Women's Roles & Sexuality in Early Modern Europe

Women’s Roles & Sexuality in Early Modern Europe

The roles of women have transformed enormously over time. As women, our freedoms, our independence, our ability to make choices for ourselves were things that were not always prevalent within society. We have lived within a man’s world for centuries and have come a very long way.  My blog is going to explore the women’s roles and sexuality within Early Modern Europe.

In Early Modern Europe women’s sexual and marital status mattered most, as a woman’s life was for the purpose of getting married and reproducing. Acceptable women were; virgins, wives, or  widowers (Ruth Mazo, 2003, pg. 155). A woman could marry amongst her social and economical class solely; however, was able to choose her spouse providing he met these criteria. This in itself was a big step forward from Medieval Europe where arranged marriages were normative, and wives just hoped whoever they married would not be physically or emotionally abusive towards them (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 52).  The abuse some women experienced was something lived with for a very long time, or their whole marriage. Divorce was very frowned upon, and virtually impossible unless your spouse had died (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 52).

A man’s masculinity and sexuality was celebrated; painted, songs were written about it, pornographic literature exploring this. However, a woman showing too much independence or sexuality could actually leave her punished or even killed (M.E Wisner, 2000, pg. 59). Women were viewed as sex objects, or property (Ruth Mazo, 2003, pg. 154). As previously stated, the purpose of women was to marry and reproduce.  Men often had wives for reproduction purposes but also saw prostitutes when they wanted to have more “dirty” sex.  Wives did not perform in the way prostitutes did as it was made illegal as per religion, to perform sexual intercourse any other way but missionary. Men would not be so "unclean" as to have rough or dirty sex with their wives- that was left for the prostitute and barring children was the only reason they have sex with their wives ( M.E Wiesner pg. 58).

In this era contraceptives did not exist and for many women unmarried pregnancy was terrible. If a single woman became pregnant she would lose her job,  and could even be charged if the individual she conceived with was married or if it was her employer she got farmiliar with-even if it was rape (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 63). This left unmarried pregnant women in an economic down spiral. Some women would move residents to live with friends or family however, it was illegal to hide pregnant women (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 63). Others women may have decided to hide the birth. Women would give birth in outhouses, cow stalls, hay mounds, hoping they wouldn’t be noticed by the public and take their babies to a new foundling homes established in some major cities in the 16^th century. Some women would even kill their child (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 63). 

The term “quickening”, meaning the waking of the child’s soul occurred when mothers would first feel their child moving inside them (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 62). It is not until then that the pregnancy was official. There was medication a woman could take prior to the quickening without it being considered abortion (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 62). Consequences for attempting of performing an abortion after the child’s soul had awoken resulted in harsh penalties. Aborting a child was made a capital offence in 1532, where women would be drowned and men would be decapitated if found guilty of this (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 62) . 

In 1624 a stature passed in England making it a requirement that all unmarried women who find themselves pregnant were obligated to sign a declaration of their pregnancy, and if the infant died prior to the baptismal they would serve the death penalty.  In Early Modern Europe more women were executed for infanticide than any other crime other than witchcraft (M.E Wiesner, 2000, pg. 63) .

In today’s world, Canadian women have a lot more freedoms, independence and are able to make their own decisions. Marriage outside of our social class is acceptable, women go to school, and have the ability to control birth through various methods of contraception. There is still stigma attached to abortion today and it is still viewed as a sin through religious perspective however, women are not serving the death penalty if they chose to abort. Women have come a long way.

Cassandra

References:

Karras, R. (2003). Women’s Labours: Reproduction and Sex Work in medieval Europe. Journal of Women’s History, 15 (4), p.153-158.

M.E Wiesner. (2000). Women and Gender in Early Modern Europe, p.52-63.