The Routledge History of Women in Early Modern Europe

Amanda L. Capern

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000709599
• Subtopic: Early Modern History
• Index: History

The Routledge History of Women in Early Modern Europe is a comprehensive and ground-breaking survey of the lives of women in early-modern Europe between 1450 and 1750. Covering a period of dramatic political and cultural change, the book challenges the current contours and chronologies of European history by observing them through the lens of female experience. The collaborative research of this book covers four themes: the affective world; practical knowledge for life; politics and religion; arts, science and humanities. These themes are interwoven through the chapters, which encompass all areas of women's lives: sexuality, emotions, health and wellbeing, educational attainment, litigation and the practical and leisured application of knowledge, skills and artistry from medicine to theology. The intellectual lives of women, through reading and writing, and their spirituality and engagement with the material world, are also explored. So too is the sheer energy of female work, including farming and manufacture, skilled craft and artwork, theatrical work and scientific enquiry.

The Routledge History of Women in Early Modern Europe revises the chronological and ideological parameters of early-modern European history by opening the reader's eyes to an exciting age of female productivity, social engagement and political activism across European and transatlantic boundaries. It is essential reading for students and researchers of early-modern history, the history of women and gender studies.

PART I

THE AFFECTIVE WORLD

Body, kinship and emotions

1

BODIES, SEX AND SEXUALITY

Sarah Toulalan

It has been observed that contemporary divisions of the stages of life were predicated on the male body and life cycle as the norm, deploying traditional numerical divisions which were not necessarily coterminous with women’s lives and bodies. This organisation tended to universalise ageing from male experiences, significant milestones in men’s lives, and changes to male bodies.¹ Some studies of renaissance and early modern women have therefore moved away from this traditional division of life stages, relating ‘age norms for women, based on medical, legal, and social discourses’ to ‘the key social and legal markers in a woman’s life: namely, the phases of maidenhood, motherhood, and widowhood.’² However, as many studies of widowhood have pointed out, this stage of life did not neatly align with older age for a woman. Even very young, newly married wives, potentially including those in their late teens and early twenties, might be widowed.³ Widowhood was also something that a woman might experience more than once if she remarried as ‘Death and its disruptions formed a regular part of married life’.⁴ In practice, then, widowhood was not necessarily the third and final stage of a woman’s life as the experience of loss of a marital – and hence sexual – partner was something that might occur at any age after marriage; and neither did all women marry nor all married women out-live a husband to experience widowhood. This division also assumes that maidenhood was the first stage of life from which a woman inevitably moved on to marry and produce children as this was the expected trajectory for the female life-course. In practice, up to 25 per cent of the female population never married in the seventeenth century, in some parts of Europe (for example, England), although some of these would have experienced motherhood as unmarried mothers, even if their infants did not survive or they were prevented by circumstances from being able themselves to raise their children.

The female lifecycle, then, might be broadly divided into three stages, but these stages relate to reproductive life, which at all stages of a woman’s life shaped her experiences of her body and her sexual life, as well as having an impact on her life more generally. This chapter, therefore, will explore women’s bodies, sex and sexuality in relation to the stages of their reproductive lives: infancy and childhood to sexual development at puberty; the potentially reproductive years post-puberty; and older age following the cessation of reproductive possibility at menopause. It will do so through a discussion of various contexts in which sex and reproduction were experienced within and without marriage, including rape and sexual assault, prostitution, fornication and adultery, childbirth, fertility and infertility, exploring each issue in relation to the different stages of reproductive life.

Sex, marriage and fertility

In one of the early considerations of the question of sexual knowledge – in this case for early-modern England – Patricia Crawford observed that women’s sexual lives took place in the context of reproduction.⁵ This was undoubtedly so for women who had experienced the physical developments of puberty which prepared their bodies for both childbearing and sex. Whether pregnancy and childbirth were strongly desired after marriage as a confirmation of fertility and a successful marital union, or were feared as a potential consequence of extra-marital sexual relations which might lead to shame, dishonour and worse, a woman’s experience of sex would be coloured by the possibility of conception or by its absence. In a time before reliable and widely available contraception, even if women made use of herbal concoctions, barrier methods inserted into the vagina before intercourse, or post-coital douches that might impede conception, they could not be certain that such methods would achieve their aim – and it has been argued that rates of illegitimacy indicate that, if used, their efficacy is doubtful.⁶ More recently historians have focussed upon experiences, attitudes towards, and the personal and social consequences of failed reproduction and infertility, which could be devastating for a couple in early modern European societies in which fertility was highly valued. The ability to conceive easily or otherwise was likely to affect women’s sexual desire and pleasure in sexual relations, although it is difficult to find personal accounts that speak of sex rather than of the devastation (or, potentially, relief) of remaining childless. If sexual relations were productive, and pregnancy and childbearing successfully negotiated to produce offspring, continuing marital sex could also be adversely affected by the mismanagement of birth or by the consequences of multiple experiences of childbirth.

Women’s experiences of marital sex also took place within an economic context where personal feelings of love or liking of the marital partner might not always be considered of any importance: whether entering into a marriage in order to further cement or enhance the wealth and prestige of noble or merchant families, to trade family name and social status for recuperation of dwindling or lost family resources, to provide household skills and labour to support a family workshop or business, or to trade one’s body for goods or cash to keep oneself afloat in difficult personal circumstances, emotional compatibility or sexual attraction was likely to be a secondary consideration. However, it was not always a consideration that was disregarded, especially as contemporary family-state analogies emphasised the importance of marital harmony for community and national stability more broadly. Prescriptive advice by religious authors also stressed the importance of sexual contentment within marriage for the avoidance of adultery, which was perceived as inevitably leading to marital strife and both wider familial and community discord. Finally, medical advice about successful procreation theorised that the sexual pleasure of both man and wife was crucial for conception to take place. Sexual pleasure was thus understood as important not only at a micro level, as something that was a good in itself within marriage, but also on a macro level for the continuation of societies through successful reproduction and for the stability of those societies as a consequence of marital harmony.

A woman’s experience of her sexual life within marriage was hence shaped by a range of personal circumstances that included not only the circumstances of a marriage and the emotional connection with a husband, but also the age at which marriage took place, the ease or difficulty of conceiving, and experiences of childbirth and menopause. In Roman Law, the legal age for marriage was 12 for girls (14 for boys) although outside of elite social circles the age at which it actually took place was generally in the mid- to late 20s in most of north-western Europe, when partners had accumulated sufficient resources to support a new household. In England, demographic historians have established that marriages usually took place at 26 for women and 28 for men. This was slightly lower in other locations: Rossiaud has argued that between 1450 and 1550 age of marriage in south-eastern France was relatively stable at 21/2 for women and 24/5 for men.⁷ Girls generally married at a younger age, below 18 on average, in southern Europe, including Spain and Italy.⁸ In the lower reaches of society marriage thus generally took place when young women were, unless affected by a disorder or malnourishment that had retarded sexual development, well past puberty, and hence when thought of as ‘ripe’ or ready for sexual relations and childbearing. In elite society, where dynastic considerations frequently guided choice of marital partner and negotiations were conducted by parents, relatives or others on their behalf, girls were often betrothed at a very young age, and might be married once they reached the legal age, whether or not they had reached puberty. However, demographic analysis has indicated that the age of marriage for girls in this sector of society rose from around 20 in the sixteenth century to between 22 and 24 in the later seventeenth century.⁹ Evidence also suggests that even if marriage took place as soon as legally permissible, cohabitation and marital sexual relations did not begin until both partners had sexually matured. For girls this would be indicated by the establishment of a regular menstrual flow (for boys by the ability to produce seed or semen).¹⁰ As there was considerable variation in the age at which a girl might fully develop sexually at this time, there was also variation in the age at which she might begin sexual relations.

Medical authors throughout Europe were consistent in their assertions that the usual age for the onset of menstruation was between 12 and 14, but it was also not unusual for it take place much later than this, even into the early 20s for some girls and young women (it was more unusual for it to take place earlier, although incidences were recorded, particularly when exceptionally early). The classical humoral model of the body underpinned medical ideas about sexual development as well as sexual differentiation. The body was composed of four humours – blood, yellow and black bile, and phlegm – which corresponded to the qualities of hot, dry, cold and wet. The constitution of the body related to the balance of these humours, which varied according to both gender and age: women were more cold and moist than men, who were usually hot and dry; bodies were warm and moist in childhood, becoming gradually more cold and dry as they aged. The developmental changes of puberty began to occur as heat increased and the blood that was needed for nourishment and growth in infancy and early childhood was no longer consumed by the body for this purpose, and now was available for the production of seed and to be expelled in girls as menstrual blood.¹¹ The balance of humours, and hence bodily heat, varied individually, shaping appearance and state of health as well as the timing of physical development, explaining variation in age at menarche as well as its cessation later in life.

The onset of menstruation was significant not only because it indicated that a girl was now likely to be fertile and so ready for childbearing, but also because it was understood to facilitate sex. The menstrual flow both lubricated the vaginal passage and ‘relaxed’ it so that penetrative sex was possible, as, ‘while her Courses flow or within a day after, then both the Hymen and the inner wrinkled Membrane of the Vagina are so flaggy and relaxed, that the Penis may enter glibly without any lett’.¹² Both medical and midwifery books and reports of trials for rape involving younger, prepubescent, girls indicate that penetration was invariably impossible without force that caused tear...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• Notes on contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• PART I: The affective world: body, kinship and emotions
• PART II: Practical literacies: education, law and labour
• PART III: Power: politics and religion
• PART IV: Intellect and materiality: humanities, arts and science
• Index