Same Bodies, Different Women: ‘Other’ Women in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period(2 History and Art)

This volume is a collection of essays focusing on marginalized women mostly in Central and Eastern Europe from around 1350 to 1650. “Other” women are discussed in three different categories: women whose religious practices put them on the social margins, “common women” who are in society but not of society because they are in the sex trade, and women whose occupations were reason enough to shunt them. In order to fill a gap in gender history for countries east of the Rhine River, the studies included present how official city-funded brothels in medieval Austria worked, how a princess’ disability affected her life as Byzantine empress, how one unmarried Transylvanian woman who got pregnant dealt with being the center of a court case, and how enslaved women in medieval Hungary were treated as sexual property. The hope with this volume is that it will show the many interdisciplinary ways that women on the margins can be studied in this region, and to diminish the taboo of discussing this topic to begin with.

Table of Contents:
Introduction By Marianna D. Birnbaum - CHAPTER 1 - Female Rebellion in the Margins of a Late Thirteenth-Century Mort de Roi Artu Author(s): Emily Shartrand - CHAPTER 2 - A Heretic with a Distorted Face: Sophia of Montferrat, the ‘Other’ Empress of Byzantium Author(s): Petra Melichar - CHAPTER 3 - Suspect Women: Prostitution, Reputation, and Gossip in Fourteenth-Century Prague Author(s): Eleanor Janega - CHAPTER 4 - Prostitution in Urban Brothels in Late Medieval Austria Author(s): Michael M. Hammer - CHAPTER 5 - Prostitutes and Urban Communities of Medieval Slavonia: Examples from Gradec Author(s): Marija Karbić - CHAPTER 6 - Prostitution in Late Medieval Dubrovnik: Legislation, Practice and Prosecution Author(s): Gordan Ravančić - CHAPTER 7 - Rub-a-dub-dub, Three Maids in a Tub: Women in Bathhouses and Secondary Sites of Sex Work in Medieval Hungarian Towns Author(s): Christopher Mielke - CHAPTER 8 - Laundry Ladies in Medieval Poland Author(s): Leslie Carr-Riegel - CHAPTER 9 - Sexual Access to Slave Women: Árpádian Hungary as a Case Study Author(s): Cameron Sutt - CHAPTER 10 - Fornicatrices, scortatrices et meretrices diabolares: Disciplining Women in Early Modern Hungarian Towns Author(s): Blanka Szeghyová - CHAPTER 11 - De Ardentissimo Amore: Between Rape and Adultery – a Sixteenth-century Trial Author(s): Alexandra Chira

About the Author :
CHRISTOPHER MIELKE he was awarded in 2017 a PhD in Medieval Studies from Central European University receiving a “magna cum laude” for his dissertation “Every hyacinth the garden wears: the archaeology of medieval queens of Hungary, 1000-1395.” This was an archaeological study of the material culture and space of Hungarian queens of the Árpádian and Angevin dynasties. From 2012 to 2017, he was the host, organizer, and lead correspondent for CEU Medieval Radio (www.medievalradio.org), having interviewed over 70 guests for the biweekly program “Past Perfect!”. Most recently, he has led the charge for updating exhibits at the Beverly Heritage Center, including a reconstructed floorplan of the original 1808 Randolph County Courthouse, and including information about the Underground Railroad in the Exhibit about the Staunton-Parkersburg Turnpike. He is also part of negotiating the opening of Beverly’s first public library. ANDREA-BIANKA ZNOROVSZKY received a Joint Excellence in Science and Humanities Research Fellowship from the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna, in collaboration with Universität Salzburg, Institut für Realienkunde des Mittelalters und der Frühen Neuzeit. Starting with September 2018, she functions as a researcher at the Universita Ca'Foscari, Venice, Italy, as a recipient of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions-Individual Fellowship (IF), financed by the European Commission, Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation 2014- 2020. She received her PhD magna cum laude in Medieval Studies from the Central European University in Budapest in 2016. Her doctoral dissertation, Between Mary and Christ: Depicting Cross-Dressed Saints in the Middle Ages (c. 1200-1600), explored the iconographic development of cross-dressed saints in relation to their cult in Western Europe. She also holds a Masters Degree in Medieval Studies from the Central European University, Budapest. In 2016-2017 she functioned as an Assistant Professor at the American University of Central Asia, Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic, where she taught academic writing (First Year Seminar) and art courses (Women in Art and Literature).