're in the conversation. You can laugh with them and then you can get into the community and.

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[Anthony Delaney]

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[Maddy Pelling]

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