Medieval Women: Economic Factors

Question 1

How did peasant women contribute to medieval economy, relating to the wife as ‘a full partner in the management of the holding’?

Answer 1

providing labour on land

Peasant women collecting harvest, milking cows, cooking, baking bread etc.

Question 2

What does Eileen Power’s historiography on married women suggest?

Answer 2

Eileen Power: misconception that married women solely focus on family life as married women not exempt from not participating in labour

e.g. some married women providing assistance for their husband’s trading endeavours

Question 3

How did town wives/urban differ from peasant women in their work?

Answer 3

Town wives = mainly based on trade + manufacturing

Question 4

Why were urban centres important for women’s social mobility?

Answer 4

More economic freedom for women - especially after Black Death

However, men reversed women’s mobility by 1450s as more men jobs in cities.

Question 5

What was the impact of women’s reduced work in 1450s by men and what does this suggest?

Answer 5

Possibly to enforce women back into role as caregiver as birth rate + population rate fell when more women were working in cities as > focused on job than family

Patriarchy influences