“for you say publicly and quite openly that you are not only surprised but pained that I am said to show this extraordinary intellect of the sort one would have thought nature would give to the most learned of men – as if you had reached the conclusion, on the facts of the case, that a similar girl had seldom been seen among the peoples of the world.  You are wrong on both counts, Semproni, and now that you’ve abandoned the truth, you are going to spread information abroad that is clearly false…. I would remain silent, believe me, if you, with your long-standing hostile and envious attitude towards me, had learned to attack me alone; after all, a ray of Phoebus’ can’t be shamed by being surrounded by mud.  But I am angry and my disgust overflows.  Why should the condition of our sex be shamed by your little attacks?  Because of this, a mind thirsting for revenge is set afire; because of this, a sleeping pen is wakened for insomniac writing.”
Laura Cereta to Bibulus Sempronius – A Defense of the Liberal Education of Women – 1488

What is Literacy

1. Literacy was a complicated concept
   1. Can you read the vernacular? (most common)
   2. Can you read and write the vernacular? (less common)
   3. Can you read Latin?  (much less common)
   4. Can you read and write Latin? (much, much less common)
2. Changes in literacy rates 1400 to 1600
   1. Literacy rates are weighted based on gender, and financial background.
      1. Wealthy men are the most likely to be literate, poor women are the least likely.  But a wealthy woman is much more likely to be literate than a poor man.
   2. Education was often framed in class structure – and to request or expect additional education “outside of one’s class” was seen as inappropriate.
      1. Remember however, that an act being inappropriate or railed against does not mean it didn’t happen.  It may not have been appropriate, but the “authorities” do not rail against things that aren’t being done.
      2. “Let greater personages glory in their skill in musicke, the posture of their bodies, their knowledge of languages, the greatnesse, and freedome of their spirits: and their arts in arreigning of mens affections, at their flattering faces.  This is not the way to breed a private Gentleman’s daughter.”
   3. So what do we know generally about the ability to read and or write in period?
      1. Literacy in sixteenth and seventeenth century Germany for both males and females has been estimated as being low.  General estimates range from five to ten percent, although some localized research indicates higher figures for certain regions”
      2. “Sir Thomas More in 1533 estimated that 50 to 60 percent of the (presumably adult) people could read…  Assuming his estimate included women and assuming there were perhaps three and a half million people living in England by the mid-sixteenth century, More’s estimate would indicate that perhaps half a million adult females knew how to read as the book trade began to respond specifically to their interests.”
         1. “Modern scholarship suggests that More heavily overestimated levels of literacy in early modern England… one recent study concluded that literacy rates for men and women hovered around  10% and 1% respectively in 1500, rising only to 30% and 10% by late in the seventeenth century”
      3. Grendler argues that 33% of men, and 12-13% of women in Venice could read in 1587.
   4. Because reading was more acceptable for women than writing, reading, especially Bible* reading, could provide suitably feminine subject matter.” 
      1. “Bible” in this case usually means the psalms, and saint’s lives – reading the bible directly was not the norm until after the reformation.
      2. “In representing reading, women writers can address the pious matters accepted as feminine concerns, even as they fashion an alternative discourse about the female mind and forge a place for female voices and readers in the political, literary, and intellectual culture from which they are most often excluded.” 

Women’s Education

1. The debate surrounding what women should be taught existed even before the printing press
   1. The Book of the Knight of the Tour Landry was written in the late 14^th century, then translated into English by Caxton in 1484 was intended to “make a book and an examplayre for my doughters to lerne to rede and vnderstonde how they ought to gouerne them self / and to kepe them from euylle.”
   2. Leonardo Bruni (1370-1444), wrote De studiis et litteris liber sometime between 1423 and 1426 for Battista Malatesta, regarding her daughter.  Bruni said women should learn classical and Christian authors, for grammar, rhetoric, poetry, history, moral philosophy and how to become virtuous.  He omitted only oratory and disputation from the standards of male education.
      1. Debate exists as to whether this was his actual overall preference, or if it is a statement of  women’s roles in the public sphere.
         1. He REALLY hated the existence and importance of the courts, which is where those two fields are primarily used.  It has been taken as an outright statement that since women have no place in the public sphere of debate they should not learn associated skills, but an argument can be made that he thought NO one should learn those skills.
   3. Fra Sabba Castiglione (1480-1554) argued that women should be taught to read, because not having the ability to read the most respected vernacular authors would make a middle or upper class woman seem “poorly brought up.”
   4. Ludovico Dolce (1508-68) wrote Dialogo della institutione delle donne in 1545 where he “rejected what he termed the common opinion of the majority, who viewed learned women with suspicion because they believed that learning led to loss of chastity.”
      1. What a woman should learn however is more tied to what she must do.. “A man must learn many subjects so that he can act for the good of the republic, his prince, and his friends.  A woman ruled only herself, her children, and her home.  She will not teach school, or dispute.”
2. Education and Readership
   1. The Lives of the virgin martyrs were incredibly popular texts for reading by women.  “Indeed, virgin-martyr lives are among the only texts that we know for sure were commissioned by or written for married women.”
      1. This is a problematic statement and disregards a lot of the patronage that women did for books, but the virgin martyrs were a popular text.
   2. “young girls taught and brought up in this way are much sought after by men looking for wives.”
      1. St. Agatha – was on her way home from school when she was noticed by Quintianus, who fell in love with her.”
         1. Sicilian during the Decian persecution (250ce), and was tortured in an effort to force her to give up her vow of chastity, to marry Quintianus.  She refused to reject Jesus or to abandon her vow of chastity
      2. St. Catherine of Alexandria
         1. 14 extant versions of her life
         2. “Depending on one’s background, the choice of St. Katherine as a patron could be about the self-affirmation of status for a member of the nobility, or about an assumption of an aristocratic identity for someone a few rungs down the social ladder.”
         3. “saynt Katheryn whiche thurgh her wysedome and by her clergye with the grace of the holy ghost surmounted & vaynquysshed the wisest men of al grece” 
         4. All of the Middle English lives of St. Katherine, except one, describe her as learned not simply through divine illumination, but through study.” 
         5. “King Costus, built her a large tower in which she could study uninterrupted and employed ‘vij the best maystres and hyest of konnynge that myghte be found in that end of the world of all the vij artes.”

Women as Patronesses

1. Women as patronesses – 1780 English books prior to 1641 dedicated to women patronesses.
   1. Patroness doesn’t necessarily mean reader/writer – but someone dedicated enough to books to fund the production of one.
   2. 1375 books to one woman and no one else
      1. 23% (316) of those dedicated to only one woman were dedicated to Queens (only 23%?)
         1. 219 alone to Elizabeth I
      2. 800 individuals listed as patronesses
         1. 550 were nobles/aristocratic
         2. 225 Untitled women
         3. 25 had religious affiliations (could and probably did overlap with the nobles/aristocratic population)

Women as Readers

1. Hull gives a bibliography of books that she lists as specifcally for women between 1465 and 1640. (“finding list not a definitive bibliographic statement”) – 163 titles
   1. Between 1475 and 1572, 24 books in England “can be classed as women’s books”
      1. Texts with dedications or titles directed to groups of women.
      2. Texts on subjects “clearly within a woman’s bailiwick.” (sections 2-4 below)
      3. Biographies of women.
      4. Texts that were dedicated to two or more individual women and to no other individuals or groups.
      5. Texts that have a sizable section devoted exclusively to women’s behavior or role.
2. Romance/Entertainment
   1. The Mirrour of Princely Deeds: 1578 – Margaret Tyler – translation from Spanish “prefaced with an impassioned plea in support of a woman’s right to write (in this case translate) such romantic literature.
      1. Diego Ortúñez de Calahorra’s Spanish romance Espejo de Príncipes y Cavalleros
3. Religious/Moral
   1. The Good Wife’s Guide – Le Ménagier de Paris (1392-94 – Paris)
      1. Not quite religious/moral, not quite “how-to”.  Moral instruction as much as a cookbook and instruction guide of how to run a household.
         1. Half written for the young wife, half written for a future husband (care & feeding of a wife – for the wife and her new owner).
         2. “Considering this compelling text as a whole is crucial to historicizing reading practices, understanding the author’s purposes and the late medieval audience’s actual reading matter, and noting what they cared to preserve for use in their households.”
      2. Written by an aging Parisian bourgeois, for his 15 year old wife, on how to be a good wife.
         1. “Indeed, we find the wife-as-reader a significantly more intriguing “character” or silent presence in the text, and a potential site of resistance to the strictures within.”
      3. The tale of Griselda takes up 13 whole pages of the translation.
         1. “It may be that the handbook was read and copied as a conduct manual for women and a domestic management reference, but it is also artfully shaped, especially, as we have indicated, the framing of the Griselda story within the whole treatise on obedient wives.”
         2. This could also be a reflection of the reality of women, and that wives were not always this type of submissive ideal.  This makes this text into something more like the sumptuary laws whose writing had more to do with being disregarded than followed.
      4. “Signficantly the narrator displays to us (and the next husband) that his wife can read, and in face he not only encourages her to read this book but also proffers other edifying works in Frenh from his own collection, “the Bible, the Golden Legend, the Apocalypse, the Life of the Fathers and various other good books in French that I possess, and that you are free to take at your pleasure”
         1. “The wife must also have been able to write, since he directs her to write letters to her husband in private and instructs her on other sorts of things to record.”
      5. (on Eve) “The Histoire says that before she sinned she had been somewhat subject to man, since she had been made from his rib, but that subjection was most sweet and moderate and born of natural obedience and sincere willingness.  But after this curse, she was obliged to be subject in all things, willingly or not, and all other women who were born and will be born of her had and will have to suffer and obey their husbands’ wishes and will be force to carry out completely their commands.”
   2. Philip Stubbes’ – A christal glasse for Christian Women (1591 – London)
      1. “a most excellent discourse, of the godly life and Christian death of Mistresse Katherine Stubs, who departed this life in Burton vpon Trent, in Staffordshire the 14. day of December. 1590. With a most heauenly confession of the Christian faith, which shee made a little before her departure: as also a wonderfull combate betwixt Sathan and her soule: worthie to be imprinted in letters of golde, and are to be engrauen in the tables of euery Christian heart. Set downe word for word, as she spake it, as neere as could be gathered: by Phillip Stubbes.”
   3. Thomas Bentley’s Monument of Matrons (1582)- a collection of women’s writings, with a focus on religion and prayer.  Overtly addressed to women readers. 

1. “diuers verie godlie, learned and diuine treatises, of meditationes and praier, made by sundrie right famous Queenes, noble Ladies, vertuous Virgins, and godlie Gentlewomen of al ages”
2. “A pattern of ‘pietie, godlinesse, and religion’ for female readers, women write ‘for the common benefit of their countirie.’” 
3. How-to books aimed to women running households who don’t have an army of staff to manage their households.
   1. Medicine, cooking recipes, cosmetics, ways to clean (see my “I Feel Pretty & Period Class!)

Women Who Wrote

1. Pre-14th century women writers
   1. Heloise – 1090 to 1164
      1. Nun and abbess, best known for her correspondence with Peter Abélard 
   2. Hildegaard von Bingen – 1098 to 1179
      1. Nun known for theological, botanical and medicinal texts, as well as a composer in her own right.
   3. Marie de France – 1160 to 1215
      1. Author of Lais of Marie de France and a translation of Aesop’s Fables
   4. Trotula (Trota of Salerno) – sometime prior to the end of the 12^th century
      1. Purported author of 3 texts on women’s health, probably didn’t REALLY exist.
         Liber de sinthomatibus mulierum (“Book on the Conditions of Women”)
         De curis mulierum (“On Treatments for Women”)
         De ornatu mulierum (“On Women’s Cosmetics”)
2. Julian of Norwich (1342-1416)
   1. An anchoress at the Church of St Julian in Norwich, England (where her name is from as well, we’re not sure what her real name was)
   2. Revelations of Divine Love
      1. Inspired by a series of 16 vision she had while believed to be on her deathbed.
      2. The initial version of the text (The short Text), was 25 chapters and just told the story of the visions.
      3. She later wrote The Long Text which was a theological exploration of those visions, which was 86 chapters long.
      4. Her approach to God is one of acceptance, and she visualizes God (the trinity) as both a fatherly and motherly figure, in balance, caring, and when necessary lovingly punishing humanity.
3. Catherine of Sienna (1347-1380)
   1. Is said to have wanted to be a nun from childhood, at sixteen her parents wanted to her to marry her deceased sister’s widower, but her piety (and stubbornness) stopped their expectation. 
   2. She did not learn to write until 1377, so there is some question which of her texts she *wrote* and which she simply dictated.
   3. The Dialogue of Divine Providence
      1. A conversation between God & a human soul 
   4. Letters and prayers have also survived.
4. Christine de Pizan (1363-1430)
   1. She was the daughter of a member of the King of France’s court (though born in Venice).  She was certainly better supported, but was not noble.
   2. After her husband died, she took up the pen to support her family.
   3. In 1405, wrote The Book of the City of Ladies, in which she builds a city containing (and thus portraying) all of the positive virtues of women.
   4. In 1429, in writing on the newly deceased Jean d’Arc, “Christine explores issues surrounding the female authorial voice, drawing poetic comparisons between patriarchal attempts to silence Joan’s voice and the difficulties she herself faces as a woman writer.” 
5. Laura Cereta (1469-1499)
   1. Born 1469 in the town of Brescia Italy, s ent to a monastery at 7, returned home at 11 to care for her siblings.  Married between 1484-85.  Widowed after 18 months.
   2. Her father was a magistrate and lawyer, “upper-middle-cass”
   3. Wrote to family and friends, as well as magistrates, religious leaders and humanist authors.  Her letters interweave personal communication and humanist debtes and discussions.
   4. In addition to more personal matters, which was uncommon for a humanist author, Laura wrote on “women’s contributions to scholarship… women’s right to an education in literature and the sciences, and the servitude of women in marriage.”
   5. She often compared writing and embroidery as similar arts.
      1. “While male humanist writers, working on the model of the Roman elegiac poets, enjoy otium day and night, the female writer can only experience this aspect of time as contraband: at night and furtively, while the rest of the household sleeps.”
         1. The use of time “is controlled and regulated by the paterfamilias during the daytime hours.  It is ‘spent’, like currency, on Cereta’s family or her own work, and it is exchanged in return for other goods and services.  It counts, however, as  ‘stolen’ merchandise when it is taken from the patriarchal treasury in the dead of the night, in the form of all-night binges of reading, writing or sewing.”
   6. Self published a collection of her own books in 1488.
   7. Laura died in 1499, with an unpublished collection of 82 Latin letters, and a dialogue on the death of an ass.
6. Modesta da Pozza (1555-1592)
   1. Father was a citizen, though not a noble.
   2. Il merito delle donne – published with a dedicatory letter by one of her daughters, posthumously in 1600.
   3. 7 women, of varying ages and statuses, discussing what it was to be female, including the challenges to education. Their topics range all over the place.
      1. How many servant girls, peasant and plebian women do not know how to read?
      2. Why do men care so little about ensuring that women receive an education?
      3. IF given the opportunity, women would surpass men in learning.
7. Isabella Cortese
   1. Born to a well-off, though not wealthy family.
   2. 1561, her book I secreti della signora Isabella Cortese was published – everything from standard alchemy through cosmetics.
   3. **currently unavailable in English translation, I have said for years I’m working on it, but honesty requires me to admit that it will likely be translated & published long before I’m finished.**

“A Sleeping Pen Awakened” on Academia.edu