Abduction and power in late medieval England : petitions to the Court of Chancery, 1389-1515
This study examines fifty petitions sent to the Court of Chancery between 1389 and 1515 that relate to abduction.
Caught in the (One-)Act: Staging Sex in Late Medieval French Farce
Caught in the (One-)Act: Staging Sex in Late Medieval French Farce Sharon D. King Paper given at the 14th Triennial Colloquium of the…
Fasting and the female body : from the ascetic to the pathological
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.
Double sex, double pleasure? Hermaphrodites and the medieval laws
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 Bankside Stews: Prostitution in London 1161-1546
Although historians frequently associate prostitution with a number of social, political and cultural concerns, including society’s attitudes toward both women and sexuality, and the spread of venereal disease, remarkably few have made it the central focus of their inquiries.
Worse than buggery? Incest discourses in the 12th and 13th centuries
In my paper today, I will not attempt the question why it was possible that the law developed in such an extreme way as to exclude such an excessive number of people as potential marriage partners, although my opinions on some recent approaches to this problem may become transparent in the course of this talk. Instead, my interest is focussed on what I call the incest discourses in the twelfth and thirteenth century.
The Chaste Erotics of Marie d’Oignies and Jacques de Vitry
The Chaste Erotics of Marie d’Oignies and Jacques de Vitry Jennifer Brown (Marymount Manhattan College) Journal of the History of Sexuality, Vol. 19,…
Inquiring into Adultery and Other Wicked Deeds: Episcopal Justice in Tenth- and Early Eleventh-Century Italy
This article suggests that Italian bishops often had recourse to spiritual penalties to exercise their coercive authority over serious offences during the tenth and early eleventh centuries.
A Feast for Aesculapius: Historical Diets for Asthma and Sexual Pleasure
Throughout Western history, people of all social classes have insisted that particular foods and drinks affected their bodies-purifying or contaminating them, and stimulating or tranquilizing their sensual spirits.
Reading between the lines: Old Germanic and early Christian views on abortion
The object of my studies was to determine whether women in the early medieval Germanic West (could have) committed abortion, when confronted with an unwanted or inconvenient pregnancy.
The Erotic Paternoster
The word paternoster has been applied in a variety of senses. In the Middle ages paternoster became a synonym for lovemaking.
Comparing Harems: Abbasid and Ottoman Harem Organization
The following research delves into the organizational structures of the luxurious harems of Medieval Abbasid and Ottoman Empires; comparing the two different empires’ harems within the political, economic, and social spheres that the royal women lived in.
Wynne whoso may, for al is for to selle: Sexual Economics and Female Authority in The Wife of Bath’s Prologue
Chaucer’s inimitable Wife of Bath stands out as one of the most analyzed literary characters of all time, in part because of her existence outside of any defined medieval cultural classification, and in part as an archetype of a rising social tradition.
Julian of Norwich’s “Christ as Mother” and Medieval Constructions of Gender
Recent Christian feminists have revived an interest in women mystics and feminine religious imagery. In light of what most people generalize about medieval misogyny and about the veneration of the Virgin as a surrogate for a female divinity, Julian of Norwich’s trope of Christ as Mother seems even more remarkable.
The Interrogation of of a Male Transvestite Prostitute in Fourteenth Century London
Despite the general rule that sexual offenses were matters for the church courts, in some cases the city of London took charge of these offenses. Prostitution and procuring, for example, involved public order; the temporal courts dealt with them for that reason, so that the same people might be prosecuted in both jusrisdictions for the same offense.
Sexuality in the Natural and Demonic Magic of the Middle Ages
Throughout the Middle Ages – especially the later Middle Ages – ideas of magic played a large part in the formation of deviant sexual behaviours and it was believed that magic played a main role in sexual malfunctions and abilities.
The Sexual Riddles of the Exeter Book
Among the Exeter Book riddle collection there is a group more or less explicitly of riddles which deals sex.
Licit and Illicit Sexuality in Medieval Iberia: A Survey of Las Siete Partidas
This thesis examines Las Siete Partidas, a thirteenth-century Castilian legal code of laws, including on marriage and illicit sexual behaviors.
Woman-Woman Love in Islamic Society
Women have only recently become visible at all in Islamicist/Orientalist discourse. Within most present-day Islamic states, where representation of even married heterosexual conduct is heavily censored, woman-woman sexuality remains thoroughly submerged.
The Welsh Female Saint: Patterns within a Social Framework
Historia Divae Monacellae, the Latin Life of Melangell is also comparatively late in composition, with the earliest manuscript being from the 16th century, but possibly drawing on earlier written sources.3 When we look at the availability of written texts relating to male saints the difference in source material is immediately evident.
Traditions of Courtly Love and the Canterbury Tales
Chaucer uses both common and courtly love in the Canterbury Tales. His pilgrims represent nearly every level of the social scale and range anywhere from a knight to a miller to a parson to a pardoner. Thererfore, their status will determine what kind of tale they will tell.
Sex in the Middle Ages
Here are some of the more interesting pieces of research we have uncovered about sex in the Middle Ages.
The Church and sexuality in medieval Iceland
From its earliest days Christianity has attempted to control human sexuality. The letters of Paul and the writings of the Church Fathers praise the state of virginity above that of marriage, and within matrimony permit sex only for procreation.
Mi Suete Leuedi, Her Mi Béne: The Power and Patronage of the Heroine in Middle English Romance
The Middle English Romances are somewhat difficult to study as a group. In order to examine these works accurately, one must take into consideration other literature produced at the same tirne, as well as that which preceded it.
Bawdy badges and the Black Death : late medieval apotropaic devices against the spread of the plague
Owing to the fact that historians generally view the late medieval period as an “age of faith,” the existence ofthese remarkable objects raises some fundamental questions about the exact socio-religious nature ofmedieval culture. The primary questions, however, that need answering are: when, where, and for whom were the badges produced, and perhaps most importantly, why.