Diana
Wood, ed.
Women and Religion in Medieval England.
Oxford: Oxbow
Books, 2003.
200pp.
Paperback ISBN
1842170988.
Publisher's
recommended price £20.00
Nuns
and
devout noblewomen
were celebrated for their achievements in the literature of the
medieval
period, but more often than not these women only appear on the
side-lines
of history, while the ordinary wife and mother is virtually invisible.
These papers, written by historians and archaeologists, discuss the
religious
devotion and spiritual life of medieval women from all walks of life.
From
an analysis of the architecture and economic organisation of nunneries,
to an assessment of the medieval Church's response to the pain and
perils
of childbirth, these papers consider the influence of the church on the
lives of women, and the influence that women had on the life and
worship
of the Church.
Contents:
Anglo-Saxon
Women, Furnished Burial, and the Church (Sally Crawford); Unveiling
Anglo-Saxon
Nuns (Sarah Foot); Women and the Word of God Henrietta Leyser; English
Medieval Nunneries: Buildings, Precincts, and Estates (James Bond);
Women,
Childbirth, and Religion in Later Medieval England (Carole Rawcliffe);
Piety in Question: Noblewomen and Religion in the Later Middle Ages
(Rowena
E. Archer); Will the Real Margery Kempe Please Stand Up! (Robert
Swanson);
Lollard Women (Margaret Aston).
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