Women in Reformation and Counter-Reformation Europe: private and public worlds (review)

Reviews 137 the pictures genuinely illuminated the texts, and supplied with helpful bibliographies. It would be good to be able to report that the present volume stands in these traditions, but this is not the case. Henry Loyn offers an account of English history from the coming of the Anglo-Saxons to the reign of Edward I, providing a summary of events structured around the activities of important people. In general the approach is conservative. The account of the conversion to Christianity, for example, closely foUows Bede. But there are problems here. Loyn has Bede describing a Synod of Aust Yet even accepting the identification of the place, it was certainly not a formal synod (Bede merely describes it as a 'colloquium'). Bede does not say that Ethelbert issued a law code according to the Roman example but 'according to the examples of the Romans'. Ifindnothing in Bede's account of the synod of Whitby on the overpowering majesty of the pope. Later we find Charlemagne inviting Alcuin to join the community of scholars at the royal court at Aix-la-Chapelle in 782. There was no such community there at that time. And, a book which gives wrong regnal dates for both Clovis and Philip I is not likely to be sound on the continental background to English history. The volume is provided with some excellent black-and-white illustrations, although it is possible to think that opportunities have been wasted. W e are told in the text of the recording of Harold's embassy to the Norman court in the Bayeux Tapestry, but neither of the two plates taken from the tapestry shows this scene. The generosity of the publisher in allowing so many plates has not been taken advantage of effectively. Finatiy, the bibliography bears no closer relationtothe text than do the pictures. An 'accurate description' by Wendy Davis is quoted, and a 'recent authoritative analysis' of Professor Rees Davies is mentioned, but consultation of the bibliography reveals no works by these authors. In short, this is a disappointing book which it will be difficult to recommend to students with enthusiasm. John Moorhead Department of History University of Queensland Marshall, Sherrin, ed., Women in Reformation and Counter-Reformation Europe: private and public worlds, Bloomington and Indianapolis, Indiana University Press, 1989; cloth/paper; pp. viii; 215 plates; R.R.P. US$35.00 (cloth), $10.95 (paper). This collection of essays spans the geographical range of European countries from Eastern Europe to England. It discusses women in their major roles as nuns, wives and mothers, and in their less familiar roles as workers in the mines. A widespread conclusion in the different essays is that women's ability 138 Reviews to respond to the Reformation was influenced more by their gender than anything else. Status, however, is shown also to have had importance. The effects of the changes in religion were complex both in the CounterReformation Roman church and in the various protestant communities. Within a broad general context there are many variations. The medieval church had always offered some women the opportunity for learning, and in Germany prominent abbesses publically defended the established ways. The CounterReformation , by seeking to have all female religious strictly cloistered, affected their previous freedom and their influence. The dominance of the confessor in such houses, even over a woman such as St Teresa, could be detrimental. On the other hand, the Protestant emphasis on maniage, and acceptance of the Aristotelian idea that women were inherently subject from the Creation and not simply from the Fall, influenced their position in the newly evolving Protestant social structure. Marriage was a woman's vocation and those who chose to remain single were criticised. Those who converted to a Protestant belief when their husbands did not, however, were in a profoundly ambiguous position. Exactly how these general themes developed in practice depended on differences in the various localities. Issues such as schooling and divorce and the position of women in the 'priesthood of all believers', their ways of affirming their faith and theirrightsto preach or prophesy, were profoundly affected by different political circumstances. A number of the authors, such as Grethe Jacobsen, are interested in reconsidering...