Giustina Rocca (died 1502) was an Italian Renaissance lawyer, judge and diplomat.[1] She has been called the world's first female lawyer, and claimed as an inspiration for the character of Portia in Shakespeare's play Merchant of Venice. [2][3]
Giustina Rocca was born in Trani in the second half of the fifteenth century, the daughter of Orazio Rocca, orator at the senate of Naples.[3] She married the Royal Captain Giovanni Antonio Palagano, with whom she had four children. Her daughter Cornelia died before the age of twenty in 1492.[2]
Rocca was a lawyer at the Court of Trani, and is traditionally regarded as having specialized in delicate diplomatic issues between Trani and Venice. On 8 April 1500 she pronounced an arbitration sentence before the Venetian governor of Trani, Ludovico Contarini. In her last wishes, dictated to a notary on 10 June 1501, she asked to be buried in Trani Cathedral next to the tomb of her daughter Cornelia.[2]
Rocca's life was celebrated in Tractatus de iure patronatus (1533), by the Trani jurist Cesare Lambertini.[2]
The Rocca tower in Luxembourg was completed in 2019 as an addition to the headquarters of the Court of Justice of the European Union.[4] It is the tallest building in the country.[4]