ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE AND THE QUARREL OVER MEDIEVAL WOMEN'S POWER

Transcription

1 ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE AND THE QUARREL OVER MEDIEVAL WOMEN'S POWER Perhaps because edieval historians have such difficulties in treating the entire Middle Ages in a single seester, we split our courses into two, a bifurcation in our teaching that creates a tendency to adhere to Marc Bloch's First Feudal Age, Second Feudal Age dichotoy.' Such periodization, splitting the Middle Ages at the eleventh century, right in the iddle of a tie of considerable change, is distorting to the ore general history, but creates an even ore distorting periodization in edieval woen's history. Early feinist edievalists asked, as Joan Kelly did, "Did woen have a Renaissance?" and tended to identify a Golden Age for woen in the very early Middle Ages, even before 750 AD.2They saw a decline of woen's position that started with the Carolingians and got draatically worse by the twelfth century. If as the suggestions of Joan Kelly seeed to iply, woen's history was the reverse of the standard trope, then woen did not only not have a Renaissance, but the periodization of early edieval! late edieval akes it appear that edieval woen did not have a twelfthcentury Renaissance, either; woen indeed find little place in discussions ofthe discovery of the individual, the revival of Latin letters, the estee for all things antique, and the new interest in science and the world of nature of twelfth-century Renaissance studies. Heloise, Hildegard, and Eleanor are too often left copletely out of the story, or presented as evidence of progressive erosion of woen's power and authority." In such early scenarios the reign of Eleanor of Aquitaine as Queen of France was pivotal: the last gasp of the earlier, better, Golden Age. If soe of us also saw in Katherine Hepburn as our last great strong actress of the twentiethcentury classic era of fil, that only confired the "decline of woen's power and status after Eleanor" thesis. How could a Queen of England, like Eleanor of Aquitaine, locked up in a nunnery by her husband be anything but powerless? Such periodization should be resisted, replaced by soething ore subtle, with any ups and downs for different groups and individuals in different places. Why was Eleanor the last gasp in that particular scenario? Early studies by feinist edievalists saw the later Middle Ages as dire, in part because odern [ale?] historians had so often repeated what see to be the increasingly isogynist stateents about woen by twelfth-century authorities like Bernard of Clairvaux; in that view edieval isogyny was a cuulative, ever worsening proble.' But ore recent evaluations suggest differently. Studies of scriptoria and woen's libraries, like those of Felice Lifshitz for the early centuries, show that religious woen read and copied selectively, ignoring or excising fro their sources the ost isogynist parts; work on nuns'

2 self-estee like that of Penelope D. Johnson for later ties suggests that such isogyny ay have passed any woen right by." But for the later Middle Ages there was also the Frauenfroge, the woen's proble or question, which in explaining what seeed to [ale?] historians the extraordinary nuber of regular and extra-regular counities of religious woen in the later Middle Ages had coe to the conclusion that these were only the result of a late edieval deographic anoaly: large nubers of woen without husbands." Associated with the Frauenfrage are such interpretations as Eileen Power that religious houses for woen, regular or extra-regular, were priarily duping grounds for unwanted girls, with the associated assuption that arriage was [and should be] the nor.' Finally, certainly when I began teaching edieval woen we had available very few woen's voices fro the later Middle Ages and Were stuck with that created by Chaucer in the wife of Bath, or that frustrating "Autobiography" of Marjorie Kepe. But was the apparently increasing isogyny of the later Middle Ages reflective of the decline in woen's power, or ight it not be viewed a backlash, a response to the very real power and authority held at least by aristocratic woen, both secular and religious, of the later Middle Ages? And a isogyny that edieval woen did not necessarily buy into? And a isogyny that feinist edievalists are increasingly rejecting as the standard discourse? In this sense, Joan Ferrante's To the G10ly ofher Sex is a breath of fresh air, for she sees the glass nearly full instead of half epty. This is in great contrast to the standard odern discourse of edieval history and literature [written by en?] that sees to have extracted out the ost isogynist bits for repetition and ignored the woen's literature Ferrante treats." There is uch in recent feinist work to extol, and the audience response to our presentations at Kalaazoo brought to light so any new studies! Still, uch of that work stands in rather un-theorized isolation fro any ore general paradig. It is tie to reforulate the question of periodization because it is ill-founded in the following ways. First, the idea of a Golden Age of the early edieval period ignores the fact that the econoic situation of everyone in edieval Europe had begun to iprove by about the year 1000 AD, if not earlier. If we evaluate all aspects of life for woen or en before and after 1000 AD, the second period was clearly richer, ore diverse, healthier, had better weather, ore agricultural and econoic successes, and ore opportunities for ore people overall than had the early Middle Ages. That it was also ore repressive probably has to do with greater wealth too." While woen's access to power, prestige and wealth, ay have gotten relatively worse in coparison to that of en in parallel social niches, for everyone, the twelfth and thirteenth centuries in western Europe saw general prosperity and greater security. There were coplex deographic consequences in the change fro early edieval to high Middle Ages. Any arguent about the "rough and ready equality" of en and woen of the early Middle Ages asks the harsh reality of nearly equal shares in an extreely ipoverished world. Frequent faine and little iron in the diet leading to high ortality in childbirth eant that

3 there was a dearth of woen. Whereas the wergilds found in barbarian law codes for woen in the childbearing ages ay have been higher than en's, this reflects also a uch higher ortality rate for woen. We ust wonder if this shows woen ore valuable, or only treats the as childbearing coodities. Life expectancies increased with the level of aterial culture for everyone. Woen of the lower classes had uch higher living standards after the year 1000 than in the early Middle Ages, ore recourse to labor-saving devices like water-powered grinding ills, or spinning wheels. Woen of the early Middle Ages did not survive as well relative to en as they would later when en ebarked on Crusades, or died fighting in real or play battles like tournaents. And this eant that they were uch ore often pressed into service as child-bearers with little real option to lead religious lives or lives as single-woen. Related were technological advances of the high Middle Ages that favored woen's survival, while warfare of the high Middle Ages did not favor en's. Although queens like Eleanor of Aquitaine or Marguerite of Provence, Louis IX's queen, accopanied their husbands on crusade and had any children, other woen ight have children spaced farther apart as a result of their en being away. Castles were defendable by stay-at-hoe wives with a few knights under their control. Because crusades took husbands away for long periods of tie, years at a tie, they allowed those lady-castellans soe relief fro constant childbearing. Career necessities of couting long-distance to crusades in warrior class failies after the illenniu, added to a new ephasis on clerical celibacy, thus eant that fewer woen got pregnant; those who did, got pregnant less frequently after the illenniu than in the early Middle Ages. Fewer and better-spaced pregnancies overall ust have iproved the life expectancies of woen at the top of society. With regard to the right to own, alienate, or adinister property, while woen rarely got initial shares equal to their brothers', they often ended up inheriting, ruling,or acting as regents because of the disproportionate deaths of en fro disease and injury on those crusades as well as crusader departures. Eleanor was only one of any woen who acted while en were away, and the periods of power taken on by her daughters and granddaughters at various stages of their lives is quite aazing." Moreover, such woen in the later Middle Ages could ake real choices about arried versus religious lives, or at least choose to enter religious lives later in life. Whereas a previous generation of [ale?] historians, even those supporting the notion of investigating woen's history, conceived of arriage as the only desideratu for woen, today we can think about the choice to not arry as a freedo and a success, not an oppression or a failure. Woen leading religious lives in the Middle Ages had full, rich, and powerful lives, not lives of deprivation. The early edieval scarcities of childbearing woen brought attacks on woen who wanted to take theselves out of the reproductive arket to becoe nuns, and the general poverty eant that few lived long enough to exceed the childbearing age and retire to rule nuns." But the reduced pregnancies and better aternal health that ended the scarcity of woenby the high Middle Ages eant that any ore woen could becoe

4 ebers of religious counities, often ones where they exercised soe of the sae social functions that they had earlier as the wives of priests. Moreover it allows us to identify a new category of postenopausal woen who ayor ay not have chosen to give up power to their children or grandchildren, often preferring to continue to rule in their older years, and support religious counities for woen rather than necessarily enter the. Yet the best-kept secret of later edieval history is the large nuber of woen's religious counities." Those counities have enorous unpublished archives that need investigation, and it turns out that those archives docuent not only religious woen, but the secular noblewoen who tended to support onastic houses for woen to which they ight retire (if necessary), or to which they could turn as efficacious recipients of als for prayers." Such aterials for woen of the later Middle Ages, fro all sorts of archival depositories, reain, disproportionately to those for en's houses, unpublished. So I hope the next great ove in edieval feinist history will be the investigation of the any still unpublished archives that could throw light on woen in the later Middle Ages. Along with that will coe an expansion of our classifications of woen: to rich, poor, peasant, castellan, young girls, arried, and widowed, we ust add the category, possibly one hardly ever found for the early Middle Ages, of the postenopausal woan, usually a widow of power and authority, who could ake different choices once the childbearing age was past. She is distinct fro the young and still nubile woan who can act as an heiress or regent for her children, but was still a pawn in the arriage gae. This category of the postenopausal woan of power and authority is one with which we ust perhaps investigate Eleanor of Aquitaine, but can be applied to any other woen of her tie and later. '4 There is then abundant archival work to infor new theories and better periodization. Such research is slow and tie-consuing and ay result in fewer publications, so I a not necessarily advocating it for feinist edievalists without tenure, although getting one's toes wet in the archives before copleting the Ph.D. akes it easier to return to the archives later. But those of us who have tenure and are arching our last children off to college, should consider that instead of being enticed into the illusory powers of deanships and coittee work which could as easily be done by en, that we turn to the great unfinished tasks of archival research. If we reain at hoe with caregiving tasks, we should at least turn to the ore careful translation and reediting of source aterials for teaching in which the parts about woen have been left out or woen's versions of texts disissed as aberrant. The accuulation of work on resources not at this point part of our standard knowledge about edieval woen will contribute to new paradigs about the coplexities of woen's lives, particularly in the years after the year 1000 AD, but also a less rosy-eyed view of the early edieval period. Such theory ust, I think take seriously woen's spiritual concerns (and take on the odern onopolization of the history of edieval religious orders by en) as well as woen's actual control of aterial resources. It will be based on the work not only of those of us who have been placed by Fortuna's wheel in Research I institutions where we train the next generation of edievalists, but particularly by

5 those who labor in the vineyards of undergraduate education, the unsung (but I hope not unthanked or unappreciated) heroines of our profession who have in the world of edieval feinist scholarship so often backed up the efforts of those woen training that next generation of specialists. To discover the woen of power of the post-eleanor of Aquitaine age, the woen of power of the post-katherine Hepburn age ust begin to travel the routes and rediscover the archives which reflect the activities of Eleanor and her daughters and granddaughter, or her other-in-law the Epress Matilda, or the any ruling or regent Queens, countesses, and Ladies of castles of their ties. There is still uch work to be done, and if in doing it we rediscover ore woen very uch like ourselves, all the better. -Constance H. Beran, University ofiowa 1 Marc Bloch, Feudal Society (London, 1961). 2 Woen are not very apparent in either Charles H. Haskins, Renaissance of the Twelfth Century (Cabridge, MA, 1927), or Renaissance and Renewal in the Twellth Century, edited Robert L. Benson and Giles Constable, with Carol D. Lanha (Cabridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982). 3 Joan Kelly-Gadol, "Did Woen have a Renaissance?" in Becoing visible: Woen in European History, ed. R. Bridenthal and C. Koonz, first ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977), , repr. in Kelly, Woen, History and Theory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 19-50; depending especially on Marion Facinger Meade, "A Study of Medieval Oueenship: Capetian France ," Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 5 (1968): 3-48, and David Herlihy, "Land, Faily, and Woen in Continental Europe, ," Traditio 1 (1962): ; cf. ide, ""Did Woen Have a Renaissance?" A Reconsideration," Medievalia et Huanistica n.s. 13 (1985): R.W. Southern, Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages (Harondsworth, Penguin, 1970), , includes the faous quote fro Bernard's 'serones in Cantica," 65: (PL 183, 1091), "To be always with a woan and not to have intercourse with her is ore difficult than to raise the dead. You cannot do the least difficult: do you think I will believe that you can do what is ore difficult?" Jean Leclercq, on the other hand, in Woen and Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (Kalaazoo, 1989) attepts to argue, rather incoherently, that Bernard was not a isogynist. 5 Felice Lifshitz, "Deonstrating Gun(t)za: Woen, Manuscripts, and the Ouestion of Historical 'Proof," in Vo Nutzen des Schreibens. Sozia/es Gedtichtnis, Herrschaft und Besitz i Miffelalter, ed, Walter Pohl and Paul Herold (Vienna: sterreichischen Akadeie Des Wissenschaften, 2002), but see also Penelope D. Johnson, esp. Equal in Monastic Profession: Religious Woen in Medieval France (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991). 6 Herbert Grundann, Religious Moveents in the Middle Ages: The Historical Links between Heresy, the Mendicant Orders, and the Woen's Religious Moveent in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Century, with the HistoricalFoundations of Geran Mysticis, trans. Steven Rowan, with an introduction by Robert E. Lerner (South Bend, IN: Notre Dae University Press, 1995, first published in Geran as Religiose Bewegungen i Miffelalter, 1935). 7 Medieval English Nunneries c to 1535 (Cabridge, 1922); feinist reaction to her apparent distaste for nuns ay bring us to discount too uch the value of this book for its inforation on religious woen anaging property, etc. The iportance of how we read the evidence is everywhere apparent; see for exaple Joan M. Ferrante, To the Glory of her Sex: Woen's Roles in the Coposition of Medieval Texts (Blooington: Indiana University Press, 1997). 9 The classic stateent is Robert S. Lopez, The Coercial Revolution of the Middle Ages; on dissent, see Robert. I. Moore, The Foration of a Persecuting Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987). 10 On this see Miria Shadis and Constance H. Beran, "A Taste of the Feast: Re-considering Eleanor of Aquitaine's Feale Descendants," Eleanor of Aquitaine, Lord and Lady, ed. Bonnier Wheeler and John Cari Parsons (New York: Palgrave, 2003), See also Beran, "Abbeys for Cistercian Nuns in the Ecclesiastical Province of Sens: Foundation, Endowent and Econoic Activities of the Earlier Foundations," Revue Mabillon 73 [1997]: ), and Shadis, "Piety, Politics, and Power: The Patronage of Leonor of England and her Daughters Berenguela of Leon and Blanche of Castile," in The Cultural Patronage of Medi

6 eval Woen, ed. June Hall McCash (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1996), Good new work is found in Aristocratic Woen in Medieval France, ed. Theodore Evergates (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999) and Fredrik L. Cheyelle, Erengard of Narbonne and the World of the Troubadours (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001).. 11 See suggestions of this in Lisa M. Bitel, Land of Woen: Tales of Sex and Gender fro Early Ireland (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997). 12 See the evidence being copiled by the NEH-funded "Medieval Religious Woen's Lives and Counities, ," directed by Mary Martin McLaughlin and Suzanne Weple, , now on-line as MATRIX. hllp:f/onasticatrix.usc.edu/ 13 On the efficacy of religious woen's prayers, see y arguent in Constance H. Beran, "Dowries, Private Incoe, and Anniversary Masses. The Nuns of St. Antoine-dee-Chaps (Paris)," Proceedings oi the Western Society for French History 20: (1993): A few naes to include are Matilda of Courtenay, countess of Auxerre, Nevers, and Tonnerre; Eleanor of Verandois; Isabelle countess of Chartres and her daughter, Matilda of Aboise; Blanche of Castile; possibly Ingebourg of Denark; Eleanor of Provence; Eleanor of Castile; and Isabelle of Aubigny, countess of Arundel.