The Sword and the Pen: Women, Politics, and Poetry in Sixteenth-Century Siena by Konrad Eisenbichler (review)

Konrad Eisenbichler presents a sustained investigation of key female protagonists in sixteenth-century Siena’s literary culture. Siena was a theatre for the ambitions of France, Spain, the Papal States, and Florence in this period, and the atmosphere is nicely captured in the works of poets such as Aurelia Petrucci and Virginia Martini Salvi. Early descriptions of the 1553 siege of the city recounted the exhortatory role of women in that event and Eisenbichler is particularly concerned with their engagement with politics and military theory.

A key strength of this work is its careful analysis of the oeuvre of three Sienese women. Aurelia Petrucci, Laudomia Forteguerri, and Virginia Martini Salvi have been considered by other scholars – Virginia Cox, Marie-Françoise Piéjus, and James Nelson Novoa, for example – but this is a sustained examination of their literary production. Fine translations are followed by the original citations and Eisenbichler contextualises his literary analysis with an impressive range of archival research. Contemporary male writers and academicians who corresponded with the women are also discussed, particularly those who made them the subject of their own literary production – for example, Alessandro Piccolomini and his fascinating tenzone, a poetic conversation with Sienese women poets on the subject of a visit to Petrarch’s tomb.

Eisenbichler presents a well-rounded account of the poetic sensibilities and cultural limitations of his writers. These are especially clear in the study of Aurelia Petrucci, but a few other examples also demonstrate this: Virginia Maria Casolani Salvi laments her inability to travel freely; a Friulian visitor to Siena describes the parlour games played by the city’s noblewomen; Laudomia Forteguerri weaves contemporary politics into her love sonnets to Margaret of Austria and laments the barriers to her pursuit of scientific endeavours such as astronomy; Virginia Martini Salvi is effectively exiled for sedition.

One of Eisenbichler’s aims – following Sarah Gwyneth Ross’s observations – is to move beyond the traditional trope of seeing such writers as ‘exceptional’ and ‘transgressive’. While these terms can certainly be applied to the women, to varying degrees, Eisenbichler points out that their engagement in Sienese society does not indicate their ‘marginalization’ and he demonstrates the full extent of their cultural integration in his generous appendix. This presents more works by these and other Sienese women, again with graceful translations. This volume is thus perfectly placed for both literary and social historians, and would also be a useful text for teaching.