In late medieval Valencia, city authorities would not punish a woman for being a prostitute or being a concubine, but she could not be both. A new article in the journal Speculum examines why this was, and why many lower-class men and women broke this law so they could be together.
In the article, jointly written by Susan McDonough and Michelle Armstrong-Partida, the historians focus on Valencian court records, which survived from 1367 to 1402, and the information they reveal about the men and women who were fined when found being in a relationship with a prostitute. While these city records provide the clearest examination of ‘prostitute-concubines’, there is also evidence for this situation in other Mediterranean towns like Barcelona, Marseille, Palermo, and Mallorca.
In medieval cities such as Valencia, prostitution was a regulated activity – city authorities created brothels and had rules on who could work in them and who could go to them. Moreover, they imposed various taxes and fines, which gave the city revenues. Women – usually those who were poor or migrants – would become sex workers in hopes of improving their economic situation.
Meanwhile concubinage – a couple living together but not married – may have been disapproved of by church authorities, but was widespread in parts of society, especially the elite. In the city of Valencia, a couple could live in a concubinous relationship without penalty, as long the neighbours did not complain (in other words, as long as the couple remained discrete and did not cause problems).
However, city authorities did have a problem with prostitutes who also lived as concubines. Between 1367 to 1402, 400 women and 280 men were fined for this infraction, which was the majority of all offences recorded in relation to prostitution. For example, in 1387 Bartomeu Crespi and the ‘fembra peccadriu’ Johanna, were together fined 22 sous for being “amich and amiga, staying in the public brothel.”
Why did the city authorities in Valencia and other places object to this situation? McDonough and Armstrong-Partida note that for these authorities, “a prostitute in a licensed brothel could not be tied to one man alone. She was, by definition, a woman whose body was available to many men, unlike a concubine who limited access to her body to just one man.” More importantly, they did not like the fact that these men and women, who came from poor and migrant communities, were engaging in behaviour that was supposed to be only allowed for themselves.
Yet, despite the fines, and a later law which forced men convicted of being in such a relationship to wear a hood with a yellow cowl (there were already laws mandating that prostitutes wear specific clothing), there were many still willing to live together. Often these relationships would be short-term (an example might be the sailor who was staying at port for a few months), but in one case, that between Na Valenço and En Peret, they were together for at least five years. McDonough and Armstrong-Partida’s article offers some explanations on why they did so.
People pointing and looking down at others, depicted in a 14th-century manuscript from Spain. Rylands Hebrew MS 6 Rylands Haggadah fol.41
There could be many and multiple reasons for men and women to have these relationships – affection, friendship, economic co-dependence (the records often note that these could be very poor people, who would not even have enough money to pay their fines). But there could also be some gender-specific reasons. The authors write this when it comes to women:
We suggest that when a prostitute became a concubine, she was claiming a degree of power within her relationship with her lover or with the hosteler to whom she owed rent. When they chose a concubinous relationship, even an unhappy one, prostitutes were able to explore what life as part of a married couple might be like. In so doing, prostitutes developed a different skill set: participating in the maintenance of a household and nurturing, even if for a short time, an affective relationship with one man.
Meanwhile for men, it was also a way to demonstrate their masculinity – to show to other people and themselves that they were good enough and doing well enough that they could have a woman exclusive to them.
The historians note how this practice was taking place in many other places in the Western Mediterranean – one can even see some of these people appearing in the records of multiple cities. McDonough and Armstrong-Partida write:
Though the municipal authorities worked hard to penalize and delegitimize the masculine identity of poor laborers, foreigners, and vagabonds, those men and the women they partnered with did not accept that estimation. No matter the brevity of their relationships, Mediterranean prostitutes and their concubinous amichs found in each other a partner with whom they could challenge the authorities’ attempts to shut them out of an avenue to companionship, mutual aid, and participation in a marriage-like institution.
The article, “Amigas and Amichs: Prostitute-Concubines, Strategic Coupling, and Laboring-Class Masculinity in Late Medieval Valencia and the Mediterranean,” by Susan McDonough and Michelle Armstrong-Partida, appears in the latest issue of Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies. It is open access until the end of February – click here to read it.
In late medieval Valencia, city authorities would not punish a woman for being a prostitute or being a concubine, but she could not be both. A new article in the journal Speculum examines why this was, and why many lower-class men and women broke this law so they could be together.
In the article, jointly written by Susan McDonough and Michelle Armstrong-Partida, the historians focus on Valencian court records, which survived from 1367 to 1402, and the information they reveal about the men and women who were fined when found being in a relationship with a prostitute. While these city records provide the clearest examination of ‘prostitute-concubines’, there is also evidence for this situation in other Mediterranean towns like Barcelona, Marseille, Palermo, and Mallorca.
In medieval cities such as Valencia, prostitution was a regulated activity – city authorities created brothels and had rules on who could work in them and who could go to them. Moreover, they imposed various taxes and fines, which gave the city revenues. Women – usually those who were poor or migrants – would become sex workers in hopes of improving their economic situation.
Meanwhile concubinage – a couple living together but not married – may have been disapproved of by church authorities, but was widespread in parts of society, especially the elite. In the city of Valencia, a couple could live in a concubinous relationship without penalty, as long the neighbours did not complain (in other words, as long as the couple remained discrete and did not cause problems).
However, city authorities did have a problem with prostitutes who also lived as concubines. Between 1367 to 1402, 400 women and 280 men were fined for this infraction, which was the majority of all offences recorded in relation to prostitution. For example, in 1387 Bartomeu Crespi and the ‘fembra peccadriu’ Johanna, were together fined 22 sous for being “amich and amiga, staying in the public brothel.”
Why did the city authorities in Valencia and other places object to this situation? McDonough and Armstrong-Partida note that for these authorities, “a prostitute in a licensed brothel could not be tied to one man alone. She was, by definition, a woman whose body was available to many men, unlike a concubine who limited access to her body to just one man.” More importantly, they did not like the fact that these men and women, who came from poor and migrant communities, were engaging in behaviour that was supposed to be only allowed for themselves.
Yet, despite the fines, and a later law which forced men convicted of being in such a relationship to wear a hood with a yellow cowl (there were already laws mandating that prostitutes wear specific clothing), there were many still willing to live together. Often these relationships would be short-term (an example might be the sailor who was staying at port for a few months), but in one case, that between Na Valenço and En Peret, they were together for at least five years. McDonough and Armstrong-Partida’s article offers some explanations on why they did so.
There could be many and multiple reasons for men and women to have these relationships – affection, friendship, economic co-dependence (the records often note that these could be very poor people, who would not even have enough money to pay their fines). But there could also be some gender-specific reasons. The authors write this when it comes to women:
We suggest that when a prostitute became a concubine, she was claiming a degree of power within her relationship with her lover or with the hosteler to whom she owed rent. When they chose a concubinous relationship, even an unhappy one, prostitutes were able to explore what life as part of a married couple might be like. In so doing, prostitutes developed a different skill set: participating in the maintenance of a household and nurturing, even if for a short time, an affective relationship with one man.
Meanwhile for men, it was also a way to demonstrate their masculinity – to show to other people and themselves that they were good enough and doing well enough that they could have a woman exclusive to them.
The historians note how this practice was taking place in many other places in the Western Mediterranean – one can even see some of these people appearing in the records of multiple cities. McDonough and Armstrong-Partida write:
Though the municipal authorities worked hard to penalize and delegitimize the masculine identity of poor laborers, foreigners, and vagabonds, those men and the women they partnered with did not accept that estimation. No matter the brevity of their relationships, Mediterranean prostitutes and their concubinous amichs found in each other a partner with whom they could challenge the authorities’ attempts to shut them out of an avenue to companionship, mutual aid, and participation in a marriage-like institution.
The article, “Amigas and Amichs: Prostitute-Concubines, Strategic Coupling, and Laboring-Class Masculinity in Late Medieval Valencia and the Mediterranean,” by Susan McDonough and Michelle Armstrong-Partida, appears in the latest issue of Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies. It is open access until the end of February – click here to read it.
Susan McDonough is an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Click here to view her university page or follow her on Twitter @susanalice96. Michelle Armstrong-Partida is an Associate Professor of History at Emory University. Click here to see her Academia.edu page or follow her on Twitter @marmpartida.
Together, they are working on a research project and book entitled Singlewomen: Enslaved and Free in the Late Medieval Mediterranean.
Top Image: British Library MS Stowe 947 fol. 5v
Subscribe to Medievalverse
Related Posts