Stolen women in medival England : rape, abduction and adultery, 1100-1500

By:

Dunn, Caroline

Material type: Text

TextPublication details: Cambridge; Cambridge University Press; 2013Description: 261pISBN:

9781107017009

Subject(s):

Abduction-England-History

DDC classification:

306.8830942 DUN

Summary: This study of illicit sexuality in medieval England explores links between marriage and sex, law and disorder, and property and power. Some medieval Englishwomen endured rape or were kidnapped for forced marriages, yet most ravished women were married and many 'wife-thefts' were not forced kidnappings but cases of adultery fictitiously framed as abduction by abandoned husbands. In pursuing the themes of illicit sexuality and non-normative marital practices, this work analyses the nuances of the key Latin term raptus and the three overlapping offences that it could denote: rape, abduction and adultery. This investigation broadens our understanding of the role of women in the legal system; provides a means for analysing male control over female bodies, sexuality and access to the courts; and reveals ways in which female agency could, on occasion, manoeuvre around such controls.

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Item type	Current library	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode	Item holds
Books	Gandhi Smriti Library	306.8830942 DUN (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		153759

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Previous	306.8743 ENR Making babies: strumbling into motherhood	306.87430954 JAN Janani: mothers,daughters,motherhood/	306.88 SHA Shadow lives :	306.8830942 DUN Stolen women in medival England : rape, abduction and adultery, 1100-1500	306.89 DIV Divorce and remarriage among Muslims in India /	306.8930954 KIR Separated and divorced women in India :	306.954 PRI Writings of pamela price: State, politics and cultures in modern South India; honour, authority and morality	Next

This study of illicit sexuality in medieval England explores links between marriage and sex, law and disorder, and property and power. Some medieval Englishwomen endured rape or were kidnapped for forced marriages, yet most ravished women were married and many 'wife-thefts' were not forced kidnappings but cases of adultery fictitiously framed as abduction by abandoned husbands. In pursuing the themes of illicit sexuality and non-normative marital practices, this work analyses the nuances of the key Latin term raptus and the three overlapping offences that it could denote: rape, abduction and adultery. This investigation broadens our understanding of the role of women in the legal system; provides a means for analysing male control over female bodies, sexuality and access to the courts; and reveals ways in which female agency could, on occasion, manoeuvre around such controls.

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