Scholarship on early medieval England has seen an exponential increase in scholarly work by and about women over the past twenty years, but the field has remained peculiarly resistant to the transformative potential of feminist critique. Since 2016, Medieval Studies has been rocked by conversations about the state of the field, shifting from #MeToo to #WhiteFeminism to the purposeful rethinking of the label “Anglo-Saxonist.” This volume takes a step toward decentering the traditional scholarly conversation with thirteen new essays by American, Canadian, European, and UK professors, along with independent scholars and early career researchers from a range of disciplinary perspectives. Topics range from virginity, women’s literacy, and medical discourse to affect, medievalism, and masculinity. The theoretical and political commitments of this volume comprise one strand of a multivalent effort to rethink the parameters of the discipline and to create a scholarly community that is innovative, inclusive, and diverse.
- Cover
- Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Metacritical Considerations
- 1. The Lost Victorian Women of Old English Studies
- 2. Embroidered Narratives
- 3. Remembering the Lady of Mercia
- Affect Theory
- 4. Be a Man, Beowulf
- Sentimental Masculinity and the Gentleness of Kings
- E. J. Christie
- 5. Shame, Disgust and Ælfric’s Masculine Performance
- Treatments of Virginity
- 6. The Ornament of Virginity
- Aldhelm’s De uirginitate and the Virtuous Women of the Early English Church
- Emily V. Thornbury
- 7. Chaste Bodies and Untimely Virgins
- Sexuality, Temporality, and Bede’s Æthelthryth
- Lisa M. C. Weston
- Medical Discourse
- 8. Monaðgecynd and flewsan
- Wanted and Unwanted Monthly Courses in Old English Medical Texts
- Dana M. Oswald
- 9. Dangerous Voices, Erased Bodies
- Reassessing the Old English Wifgemædla and Witches in Leechbook III
- Erin E. Sweany
- 10. Women and “Women’s Medicine” in Early Medieval England, from Text to Practice
- Women’s Literacy
- 11. The Literate Memory of Hugeburc of Heidenheim
- 12. A Road Nearly Taken
- An Eighth-Century Manuscript in a Woman’s Hand and Franco-Saxon Nuns in Early Medieval English Intellectual History
- Matthew T. Hussey
- 13. “Historical Accuracy,” Anonymity, and Women’s Authorship
- The Case of the Case for Beowulf
- Stephen M. Yeager
- Index
- List of Illustrations
- Fig. 3.1 Cassell’s Illustrated History of England from the Roman Invasion to the Wars of the Roses
- Fig. 3.2 The Æthelflæd statue at Tamworth Castle, designed by H. C. Mitchell and sculpted by E. G. Bramwell. The statue was raised in 1913
- Fig. 3.3 The Æthelflæd statue sculpted by Luke Perry and raised in 2018
- Fig. 11.1 Hugeburc’s cipher. München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm. 1086, fol. 71v, lines 4–78
- Fig. 12.1 Detail from Würzburg, Universitätsbibliothek M.p.th.f.79, fol. 1v.
- Fig. 12.2 Detail from Oxford, Bodleian Library MS. Hatton 48, fol. 1r.
- Fig. 12.3 Detail from Boulogne-sur-Mer, Bibliothèque Municipale 74 (82), fol. 53r.
- Fig. 12.4 Detail from Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale lat. 17177, fol. 8r.
- Fig. 12.5 Detail from Boulogne-sur-Mer, Bibliothèque Municipale 74 (82), fol. 1r.
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