Infertility in Early Modern England by Daphna Oren-Magidor (review)

Despite an expansive historiography related to early modern pregnancy and childbirth, scholars have been less interested in the history of infertility. Accounts of illicit sex, unwanted pregnancies, and infanticide abound, but our knowledge of how couples responded to an inability to conceive a child is much less complete. Daphna Oren-Magidor argues that, "scholars have downplayed the significance of infertility in early modern English society" (3) even though, "the centrality of childbearing to the early modern social order meant that the idea of failed reproduction was destabilizing" (2). Her excellent and welcome study corrects this scholarly omission and reveals the multiple levels on which infertility registered: "infertility was not solely a personal misfortune, but…a source of social and cultural anxiety" (2). Noting that many early modern couples experienced fertility problems at some point but ultimately had children, or had children with another spouse, Oren-Magidor encourages a re-historicization of our modern, medicalized conception of infertility. Instead, the book defines 'infertility' broadly as "any condition that hindered a couple from having viable children who could survive outside the womb" (5–6).

Among the conclusions that Oren-Magidor draws is that early modern men, as well as women, were concerned about and struggled with infertility. Patriarchal society was invested in men's demonstrations of virility and potency as much as it was women's sexual honor and maternity. On an individual level, however, there were gendered differences in the experience of infertility. While the suffering a childless woman might experience was tied to the centrality of motherhood for early modern women's social identity, men generally expressed distress over inheritance and the survival of the family name. Oren-Magidor also argues that whether experienced as a personal hardship or as cultural metaphor, early modern infertility was understood and mediated through religion. Fertility problems were often seen as a sign of personal failing or divine disfavor. These religious undertones allowed infertility to serve as a trenchant cultural metaphor signaling right and wrong behavior in an early modern society obsessed with order and hierarchy. Oren-Magidor's investigation of popular sources such as ballads, plays, and literature, for instance, reveals that figures who transgressed the social or gender order might be punished with fertility problems.

Chronologically, the study extends from 1540 to about 1714, when the end of Queen Anne's reign concluded a series of highly public royal fertility problems. This period encompasses the religious upheavals of the Reformation as well as the increasing intervention of male medical practitioners in the realm of reproduction. As scholars have noted, the Reformation had a significant impact on reproductive practices. Protestantism disavowed a monastic path for women, heightening the centrality of motherhood to women's social identity. At the same time, the possibilities for divine intervention in reproductive matters was narrowed, as a range of religious rituals related to pregnancy and fertility, especially those that relied on saintly assistance, were rendered invalid and charged as papist.

After an introductory first chapter, the book's four body chapters move thematically outward from the personal to the societal. Chapter two uses diaries and other personal accounts to consider the individual experiences of men and women who struggled with fertility issues. While these accounts expressed deep emotional suffering over infertility, Oren-Magidor notes that fertility problems were rarely a secret. Kin and neighbors watched for a newly married couple to become pregnant and used gossip and other means to police couples who failed to produce children. Chapter three surveys a number of midwifery manuals and related medical texts to understand how contemporaries perceived infertility in a physiological sense. A humoral understanding of the body defined infertility as the product of imbalance, particularly of excess and immoderation in diet, exercise, or sexual behavior. In this way, medical and moral failings were considered deeply connected. Chapter four extends beyond individual experiences to explore how infertility served as a larger cultural metaphor for sexual...