I will examine current popular fictional and non-fictional works that assert the resurrection of Mary Magdalene, her position in the Christian story and her authority.
Mary Magdalene, Partner or Prostitute: An in-depth study of the transformation of Mary Magdalene in church history
November 15, 2013 By
Judging Female Judges: Sir John Fortescue’s Vision of Women as Judges in De Natura Legis Naturae
November 14, 2013 By
Judging Female Judges: Sir John Fortescue’s Vision of Women as Judges in De Natura Legis Naturae Emma Hawkes Limina, Volume 8, (2002) Abstract The fifteenth-century English legal commentary, De Natura Legis Naturae, is probably the most obscure of Sir John Fortescue’s renowned writings. Fortescue’s text examines female authority more explicitly than his other writings, there has, […]
Hunting in Medieval literature: Satisfaction of Conquest or Thrill of Pursuit?
November 10, 2013 By
Hunting in Medieval literature: Satisfaction of Conquest or Thrill of Pursuit? Katherine Correa The Adelphi Honors College Journal of Ideas, Volume 11 (2011) Abstract In the medieval period, hunting was a pastime reserved exclusively for the nobility. While hunting in ancient civilizations was the primary way of obtaining food, furs, and other useful animal parts, […]
Two dozen and more Silkwomen of Fifteenth-Century London
October 24, 2013 By
This article attempts to record systematically all the silkwomen of London who were daughters or wives of London mercers between 1400 and 1499.
Transvestite Knights: Men and Women Cross-dressing in Medieval Literature
September 29, 2013 By
In this thesis, I will look at mainly French and German texts from the 12th to the 15th centuries which deal with the subject of cross-dressers in the decidedly masculine domain of the knight. There are many tales of cross-dressing, particularly of women, but the concept of men dressing as women while jousting, and women dressing as knights, brings up several questions about the clothes, what it meant to be male and female, and how cross-dressing could be viewed on the tournament field.
What do We Really Know about Medieval Women?
September 29, 2013 By
What do We Really Know about Medieval Women? Carolina Galdiz (Trinity College) 115 Vernon, Paper 26, (2013) Abstract At the onset of this project, I had hoped to do a comparative analysis of women in different social classes. My vision was that sources on the subject would endeavor to discuss women as a group and […]
The Queen and her consort : succession, politics and partnership in the kingdom of Navarre, 1274-1512
September 29, 2013 By
This thesis draws attention to an exceptional group of sovereigns and demonstrates the important role that these women and their spouses played in the political history of Western Europe during the Late Middle Ages. It also highlights the particular challenges of female rule and offers new modes of analysis by focusing on unique areas of investigation which have not been previously examined
An Examination of the Family in ‘The Tale of Sir Gareth’
September 27, 2013 By
This thesis investigates the theme of family interactions within Malory‘s ―Tale of Sir Gareth,‖ examining the tale itself as well as looking at several analogous Fair Unknown stories in order to determine if the theme is Malory‘s own or if it could have come from a probable source.
Time, consciousness and narrative play in late Medieval secular dream poetry and framed narratives
September 26, 2013 By
This thesis proposes to look at the equation between time and text in the later medieval period. Time-telling and tale-telling have a particularly dynamic relationship in the considers time-telling and temporal referencein an era (c.1230 – 1500) that time-measurement multiple cultural experiencesa greatvariety of types of and
attitudes to time.
The Transformative Nature of Gender: The Coding of St. Brigit of Kildare through Hagiography
September 26, 2013 By
The Transformative Nature of Gender: The Coding of St. Brigit of Kildare through Hagiography Liliane Catherine Marcil-Johnston Master of Arts, The Department of Theology, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada December (2012) Abstract This study examines how gender is portrayed in the hagiographic tradition surrounding St. Brigit of Kildare. In particular, it provides an in-depth look […]
The Storie of Asneth and its literary relations: the Bride of Christ tradition in late Medieval EnglandThe Storie of Asneth and its literary relations: the Bride of Christ tradition in late Medieval England
September 10, 2013 By
This is a study of the fifteenth-century, “Storie of Asneth,” a late-medieval English translation of a Jewish Hellenistic romance about the Patriarch, Joseph, and his Egyptian wife, Asneth (also spelled Aseneth, Asenath).
A Cell of their Own: The Incarceration of Women in Late Medieval Italy
September 3, 2013 By
I will then move to sketch the social profile of female inmates, mainly drawing on the records of Le Stinche, the Florentine municipal prison, during its first century of activity, circa 1300–1400.
Caught in the (One-)Act: Staging Sex in Late Medieval French Farce
August 21, 2013 By
Caught in the (One-)Act: Staging Sex in Late Medieval French Farce Sharon D. King Paper given at the 14th Triennial Colloquium of the Société Internationale pour l’étude du Théâtre Médiéval Poznań, Poland, 22nd – 27th July (2013) Abstract Among the myriad subjects for comical delectation of audiences of late medieval France,the rules and roles of […]
Wild woman and her sisters in medieval English literature
August 18, 2013 By
The subject of this work is the concept and figure of the Wild Woman. The primary focus will be on various forms this figure assumes in medieval English literature: Grendel’s mother—the second monster Beowulf faces—and Chaucer’s Wife of Bath, along with other figures.
Fasting and the female body : from the ascetic to the pathological
August 17, 2013 By
Importantly, the dietary practices of the early Christians cannot be understood as a single corpus of ideas or practices. It could mean going without food altogether, as in the case of one of the desert fathers, Simeon Stylites, who ate nothing for the whole of lent.
The Portraiture of Women During the Italian Renaissance
August 13, 2013 By
Further study of female portraiture of the Italian Renaissance is needed because most existing portraits from the Italian Renaissance depict men. Due to the small pool of female portraits from the time period to study, the specific topic of women in Italian Renaissance portraiture has been overlooked or quickly dismissed by many scholars.
Women on Trial: Piecing Together Women’s Intellectual Worlds from Courtroom Testimony
August 12, 2013 By
To tease out these issues, I would like to offer an analysis of a specific set of criminal records from the city of Toulouse in the later Middle Ages. In recent years, many scholars have attempted to gain access to the lives of women in medieval Languedoc.
Double sex, double pleasure? Hermaphrodites and the medieval laws
August 5, 2013 By
I think the question of how the medieval laws dealt with ambivalent bodies deserves some attention in own right. The more general question is: how did medieval societies deal with experiences that challenged accepted views of what was normal?
The Chaste Erotics of Marie d’Oignies and Jacques de Vitry
August 1, 2013 By
The Chaste Erotics of Marie d’Oignies and Jacques de Vitry Jennifer Brown (Marymount Manhattan College) Journal of the History of Sexuality, Vol. 19, No. 1, January (2010) Abstract IN JACQUES DE VITRY’S THIRTEENTH-CENTURY vita of Marie d’Oignies, the hagiographer, or author of a sacred biography, implicates himself in his knowledge of a priest’s surprising reaction […]
Impregnable friendship : locating desire in the middle English ‘Amis and Amiloun’
July 24, 2013 By
Scholarship on Amis and Amiloun has generally been divided into two critical schools. The majority of critics have read the work as an exemplar of perfect friendship, overlooking (or ignoring) any trace of homoeroticism, citing the possibility itself as anachronistic, or explaining away its presence by offering historical or theoretical justification for intimacy among medieval men.
Queen Guinevere. A queen through time
July 22, 2013 By
According to Hopkins, “[Arthur’s] queen, Guinevere, is more elusive, less written about [than Arthur and his knights], and yet has been for centuries a central character playing a critical role in the rise and fall of the Round Table” (6). He goes on by characterizing her as “a key figure in the life of Camelot, this remarkable woman is seen variably as scholar, seductress, warrior, and dignified gentle beauty by the countless artists and writers who have depicted her. Who, then, was Guinevere?” (10) The purpose of this essay is to answer this question by looking at different texts and novels referring to the Queen.
Blood beliefs in early modern Europe
June 29, 2013 By
This thesis focuses on the significance of blood and the perception of the body in both learned and popular culture in order to investigate problems of identity and social exclusion in early modern Europe.
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and the Threat of Women to Courtly Life
June 26, 2013 By
This paper argues the use of this poem as a warning to readers of the period of the dangers of women to men’s chivalric values, honour, and their status as knights
Representations of English Women and their Pilgrimages in Twelfth-Century Miracle Collections
June 18, 2013 By
Drawing on a survey of sixteen miracle collections compiled in twelfth-century England, the study examines the representation of women as pilgrims, and demonstrates that many modern assumptions about female travel in the Middle Ages are not consistent with the miracle accounts.
Androgynes, Crossdressers, and Rebel Queens: Modern Representations of Medieval Women Warriors from Tolkien to Martin
May 15, 2013 By
This was another stellar paper given at the Tales after Tolkien session. It was an intriguing look at the women of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and George R. R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones and how each author portrays the mother and warrior characters of Galadriel/Cersi/Daenerys and Eowyn/Arya/Brienne. The paper examined the differences and problems posed by the portrayal of women in theses fantasy novels.
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