Catholic church question, early 1700s

[dinogrrl]

I'm (still) writing a fantasy story set in early 18th century Venice, and there's several scenes of the main character and her family attending Mass or otherwise being inside their church. It's not a big cathedral, more like a well-attended neighborhood church.

My question is probably very stupid but where the heck do the men put their hats while attending Mass or whatever else they're in there for? Do they just like, put their hats beside themselves on their seats? Or just hold onto them on their laps or some other way? Or would your average 18th century Catholic church have a sort of coat room or somesuch? My google-fu is failing in finding a church layout from that time period or text explanation, though I did find a good article about priests wearing wigs...

Comments

[garonne]

Here you can see them holding the hats under their elbows (France, 1696).

[garonne]

And here a guy who puts his hat on the ground (France, 1835).

And another guy holding his hat.

And generally: on the pew beside him, or if there is no room than on his lap while sitting and on the pew behind him while standing/kneeling. (Source: attending mass in 21st century Italy in 17th/18th century churches.)

[dinogrrl]

Ah, thank you so much! So basically kinda verified what I was thinking, that's good to know (ie, mostly the same as nowadays, just put it wherever it's not in the way). I was actually wondering about setting belongings on the floor, I figured that would be potentially problematic with having to kneel and whatnot but since that guy's off to the side then I guess that wouldn't be a problem.

Need to work on how to search period artwork, I guess!