Sex, Lies and the Church Courts

Question 1

Where do the regulation of sexuality in late medieval England find its most formal expression?

Answer 1

People punished in ecclesiastical and secular courts sod fornication and adultery

Question 2

What did for fornication prosecutions come from?

Answer 2

Not necessarily from tangible proof e.g. bastard children
Often informal networks of gossip, rumour and lies about neighbours ex lives which then came to the attention of officials
Weighing circumstantial evidence from servants, neighbours and other witnesses

Question 3

What is a way to investigate the networks of rumour and gossip?

Answer 3

Analyse patterns of defamation cases heard in ecclesiastical courts concerning sexual and other allegations

Question 4

Who was more likely to be victims of sexual defamation cases?

Answer 4

Women (often by other women) - men more likely to be defamed regarding dishonesty or secular crimes

Question 5

Why did many defamation cases of a sexual nature come to court?

Answer 5

Victims in danger of being further accused of fornication

Question 6

How did church courts punish defamers?

Answer 6

Excommunication or penance (sometimes those convicted commuted penance with monetary payments)

Question 7

How would a defamation case get to trail?

Answer 7

Litigation or ex officio (complaints to local officials) - hard to determine which one more popular due to lack of sources

Question 8

How did many people fight there defamatory accusations?

Answer 8

Through compurgation (assembling a group of people to swear on an individuals good character)

Question 9

What could happen to a person if they were accused of defamatory comments led to them being presented to a ecclesiastical court?

Answer 9

They could suffer financial losses and could loose their good status and good fame

Question 10

What defamatory words were common?

Answer 10

Sex related e.g. hormonger or whore
Finance relegated e.g. serf
Nationality based e.g. “Skottishe prestes whore” (Middlesex Deanery)

Question 11

Name an example which proves there was a ‘prior semantic misogyny’ for people to draw on when insulting women.

Answer 11

The term ‘whore’ when applied to a man meant a ‘rascal’ but when applied to women carried the modern connotation of prostitution and sexual reprobation with sting moral judgement

Question 12

Were sexual insult used in non-sexual cases?

Answer 12

Yes - e.g. in Fulham in 1497 2 women accused a man of stealing a spoon and called him a cuckhold

Question 13

Who were the most likely to be defamed in jurisdictions of London , Durham and Wisbech?

Answer 13

Men by a margin of 2:1

Women more likely to be target of sexual defamation (whereas men for theft, murder or assault)

Question 14

What was the most popular type of defamation case?

Answer 14

Sexual defamation - same in Italy (as a woman’s moral standing was based on her sexual role in the transmission of wealth) and colonial America

Question 15

Were men or women accused more of being defamers in court cases?

Answer 15

Women - in reality it was equal between the genders e.g. in 15th century London/Durham/Wisbech there were 45 male sexual defamers and 44 female sexual defamers

Question 16

What were the two most common forms of sexual defamation?

Answer 16

1. Women defaming women

2. Women defaming men

Question 17

What question can be asked regarding the high number of women accused of defamation?

Answer 17

Were courts more likely to bring charges against women?

Were women over represented in the court record relative to the actual occurrence of defamatory behaviour?

Question 18

What is a key downside to the use of court records as sources?

Answer 18

Don’t provide any information in regards to the age, social background or marital status of the parties involved

Question 19

What do some ex officio depositions reveal value where sexual gossip or defamation’s occurred?

Answer 19

Public confrontations - those defamers who testify state their insults based on second hand information and circumstantial evidence as opposed to eyewitness accounts

Question 20

What was the canon law definition of defamation?

Answer 20

Imputing of a crime upon someone previously not of I’ll fame amount good and dignified persons - not the words themselves but their transmission is emphasised

Question 21

What was the common context of where defamation ps were made?

Answer 21

In social gatherings of friends and neighbours e.g. in Wisbech where John Freman called Margaret Dygby a “stronge hoor” in church

Question 22

How was gossip used in a social context?

Answer 22

1. To define a group by marginalising a renegade
2. Weapon against a rival
3. A way to shade information to protect individual interests

Question 23

Where did women hold the most power in late medieval / Early Modern England?

Answer 23

Not in official positions e.g. barred form positions in the ecclesiastical and hierarchy
In he private space of the household and neighbourliness

Question 24

What have anthropologists concluded about how women’s public reputations were defined?

Answer 24

In terms of the propriety of their sex lives e.g. to ensure orderly descent of property to legitimate heirs

Question 25

What has the association of gossip with female discourse done to it?

Answer 25

Marginalises it by framing it on contrast to public affairs and renders it suspect/dangerous by association with the private sphere of character and reputation

Question 26

Were women victims of sexual accusations and judgement?

Answer 26

Not necessarily - they were active players seizing on the already exiting misogynist discourse surrounding sexual insults and turned it on other women