A social history of women in England 450 – 1500
Henrietta Leyser
first published: 1995
Synopsis
Medieval Women looks at a thousand years of English history, as it affected – and was made by – women.
Henrietta Leder considers the problems and attitudes fundamental to every women of the time: medieval views on sex, marriage and motherhood; the world of work and the experience of widowhood for peasant, townswoman and aristocrat. The intellectual and spiritual worlds of women are also explored.
Based on an abundance of research from the last twenty-five years, Medieval Women celebrates the diversity and vitality of English women’s lives in the Middle Ages.
I was visiting the Tynemouth Priory when I spotted this book in their gift shop, and the back cover blurb sounded promising. Well… I couldn’t be more wrong! What a disappointment.
I have no doubt that the author knows much about the subject, this was very clear while reading the book, but it’s dry. I was indeed expecting something more academic, but this book felt like essays that were put together, and I don’t think Leyser was very careful to create unity with its chapters. The promise in the introduction that this book would please scholars as well as the ‘common’ reader is not fulfilled in my opinion. Although I’m used to academic writing I sometimes hoped the book would finish soon as it couldn’t be more boring.
On the other hand, Leyser added original texts to almost all chapters, and these were really interesting to read. I believe this is fundamental for history books, so the reader gets to know the sources and how the research was done. I’m keen to know more about this subject and discovered new things by reading the book, therefore I will focus on the positive side of it on this review.
The first part covers the Anglo-Saxon period, which is hard to research due to the lack of evidence. It was curious to learn how graves reveal much about ancient life and even social status depending on the position the body was buried. It was equally provocative to know how divorce worked at that time, when women had more rights than I thought. It’s a pity that we don’t learn details like this at school, and medieval women always end up depicted like voiceless subservient beings. After reading the book, I watched the film The Dig, which was a very good addition to what I read in this first part on excavations and archaeological research.
The second part is about the eleventh century, and the changes society faced after William the Conqueror arrived in England. This section brings a genealogical table which really helped me follow the timeline, especially with so many people carrying the same name. This historical period meant a reduction in women’s rights in England, one of the biggest loss (in my opinion) being the right to hold land. I really enjoyed reading this part, there was a good history line and it was easy to follow with the genealogical table.
The third part delves into family roles in the high and later Middle Ages, and explores many curious points about women’s life. I learned much about working women, their rights and challenges, and this was my second favourite chapter in the book. The other chapters in this section talk about sex, marriage and widowhood, including fascinating real cases to illustrate the topics (Leyser added so many stories that reading them became confusing though).
Finally, the last part looks at culture and spirituality, and again the author focuses on religious women. This happened throughout the book, which was a little frustrating for me as I’m not really interested in religiosity and would prefer to know more about the ‘common’ women, even more than the aristocrats too.
From an overall perspective, I’m glad I read this book as I learned many new and interesting facts about medieval women. However, I believe more well written and engaging books about the topic need to be published, they would make the reading experience more pleasant.
Thoughts of One's Own 