History 1100, Handout A for mini-test 2

Xenophon, Oeconomicus. From Marvin Perry, et al., Sources of the Western Tradition, vol. 1, 3rd ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1995), 68-69

[Editor's introduction] Women occupied a subordinate position in Greek society. A woman's chief functions were to bear male heirs for her husband and to manage his household. In Athens, respectable women were secluded in their homes; they did not go into the marketplace or eat at the same table as their husbands and guests. Nor did women have political rights; they could not vote or hold office. In order to exercise her property rights, a woman was represented by a male guardian-usually a father, husband, brother, or son.

              Parents usually arranged the marriage of their daughters. A father who discovered that his daughter had been unchaste could sell her into slavery. Adultery was a crime. A husband was compelled by law to divorce his adulterous wife and could have her lover executed.

Xenophon, Oeconomicus

A philosopher's notion of a woman's place in society appears in the following passage from Oeconomicus (“Estate Management”) by Xenophon ca. 428-354 B.C.). An Athenian soldier, historian, and friend of the philosopher Socrates, Xenophon uses a conversation between Socrates and his friend Ischomachus as a way to discuss a wife's role in the Greek household.

            "'Ah, Ischomachus,' said I, 'that is just what I want to hear from you. Did you yourself train your wife to be of the right sort, or did she know her household duties when you received her from her parents?'

            "'Why, what knowledge could she have had, Socrates, when I took her for my wife? She was not yet fifteen years old when she came to me, and up to that time she had lived in leading-strings [cords by which children were supported when beginning to walk], seeing, hearing and saying as little as possible. . . .

            "'Well, Socrates, as soon as I found her docile and sufficiently domesticated to carry on conversation, I questioned her to this effect.

            "' "Tell me, dear, have you realised for what reason I took you and your parents gave you to me? For it is obvious to you, I am sure, that we should have had no difficulty in finding someone else to share our beds. But I for myself and your parents for you considered who was the best partner of home and children that we could get. My choice fell on you, and your parents, it appears, chose me as the best they could find. Now if God grants us children, we will then think out how we shall best train them. For one of the blessings in which we shall share is the acquisition of the very best of allies and the very best of support in old age; but at present we share in this our home. For I am paying into the common stock all that I have, and you have put in all that you brought with you. And we are not to reckon up which of us has actually contributed the greater amount, but we should know of a surety that the one who proves the better partner makes the more valuable contribution."

            "'My wife's answer was as follows, Socrates: "How can I possibly help you? What power have I? Nay, all depends on you. My duty, as my mother told me, is to be discreet."

            "And since both the indoor and the outdoor tasks demand labour and attention, God from the first adapted the woman's nature, I think, to the indoor and man's to the outdoor tasks and cares.

            "For he made the man's body and mind more capable of enduring cold and heat, and journeys and campaigns; and therefore imposed on him the outdoor tasks. To the woman, since he has made her body less capable of such endurance, I take it that God has assigned the indoor tasks. And knowing that he had created in the woman and had imposed on her the nourishment of the infants, he meted out to her a larger portion of affection for new-born babes than to the man. And since he imposed on the woman the protection of the stores also, knowing that for protection a fearful disposition is no disadvantage, God meted out a larger share of fear to the woman than to the man; and knowing that he who deals with the outdoor tasks will have to be their defender against any wrong-doer, he meted out to him again a larger share of courage. But because both must give and take, he granted to both impartially memory and attention; and so you could not distinguish whether the male or the female sex has the larger share of these. And God also gave to both impartially the power to practise due self-control, and gave authority to whichever is the better—whether it be the man or the woman—to win a larger portion of the good that comes from it. And just because both have not the same aptitudes, they have the more need of each other, and each member of the pair is the more useful to the other, the one being competent where the other is deficient."

            "Now since we know, dear, what duties have been assigned to each of us by God, we must endeavour, each of us, to do the duties allotted to us as well as possible. The law, moreover, approves of them, for it joins together man and woman. And as God has made them partners in their children, so the law appoints them partners in the home. And besides, the law declares those tasks to be honourable for each of them wherein God has made the one to excel the other. Thus, to the woman it is more honourable to stay indoors than to abide in the fields, but to the man it is unseemly rather to stay indoors than to attend to the work outside."

History 1100, Handout B for mini-test 4

The Customs of the Manor of Darnhall. From Marvin Perry, et al., Sources of the Western Tradition, vol. 1, 4th ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1999), 214-17

[Editor’s introduction] The feudal lord's way of life was made possible by the toil of the serfs who worked on the manors. Serfs, who were not free persons, had some rights but many burdensome obligations. Unlike slaves, they could not be sold off the land or dispossessed from their landholdings. Their tenure on their farms was hereditary, but they owed heavy rent to the landlord in the form of labor and a share of their crops and livestock. There were many restrictions on their personal freedom: they needed the landlord's permission to leave the estate, to marry, or to pass on personal property to their heirs. In return, they received security; they were defended by the landlords against outside aggressors or fellow serfs.

           The labor services usually took up half the work week of the serf. He was required to plow, plant, and harvest the lord's fields, repair roads, fix fences, clear ditches, and cart goods to barns and markets. Although specific obligations varied from time to time and manor to manor, they were sufficiently onerous to encourage the serfs to seek freedom; in later centuries, when the opportunity presented itself, a serf might flee to a nearby town or to newly developed lands, or might purchase certain freedoms from the manorial lord. The serfs' struggle to rid themselves of the burdens of serfdom took centuries. It was largely successful in western Europe by the fifteenth century. But in eastern Europe, serfdom was imposed on the formerly free peasantry in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Remnants of serfdom in western Europe survived until the French Revolution. Serfdom was abolished in central and eastern Europe in the mid-nineteenth century.

The Customs of the Manor of Darnhall

The following reading from the customs of the manor of Darnhall (variously spelled in the original manuscripts) in Cheshire, a rural county in northwestern England, details the general burdens of serfs. The manor of Darnhall belonged to an order of monks. In the year 1326, the abbot of the monastery drew up this custumal, a document reaffirming his rights over the serfs. Although this document comes from the Late Middle Ages, it does characterize essential elements of serfdom [and manorialism].

Here begin the customs of the bond-tenants of the manor of Dernale [Darnhall].

            One is that they ought to [appear in] court at the will of the lord, or of his bailiff, upon being summoned only, even during the night, and they ought all to come the next day.

            And whereas some of them have been accustomed to give part of their land to their sons, so that it came about that after their death their sons have by the carelessness of the bailiffs of the place been received as holding those same lands without doing to the lord anything for their seisin in their father's time; those sons who hold land ought to do suit of court [to sue], or obtain the lord's grace to redeem the suit at the will of the lord, on account of the great loss which has by this means been suffered by the lord.

            Also they all [must use] the mill under pain of forfeiture of their grain, if they at any time withdraw suit; and every year they owe pannage for their pigs.

            Also they ought to make redemption of their daughters, if they wish to marry out of the manor, at the will of the lord.

            They will also give leyrwithe for their daughters, if they fall into carnal sin.

            Also, when any one of them dieth, the lord shall have all the pigs of the deceased, all his goats, all his mares at grass, and his horse also, if he had one for his personal use, all his bees, all his bacon-pigs, all his cloth of wool and flax, and whatsoever can be found of gold and silver. The lord also shall have all his brass pots or pot, if he have one (but who of these bond-tenants will have a brass pot for cooking his food in?), because at their death the lord ought to have all things of metal. . . .

            Also the lord shall have the best ox for a hereghett, and holy Church another. After this the rest of the animals ought to be divided thus, if the deceased has children, to wit, into three parts-one for the lord, one for the wife, one for the children; and if he leaves no children, they shall be divided into two parts—one for the lord and one for the wife of the deceased, equally. Also if they have corn, in grange [barn] or in field, then the wife of the deceased ought to choose her part, to wit, half the corn in the grange or the field, as she chooses. And if she choose her part in the field, then all the corn in the grange shall remain wholly to the lord; and if she choose her part in the grange, then all the corn in the fields shall remain wholly to the lord, together with his moiety [half] and share in the granges; always provided that, wheresoever the wife shall choose her part, whether in grange or in field, the lord shall have his moiety and part, with her and against her; and all the other corn, in the place where the woman does not choose, shall remain to the lord; and if he has children, or a child, the division shall be made in the same way into three parts, to wit, among the lord, the wife of the deceased and his children; also if there are many children [their share shall be divided] among them.

            Also it is not lawful for the bond-tenant to make a will, or bequeath anything, without licence [permission] of the lord of the manor.

            And as to the sheep, let them be divided like all the other goods of the deceased which ought to be divided. But this is inserted in this place by itself, because, when the convent first came to Darnhale, the bond-tenants said that no division ought to be made of the sheep, but that all the sheep ought to remain wholly to the wife of the deceased. Which is quite false, because they always used to divide them without gainsaying it at all, until Warin le Grantuenour was bailiff of Darnhale; and while he was bailiff he was corrupted with presents, and did not exact the lord's share of all things in his time; and afterwards the bond tenants endeavoured to make this a precedent and custom, which they by no means ought to do, because they have been accustomed so to do according to the customs of this manor in the times of former lords.

            Moreover, the whole land of the deceased shall be in the hands of the lord, until he who is next, that is to say, he who ought to succeed the deceased—whom, according to the custom of the neighbourhood, they call the heir—shall make such a fine with the lord as shall correspond with the value of the land and the will of the lord. . . .

            . . . Also, if the lord wishes to buy corn or oats, or anything else, and they have such things to sell, it shall not be lawful to them to sell anything elsewhere, except with the lord's licence [permission], if the lord is willing to pay them a reasonable price.

            Also it is to be known that it is the custom of the manor to pay assize rents equally at the four terms of the year, to wit, at Christmas, the Annunciation of the Blessed Mary [March 25], at the feasts of St. John the Baptist [June 24] and St. Michael [September 29].

            Amercements [fines] of courts ought always to be levied within a fortnight after the holding of the court, or sooner, if the lord will; . . . and the lord's mercy [fine] is according to his will or the will of his bailiff, so that they can take according to the amount of the trespass and measure of the offence.

History 1100, Handout C for mini-test 5

Aristotle’s and Galen’s statements about women. From Woman Defamed and Woman Defended. An Anthology of Medieval Texts, edited by Alcuin Blamires (Oxford, 1992), pp. 38-45. Some footnotes have been incorporated into the text, some deleted.

[Editor’s introduction] PHYSIOLOGY AND ETYMOLOGY

           Where women were concerned, menstruation was the preoccupation of medieval medicine and physiology. If, in the realms of religion, menstruation rendered her unclean and untouchable, in the realms of physiology it signified her inability to match the fully developed human, i.e., the male, because unlike him she displayed evidence of an inefficient bodily system that had to keep on clearing itself of residual 'bilge-water'. The beliefs derived from scientific observation about this ran from the mildly to the grotesquely sinister: any woman might be 'venomous' during menstruation, but in a woman menstruating irregularly or in an older woman whose menstrual system was deteriorating, baneful fluids seeking an outlet could be transmitted through the eyes and could poison small infants, according to a popularizing work of the thirteenth century spuriously attributed to Albert the Great, On the Secrets of Women (De secretis mulierum). Since women were for the most part excluded from the medieval universities, they lacked opportunities to refute ex cathedra these wilder excesses of medical lore. The authenticity of treatises by one woman, known as Trotula, who practised medicine at Salerno in the eleventh/twelfth century, is hard to establish, but in any case she seems not to have raised any serious challenge. Possibly no one before Christine de Pizan treated in writing the 'lies' of the De secretis material and the disdain they deserved.

           Some traditional beliefs about male physiology implied that woman's power over a man's life through sexual attraction was biologically adverse. Andreas Capellanus remembers "once reading in a medical treatise that sexual activity makes men senile earlier". Since male semen was taken to be a sort of highly refined (or 'concocted') residue of blood, it was supposed in medical opinion as handed down from Aristotle and Galen that frequent sexual activity would literally drain away the vitality of a man's blood, shrinking his brain perhaps, or debilitating his eyes. This is an example of a tenet that remained fairly constant amidst the shifting physiological lore of the Middle Ages. So, generally, did the idea that the production of male sperm is facilitated by man's body heat, by contrast with woman, who is relatively colder so that she cannot refine her fluids to the same extent: hence their accumulation as menses which require purging.

ARISTOTLE (384-322 B.C.)

ON GENERATION OF ANIMALS (DE GENERATIONE ANIMALIUM )

Aristotelian physiology had considerable impact from the late twelfth century onwards, when his rediscovered writings began to be studied in the University of Paris. He reduced the role of woman in procreation to that of 'prime matter' awaiting the 'forming' or 'moving' agency of the man's semen. He defined female sex in terms of its inability to emulate male functions. . . .

I. Semen is pretty certainly a residue from that nourishment which is in the form of blood and which, as being the final form of nourishment, is distributed to the various parts of the body. This, of course, is the reason why semen has great potency—the loss of it from the system is just as exhausting as the loss of pure healthy blood . . . .

II. Now (i) the weaker creature [read: 'woman'] too must of necessity produce a residue, greater in amount and less thoroughly concocted; and (ii) this, if such is its character, must of necessity be a volume of bloodlike fluid. (iii) That which by nature has a smaller share of heat is weaker; and (iv) the female answers to this description. . . .

III. Now it is impossible that any creature should produce two seminal secretions at once, and as the secretion in females which answers to semen in males is the menstrual fluid, it obviously follows that the female does not contribute any semen to generation; for if there were semen, there would be no menstrual fluid; but as menstrual fluid is in fact formed, therefore there is no semen. . . .

IV. By now it is plain that the contribution which the female makes to generation is the matter used therein, that this is to be found in the substance constituting the menstrual fluid, and finally that the menstrual fluid is a residue . . . A woman is as it were an infertile male; the female, in fact, is female on account of inability of a sort, viz., it lacks the power to concoct semen out of the final state of nourishment . . . because of the coldness of [her] nature. . . .

V. The male provides the 'form' and the 'principle of the movement'; the female provides the body, in other words, the material. Compare the coagulation of milk. Here, the milk is the body, and the fig-juice or the rennet contains the principle which causes it to set. . . .

VI. When the semen has entered the uterus it 'sets' the residue produced by the female and imparts to it the same movement with which it is itself endowed. The female's contribution, of course, is a residue too, . . . and contains all the parts of the body potentially though none in actuality; and 'all' includes those parts which distinguish the two sexes. Just as it sometimes happens that deformed offspring are produced by deformed parents, and sometimes not, so the offspring produced by a female are sometimes female, sometimes not, but male. The reason is that the female is as it were a deformed male; and the menstrual discharge is semen, though in an impure condition; i.e. it lacks one constituent, and one only, the principle of Soul.

VII. An animal is a living body, a body with Soul in it. The female always provides the material, the male provides that which fashions the material into shape; this, in our view, is the specific characteristic of each of the sexes: that is what it means to be a male or female. Hence, necessity requires that the female should provide the physical part, i.e. a quantity of material, but not that the male should do so, since necessity does not require that the tools should reside in the product that is being made, nor that the agent which uses them should do so. Thus the physical part, the body, comes from the female, and the Soul from the male, since the Soul is the essence of a particular body.

VIII. Once birth has taken place everything reaches its perfection sooner in females than in males —e.g. puberty, maturity, old age—because females are weaker and colder in their nature; and we look upon the female state as being as it were a deformity, though one which occurs in the ordinary course of nature. While it is within the mother, then, it develops slowly on account of its coldness, since development is a sort of concoction, concoction is effected by heat, and if a thing is hotter its concoction is easy; when, however, it is free from the mother, on account of its weakness it quickly approaches its maturity and old age, since inferior things all reach their end more quickly.

GALEN (A.D. 131-201)

Galen served as court physician to Emperor Marcus Aurelius and wrote about medicine and anatomy in his native Greek. During the Middle Ages his authority—transmitted especially through Arab writings on the subject—became legendary. Although he differed from Aristotle in some respects, for example in reinstating the presence of female 'seed' in coitus (largely because he knew of the ovaries where his predecessor did not), he explicitly backed the philosopher's hierarchical theory of the sexes, and indeed grounded his medical thinking on the affirmation of a gradation of temperature between them. That difference, he believed, gave rise to a complimentarity of generative organs whereby woman's are the inverse of man's.

ON THE USEFULNESS OF THE PARTS OF THE BODY (DE USU PARTIUM) late second century AD.

I. (II. 299) Now just as mankind is the most perfect of all animals, so within mankind the man is more perfect than the woman, and the reason for his perfection is his excess of heat, for heat is Nature's primary instrument. Hence in those animals that have less of it, her workmanship is necessarily more imperfect, and so it is no wonder that the female is less perfect than the male by as much as she is colder than he. In fact, just as the mole has imperfect eyes, though certainly not so imperfect as they are in those animals that do not have any trace of them at all, so too the woman is less perfect than the man in respect to the generative parts. For the parts were formed within her when she was still a foetus, but could not because of the defect in the heat emerge and project on the outside, and this, though making the animal itself that was being formed less perfect than one that is complete in all respects, provided no small advantage for the race; for there needs must be a female. Indeed, you ought not to think that our Creator would purposely make half the whole race imperfect and, as it were, mutilated, unless there was to be some great advantage in such a mutilation.

2 (II. 300) Let me tell what this is. The foetus needs abundant material both when it is first constituted and for the entire period growth that follows. . . . Accordingly, it was better for the female to be made enough colder so that she cannot disperse all the nutriment which she concocts and elaborates. . . . This is the reason why the female was made cold, and the immediate consequence of this is the imperfection of the parts, which cannot emerge on the outside on account of the defect in the heat, another very great advantage for the continuance of the race. For, remaining within, that which would have become the scrotum if it had emerged on the outside was made into the substance of the uteri, an instrument fitted to receive and retain the semen and to nourish and perfect the foetus.

3 (II. 301) Forthwith, of course, the female must have smaller, less perfect testes [Galen calls the ovaries the female testes] and the semen generated in them must be scantier, colder, and wetter (for these things to follow of necessity from the deficient heat). Certainly such semen would be incapable of generating an animal. . . . [i.e., on its own; but Galen allows female 'semen' a contributory role in conception.] The testes of the male are as much larger as he is the warmer animal. The semen generated in them, having received the peak of concoction, becomes the efficient principle of the animal. Thus, from one principle devised by the Creator in his wisdom, that principle in accordance with which the female has been made less perfect than the male, have stemmed all these things useful for generation of the animal: that the parts of the female cannot escape to the outside; that she accumulates an excess of useful nutriment and has imperfect semen and a hollow instrument to receive the perfect semen; that since everything in the male is the opposite [of what it is in the female], the male member has been elongated most suitable for coitus and the excretion of semen; and that his semen itself has been made thick, abundant, and warm.

History 1100, Handout D for mini-test 8

Martin Luther, "About Eve and the Creation of Humankind." From Luther's Works. Lectures on Genesis, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan (St. Louis, 1958), pp. 115-119, 131-35. Some footnotes have been deleted. Information in [ ]'s has been added by the professor.

[Below are notes collected from Luther's lectures on the first book of the Bible, Genesis. The Wittenberg professor and reformer looked over the notes and approved them. The text was first published in Wittenberg, 1544, less than two years before Martin's death. The excerpts below focus on Genesis 2: 18 and 22 in which 'woman' is introduced into the Garden of Eden and to her husband. These lectures were given to an audience composed primarily of future Lutheran pastors.]

[Genesis 2:] 18. The Lord God also said: It is not good that man is alone; I shall make him a help which should be before him.

            We have the church established by the Word and a distinct form of worship. There was no need of civil government, since nature was unimpaired and without sin. Now also the household is set up. For God makes a husband of lonely Adam and joins him to a wife, who was needed to bring about the increase of the human race. Just as we pointed out above in connection with the creation of man that Adam was created in accordance with a well-considered counsel, so here, too, we perceive that Eve is being created according to a definite plan. Thus here once more Moses points out that man is a unique creature and that he is suited to be a partaker of divinity and of immortality. For man is a more excellent creature than heaven and earth and everything that is in them.

            But Moses wanted to point out in a special way that the other part of humanity, the woman, was created by a unique counsel of God in order to show that this sex, too, is suited for the kind of life which Adam was expecting and that this sex was to be useful for procreation. Hence it follows that if the woman had not been deceived by the serpent and had not sinned, she would have been the equal of Adam in all respects. For the punishment, that she is now subjected to the man, was imposed on her after sin and because of sin, just as the other hardships and dangers were: travail, pain, and countless other vexations. Therefore Eve was not like the woman of today; her state was far better and more excellent, and she was in no respect inferior to Adam, whether you count the qualities of the body or those of the mind.

            But here there is a question: When God says: 'It is not good that man should be alone,' of what good could He be speaking, since Adam was righteous and had no need of a woman as we have, whose flesh is leprous through sin?"

            My answer is that God is speaking of the common good or that of the species, not of personal good. The personal good is the fact that Adam had innocence. But he was not yet in possession of the common good which the rest of the living beings who propagated their kind through procreation had. For so far Adam was alone; he still had no partner for that magnificent work of begetting and preserving his kind. Therefore "good" in this passage denotes the increase of the human race. . . .

            Today, after our nature has become corrupted by sin, woman is needed not only to secure increase but also for companionship and for protection. The management of the household must have the ministration of the dear ladies. In addition—and this is lamentable—woman is also necessary as an antidote against sin. And so, in the case of the woman, we must think not only of the managing of the household which she does, but also of the medicine which she is. In this respect Paul says (I Cor. 7:2): "Because of fornication let each one have his own wife." . . . Therefore we are compelled to make use of this sex in order to avoid sin. It is almost shameful to say this, but nevertheless it is true. For there are very few who marry solely as a matter of duty.

            But the rest of the animals do not have this need. Consequently for the most part they copulate only once a year and then are satisfied with this as if by their very action they wanted to indicate that they were copulating because of duty. But the conduct of human beings is different. They are compelled to make use of intercourse with their wives in order to avoid sin. As a result, we are begotten and also born in sin, since our parents did not copulate because of duty but also as an antidote or to avoid sin.

            And yet, in the presence of this antidote and in so wretched a state, the Lord fulfills His blessing; and people are begotten, though in sin and with sin. This would not have been the case in Paradise. The act of begetting would have been a most sacred one without any passion of lust such as there is now, and children would have been in original righteousness and uprightness. Immediately, without any instruction, they would have known God; they would have praised him; they would have given thanks to Him, etc. All this has now been lost; and yet it serves a purpose to think of these things that we may gain some idea of the difference between that state in which we now are, that is, original sin, and that one in which Adam was, that is, original righteousness, for which we hope when all things are restored (Acts 3:21).

            In connection with the expression "Let Us make," I suggested that Eve was created according to a unique counsel that it might be clear that she has a share in immortality, a life better than that of the remaining animals, which live only their animal life, without hope of eternal life.

            What appears in the Latin text as "like unto himself" is in Hebrew "which should be about him." With this expression the text also makes a difference between the human female and the females of all the remaining animals, which are not always about their mates: the woman was so created that she should everywhere and always be about her husband. Thus imperial law also calls the life of married people an inseparable relationship. The female of the brutes has a desire for the male only once in a whole year. But after she has become pregnant, she returns to her home and takes care of herself. For her young born at another time she has no concern, and she does no always live with her mate.

            But among men the nature of marriage is different. There the wife so binds herself to a man that she will be about him and will live together with him as one flesh. If Adam had persisted in the state of innocence, this intimate relationship of husband and wife would have been most delightful. The very work of procreation also would have been most sacred and would have been held in esteem. There would not have been that shame stemming from sin which there is now, when parents are compelled to hide in darkness to do this. No less respectability would have attached to cohabitation than there is to sleeping, eating, or drinking with one's wife.

            Therefore was this fall [when Adam and Eve first sinned against God] not a terrible thing? For truly in all nature there was no activity more excellent and more admirable than procreation. After the proclamation of the name of God it is the most important activity Adam and Eve in the state of innocence could carry on—as free from sin in doing this as they were in praising God. Although this activity, like the other wretched remnants of the first state, continues in nature until now, how horribly marred it has become! In honor husband and wife are joined in public before the congregation; but when they are alone, they come together with a feeling of the utmost shame. I am not speaking now about the hideousness inherent in our flesh, namely, the bestial desire and lust. All these are clear indications of original sin. . . .

            Today you find many people who do not want to have children. Moreover, this callousness and inhuman attitude, which is worse than barbarous, is met with chiefly among the nobility and princes, who often refrain from marriage for this one single reason, that they might have no offspring. It is even more disgraceful that you find princes who allow themselves to be forced not to marry, for fear that the members of their house would increase beyond a definite limit. Surely such men deserve that their memory be blotted out from the land of the living. Who is there who would not detest these swinish monsters? But these facts, too, serve to emphasize original sin. Otherwise we would marvel at procreation as the greatest work of God, and as a most outstanding gift we would honor it with the praises it deserves.

            This is also the source of the aspersions against the female sex, aspersions which ungodly celibacy has augmented. However, it is a great favor that God has preserved woman for us— against our will and wish, as it were—both for procreation and also as a medicine against the sin of fornication. In Paradise woman would have been a help for a duty only. But now she is also, and for the greater part at that, an antidote and a medicine; we can hardly speak of her without a feeling of shame, and surely we cannot make use of her without shame.

            The reason is sin. In Paradise that union would have taken place without any bashfulness, as an activity created and blessed by God. It would have been accompanied by a noble delight, such as there was at that time in eating and drinking. Now, alas, it is so hideous and frightful a pleasure that physicians compare it with epilepsy or falling sickness. Thus an actual disease is linked with the very activity of procreation. We are in the state of sin and of death; therefore we also undergo this punishment, that we cannot make use of woman without the horrible passion of lust and, so to speak, without epilepsy.

[p. 131; Genesis 2:] 22. And the Lord God built from the rib which He had taken from Adam into a woman, and he brought her to Adam. Here Moses uses a new and unheard-of expression, not the verb "form" and "create," as above, but "build." This induced all the interpreters to suspect that there is some underlying mystery here. . . .

[The following section is noteworthy, for Luther talks very positively about marriage, a type of marital arrangement that will later be denounced by some as the ‘domestic prison of bourgeois marriage.’ I contend that the more historical perspective is to place Luther's remarks in the context of his age and to evaluate his views of women in the light shone by his contemporaries.]

[p. 132] Thus this expression is common in Scripture, that the wife is called a household building because she bears and brings up the offspring. The form which this building would have had in Paradise we have lost through sin so completely that we cannot even conceive of it in our thinking. But, as I said above, this present life of ours possesses some small and pitiable remnants of its culture and safeguards as well as of its dominion over the beasts. Sheep, oxen, geese and hens we govern, although boars, bears, and lions pay no attention to our rule. Similarly, some faint image of this building remains: he who marries a wife has her as a nest and home where he stays a certain place, just as birds do with their young in their little nest. Those who, like the impure papists, live as celibates do not have such a home.

[p. 133] This living together of husband and wife—that they occupy the same home, that they take care of the household, that together they produce and bring up children—is a kind of faint image and a remnant, as it were, of that blessed living-together because of which Moses calls the woman a building. If Adam had continued in his innocence, his descendants would have married and wandered away their father Adam to some little garden of their own. There they would have lived with their wives, and together they would have tilled the soil and brought up their children. There would have been no need for imposing buildings of hewn stone or for kitchens or for cellars, as we have now. Just as birds live in their little nests, so they would have dwelt here and there in God's work and calling. And the wife would have been the main reason for the husbands' dwelling in fixed habitations. Now in this disaster of sin, when we must have houses because of the severity of the climate, we cannot even conjure up a picture of this bliss; and yet these pitiable remains are excellent gifts of God, and it is truly wicked to use them ungratefully. . . .

            [T]here are also some remnants [of Satan's dominion] in the instance of procreation, although in the state of innocence [before the Fall] women would not only have given birth without pain, but their fertility would also have been far greater. Procreation is now hindered by a thousand diseases, and it happens either that unborn children do not survive the period of gestation or that at times marriages are altogether barren. These are flaws and punishments resulting from Adam's awful fall and from original sin. In the same way, the wife is still the house of the husband, to which he goes, with whom he dwells, and with whom be joins in the effort and work of supporting the family. In this sense it will be stated below (Gen. 2:24 : "Man will cling to his wife, and he will forsake his father and mother."

            But in addition to the countless other troubles which it has because [p. 134] of sin, this living-together is marred to an astonishing degree by wicked persons. There are not only men who think it is clever to find fault with the opposite sex and to have nothing to do with marriage, but also men who, after they have married, desert their wives and refuse to support their children. Through their baseness and wickedness, these people lay waste God's building, and they are really abominable monsters of nature. Let us, therefore, obey the Word of and recognize our wives as a building of God. Not only is the house built through them by procreation and other services that are necessary in a household; but the husbands themselves are built through them, because wives are, as it were, a nest and a dwelling place where husbands can go to spend their time and dwell with joy. . . .

            Therefore it should be particularly noted that this passage is not only directed against all the awful abuses of lust but that it also gives support for marriage in opposition to the wicked invectives with which the papacy has brought shame on marriage. For is it not a great thing that even in the state of innocence God ordained and instituted marriage? But now this institution and command are all the more necessary, since sin has weakened and corrupted flesh. Therefore this comfort stands invincible against all the doctrines of demons (1 Tim. 4:1), namely, that marriage is a divine kind of life because it was established by God Himself.

  [p. 135] What has come into the minds of the tools of Satan and the enemies of Christ? They have denied that there is any chastity in marriage, and they have declared that those most suited for the ministry of a congregation are celibates, because Scripture says (Lev. 11:44): "You shall be pure." Are spouses impure? Is God the author of impurity when He Himself brings Eve to Adam? Does Adam commit evil when he permits himself to be talked into impurity though he was able to do without marriage in his innocent nature? The papacy has truly paid the deserved penalties for such blasphemies. Not only have they defiled themselves with a crowd of harlots, but they have also connived at other crimes so loathsome that by now they are ready for the punishment visited on Sodom and Gomorrah.

            When I was a boy, the wicked and impure practice of celibacy had made marriage so disreputable that I believed I could not even think about the life of married people without sinning. Everybody was fully persuaded that anyone who intended to lead a holy life acceptable to God could not get married but had to live as a celibate and take the vow of celibacy. Thus many who had been husbands became either monks or priests after their wives had died. Therefore it was a work necessary and useful for the church when men saw to it that through the Word of God marriage again came to be respected and that it received the praises it deserved. As a result, by the grace of God now everyone declares that it is something good and holy to live with one's wife in harmony and peace even if one should have a wife who is barren or is troubled by other ills.

History 1100, Handout E for mini-test 8

Henricus Institoris and Jacobus Sprenger, Malleus Maleficarum, (1486-7), ed. and trans. by Christopher Mackay (Cambridge University Press, 2006), vol.2: 112-24. Most of the notes from Mackay have been kept; a few notes from Prof. Bostick

[Introduction from The Malleus Maleficarum (Hammer of Witches), ed. and trans. by Alan C. Kors and Edward Peters in Witchcraft in Europe 1100-1700: A Documentary History (Philadelphia: Philadelphia University Press, 1972), 113: “The Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches), written in 1486-7 by the Dominican Inquisitors Heinrich Krämer (more commonly called Institoris, the Latinized form of Krämer), and Jacob Sprenger, became the first "encyclopedia" of witch-beliefs and was constantly cited in support of those beliefs by Catholics and Protestants down to the eighteenth century. Its form is similar to that of other works in the same genre; it springs from the handbook for investigating heretics, some examples of which were in fact called "Hammers of Heretics." Krämer and Sprenger were inquisitors in Upper Germany; their book was prefaced by Pope Innocent VIII's Bull Summis desiderantes, and contained as an appendix an alleged decision in its favor by the Faculty of Theology of the University of Cologne. With such claims to the sanction of authority, the Malleus exhaustively analyzed the entire problem of witch-beliefs and set out meticulously the ways by which witches could be found, convicted, and executed. The unrelenting thoroughness of Krämer and Sprenger served, in a sense, to sum up the entire history of recent witch-beliefs and to present Christian Europe with a complete, persuasive, massively documented, and duly authorized description of the witches in its midst.”

            . . . First to the question of why this form of breach of the Faith is found more often in the delicate sex than in males. The first question will be a general one concerning the general circumstances of the condition of women, the second will be a specific one concerning which specific sort of women are found to be superstitious and sorceresses, and the third will be a particular one concerning midwives, who surpass all others in evil.

            As for the First, namely why a larger number of sorcerers is found among the delicate female sex than among men, it would certainly not be helpful to cite arguments to the contrary, since experience itself makes such things believable more than do the testimony of words and of trustworthy witnesses. Without looking down upon the sex which God has always performed brave deeds in order to confound, let us say that while different reasons are given by different people for these facts, these reasons always agree in principle. Hence, this topic is quite worthy of being preached for the admonition of women—as experience has often shown, they are eager to listen—so long as it is propounded with circumspection. . . .

            The evil of women is discussed in Ecclesiasticus 25 [:22-23] : "There is no head worse than the head of a snake, and there is no anger surpassing the anger of a woman. It will be more pleasing to stay with a lion and a serpent than to live with an evil woman." Among many things that follow and precede, he concludes about the evil woman in the same passage, “Every evil is small compared to the evil of a woman" [verse 26] . Hence, Chrysostom says in reference to the passage, “It is beneficial not to marry” [Matt. 19:10]: “What else is a woman but the enemy of friendship, an inescapable punishment, a necessary evil, a natural temptation, a. desirable disaster, a danger in the home, a delightful detriment, an evil of nature, painted with nice color? Therefore, if it is a sin to send her away, then since it is appropriate to keep her, now there is truly an obligatory sort of torture in that we are either to commit acts of adultery in sending her away or have daily quarrels" [Unfinished Work on Matthew 38]. Finally, Cicero says, "While men are driven to every act of wrongdoing [maleficium] by individual," that is, multiple, "desires, women are led to every sort of wrongdoing ["acts of sorcery"] by a single desire. For the basis of all the faults of women is greed" (Rhetoric, Bk. 2 [Pseudo-Cicero, Ad Herennium 4:23]). Seneca [actually, Publilius Syrus] in his tragedies says, "A woman either loves or hates. No third thing has been given. For a woman to cry is a lie. Two kinds of tears are kept in the eyes of women, one of true grief and one of treachery. When a woman thinks alone, she thinks evil thoughts.” . . .

            There are others who give different reasons for why women are found to be superstitious in larger numbers than men, and they say that there are three reasons. The first is that they are prone to believing and because the demon basically seeks to corrupt the Faith, he assails them in particular. Hence Ecclesiasticus 19[:4]: "He who quickly believes is fickle in heart and will be made small.” The second reason is that on account of the tendency of their temperament towards flux they are by nature more easily impressed upon to receive revelations through the impression of the disembodied spirits, and when they use this temperament well, they are very good, but when they use it badly, they are worse. The third reason is that they have loose tongues and can hardly conceal from their female companions the things that they know through evil art, and since they lack physical strength, they readily seek to avenge themselves secretly through acts of sorcery. Hence, "It will be more pleasing to stay with a lion and a snake than to live with an evil woman. All evil is small compared to the evil of a woman." (Ecclesiasticus 25, quoted above). The following reason can likewise be added. Since they are prone to flux, they can more quickly offer children to the demons, as in fact they do. . . .

            In modern times, however, this kind of breach of the Faith is found more often in women than in men, as experience itself indicates, and by tracing the reason more carefully beyond the foregoing we can say that since they are defective in all the powers of both soul and body, it is not surprising that they cause more acts of sorcery to happen against those for whom they feel jealousy. For in terms of the intellect or the understanding of spiritual matters they seem to belong to a different variety than men. Authority and reason, along with various examples from Scripture, indicate this. Terence [Hecyra 3.1] says, "Women are generally like children, possessing trivial views.” . . . . Proverbs 11[:22] says as if describing woman, “A beautiful and foolish woman is a gold ring in a pig’s nose.” This is a natural explanation, namely that she is more carnal than a man, as is clear in connection many filthy carnal acts. These defects can also be noticed the original shaping of woman, since she was formed from a curved rib, that is, from the rib of the chest that is twisted and contrary, so to speak, to man. From this defect there also arises the fact that since she is an imperfect animal, she is always deceiving, and for is reason she is always deceptive. Cato says, “She sets a trap with tears" [Distich 3.20],1 and it is said, While a woman cries, she is striving to deceive her man.” . . . All this is also demonstrated by the etymology of the noun. For the word "femina" [the Latin word for woman] is spoken as "fe" and "minus," because she has and keeps less [Latin "minus"] faith [Latin "fidem"]. This is the result of nature in terms of faithfulness, though as a result of both Grace and nature at the same time, faith never failed in the case of the Most Holy Virgin, when it had failed in the case of all the men at the time of the Passion of Christ. Woman, therefore, is evil as a result of nature because she doubts more quickly in the Faith. [p.118] She also denies the Faith more quickly, this being the basis for acts of sorcery.

            As for another power of the soul (the will), when she hates someone whom she previously loved, as a result of nature she swells with anger and with her inability to tolerate this, and she is entirely intolerant of this in the same way that the swelling of the sea bubbles and rushes. Various authorities allude to this explanation. Ecclesiasticus 251:191: "There is no anger compared to the anger of woman.” . . . In fact, the principal cause contributing to the increase of sorceresses is the grievous war between married and unmarried men and women. Indeed, this is the case even among holy women, so what about the others? . . . When they behave this way among themselves, how much more so against men! . . . One can read about a certain man whose wife had drowned in a river. When he was looking for her corpse to remove it from the water, he waked upstream, and when he was asked why he was looking for her upstream though heavy objects flow downstream and not up, he answered, “In life that woman was always contrary to my words and deeds or commands so I am looking for her in a contrary manner an case even in death she retains a contrary will that surpasses what is normal.”

            Indeed, just as the result of the first defect, that of intelligence, is that they commit the renunciation of the Faith more easily than do men, so too the result of the second, namely irregular desires and passions, is that they seek, think up and inflict various acts of vengeance, whether through acts large sorcery or by any other means. Hence, it is no wonder that such number of sorcerers exists in this category. In addition, how great is their defect in the power of memory, since as a result of nature there is in them the fault that they are unwilling to be ruled and instead follow their own urges without any piety! She strives after this, arranging to this end all the things she has remembered. . . . .

            Let us look, and we find that virtually all the kingdoms of the world have been overturned because of women. For the first prosperous kingdom (Troy) was destroyed because of the seizure of a single women, Helen, and many thousands of Greeks were killed. The kingdom of the Jews suffered many evils and deaths because of a very bad queen, Jezebel, and her daughter Athalia, queen in the kingdom of Judah, who had had the sons of her son killed in order that at his death she could reign herself, but both women were killed. The kingdom of the Romans endured many evils because of Cleopatra, the Queen of Egypt, a very bad woman. And so on about others. Hence, it is no wonder if the world now suffers on account of the evil of women.

            Next, an examination of the carnal desires of the body. As a result of them countless injuries happen to human life, so that we can justly say with Cato Uticensis that if the world could exist without women, we would interact with the gods. For if the evil of women did not in fact exist—not to mention their acts of sorcery—the world would remain unburdened of countless dangers. In the letter To Rufinus, Valerius says, “you do not know that woman is a chimera but you ought to know that that triple-shaped monstrosity is made lovely with the outstanding face of a lion, befouled with the stomach of a smelly she-goat and armed with the tail of a poisonous snake.” He means that her countenance is beautiful, her touch malodorous, and her interaction with others destructive.

            Let us also hear another characteristic, that of her voice. For she is lying in speech just as she is in nature. She is stinging and yet pleasing, and as a result of this the voice of women is compared to the song of the Sirens, who attract those who sail past with sweet melody and eventually kill them. Women do kill in that they empty wallets, drain strength, and forcibly cause the loss of God. . . . So Proverbs 5[:3-4]: “Her throat is more shiny than oil,” that is, “her most recent speech is bitter like wormwood.”

            Let us hear another characteristic. Her walk, bearing and demeanor—this is the vanity of vanities. There is no man in the world who strives to please Beneficent God as much as even a woman who is moderate in her vanities strives to please men. . . . This is the woman mentioned in Ecclesiastes 7[:27] and about whom the Church now laments because of the huge number of sorceresses: “I have found woman more bitter than death. She is a hunter’s snare, her heart is bait, and her hands are chains. He who pleases God will shun her. He who is a sinner will be captured by her.” She is more bitter than death, that is, than the Devil: “His name was Death” (Apocalypse 6[:8]). For though it was the Devil who misled Eve into committing sin, it was Eve who led Adam astray, and since the sin of Eve would not have brought the death of the soul and body upon us if the guilt in Adam to which she and not the Devil misled him had not ensued, she is “more bitter than death.” Again, she is “more bitter than death” because death is natural and kills only the body, but the sin introduced by woman kills the soul as well as the body by depriving it of Grace as a penalty for sin. Again, she is “more bitter than death” because the death of the body is an open, fearsome enemy, but woman is a hidden, cajoling one, and for this reason she is more bitter and dangerous.

            She is called a snare of hunters, that is, of demons, because men are captured not merely through carnal desires at the sight and sound of them—since their face is a burning wind and their voice a serpent's hiss according to Bernard [Poem of Exhortation to Rainald, The Manner of Living Well]—but also through their affecting countless men and domestic animals with sorcery. Her heart is called “bait,” that is, the imperceptible ill-will that holds sway in women's hearts. Their hands are chains for restraining. For when they set their hand to affecting a creature with sorcery, then with the co-operation of the Devil they bring about what they undertake.

            Conclusion. Everything is governed by carnal lusting, which is insatiable in them (next to the last chapter of Proverbs [30:15]: “There are three insatiable things . . . and a fourth that never says, ‘It is enough,’” namely the opening of the womb) and for this reason they even cavort with demons to satisfy their lust. More evidence could be cited here, but for intelligent men it appears to be reasonably unsurprising that more women than men are found to be tainted with the Heresy of sorceresses. Hence, and consequently, it should be called the Heresy not of Sorcerers but of Sorceresses, to name it after the predominant element. Blessed be the Highest One, Who has, down to the present day, preserved the male kind from such disgraceful behavior, and clearly made man privileged since He wished to be born and suffer on our behalf in the guise of a man.

What sort of women are more often found to be superstitious and sorceresses

AS FOR THE SECOND topic, namely what sort of women are found to be more given to superstition and tainted with acts of sorcery than are the rest, it should be said, as has become clear from the preceding question, that because three general faults (lack of faith, ambition, and debauchery) are seen to hold sway among bad women in particular, those women who are devoted to these faults more than the rest engage in acts of sorcery more than do the rest. Again, since among these three faults the last is the predominant one, therefore, since this fault is insatiable and so on, even among ambitious women the ones that are more tainted are those who are more inflamed with the purpose of satisfying their base lustings, like adulteresses, female fornicators and the concubines of powerful men. This takes place on the basis of seven different sorts of sorcery, by means of the tainting of the sexual act and fetuses in the womb with various acts of sorcery, as is mentioned in the bull. / First, by diverting the minds of men to irregular love and so on. Second, by impeding the procreative force. Third, by taking away the limbs appropriate for this act. Fourth, by changing men into the shape of beasts through the art of conjuring. Fifth, by destroying the procreative force with reference to females. Sixth, by causing a miscarriage. Seventh, by offering babies to demons.