Common women : prostitution and sexuality in Medieval England / Ruth Mazo Karras.
1996
HQ186.A5 K37 1996 (Mapit)
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Details
Title
Common women : prostitution and sexuality in Medieval England / Ruth Mazo Karras.
Author
Karras, Ruth Mazo, 1957-
ISBN
9780195062427 hardcover alkaline paper
0195062426 hardcover alkaline paper
0195062426 hardcover alkaline paper
Imprint
New York : Oxford University Press, 1996.
Language
English
Description
viii, 221 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.
Call Number
HQ186.A5 K37 1996
Dewey Decimal Classification
306.74/0942
Summary
"Common women" in medieval England were prostitutes, whose distinguishing feature was not that they took money for sex but that they belonged to all men in common. Common Women: Prostitution and Sexuality in Medieval England tells the stories of these women's lives: their entrance into the trade because of poor job and marriage prospects or because of seduction or rape; their experiences as street-walkers, brothel workers or the medieval equivalent of call girls; their customers, from poor apprentices to priests to wealthy foreign merchants; and their relations with those among whom they lived. Through a sensitive use of a wide variety of imaginative and didactic texts, Ruth Karras shows that while prostitutes as individuals were marginalized within medieval culture, prostitution as an institution was central to the medieval understanding of what it meant to be a woman. This important work will be of interest to scholars and students of history, women's studies, and the history of sexuality.
Bibliography, etc. Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-213) and index.
Series
Studies in the history of sexuality.
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Table of Contents
Introduction: Common Women, Prostitutes, and Whores
Prostitution and the Law
Brothels, Licit and Illicit
Becoming a Prostitute
The Sex Trade in Practice
Marriage, Sexuality, and Marginality
Saints and Sinners
Conclusion: Sexuality, Money, and the Whore.
Prostitution and the Law
Brothels, Licit and Illicit
Becoming a Prostitute
The Sex Trade in Practice
Marriage, Sexuality, and Marginality
Saints and Sinners
Conclusion: Sexuality, Money, and the Whore.