Infertility in Early Modern England

Infertility in Early Modern England

Author: Daphna Oren-Magidor

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-08-09

Total Pages: 208

ISBN-13: 1137476680

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This book explores the experiences of people who struggled with fertility problems in sixteenth and seventeenth-century England. Motherhood was central to early modern women’s identity and was even seen as their path to salvation. To a lesser extent, fatherhood played an important role in constructing proper masculinity. When childbearing failed this was seen not only as a medical problem but as a personal emotional crisis. Infertility in Early Modern England highlights the experiences of early modern infertile couples: their desire for children, the social stigmas they faced, and the ways that social structures and religious beliefs gave meaning to infertility. It also describes the methods of treating fertility problems, from home-remedies to water cures. Offering a multi-faceted view, the book demonstrates the centrality of religion to every aspect of early modern infertility, from understanding to treatment. It also highlights the ways in which infertility unsettled the social order by placing into question the gendered categories of femininity and masculinity.


Book Synopsis Infertility in Early Modern England by : Daphna Oren-Magidor

Download or read book Infertility in Early Modern England written by Daphna Oren-Magidor and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-08-09 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the experiences of people who struggled with fertility problems in sixteenth and seventeenth-century England. Motherhood was central to early modern women’s identity and was even seen as their path to salvation. To a lesser extent, fatherhood played an important role in constructing proper masculinity. When childbearing failed this was seen not only as a medical problem but as a personal emotional crisis. Infertility in Early Modern England highlights the experiences of early modern infertile couples: their desire for children, the social stigmas they faced, and the ways that social structures and religious beliefs gave meaning to infertility. It also describes the methods of treating fertility problems, from home-remedies to water cures. Offering a multi-faceted view, the book demonstrates the centrality of religion to every aspect of early modern infertility, from understanding to treatment. It also highlights the ways in which infertility unsettled the social order by placing into question the gendered categories of femininity and masculinity.


Aphrodisiacs, Fertility and Medicine in Early Modern England

Aphrodisiacs, Fertility and Medicine in Early Modern England

Author: Jennifer Evans

Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 0861933249

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An investigation into aphrodisiacs challenges pre-conceived ideas about sexuality during this period.


Book Synopsis Aphrodisiacs, Fertility and Medicine in Early Modern England by : Jennifer Evans

Download or read book Aphrodisiacs, Fertility and Medicine in Early Modern England written by Jennifer Evans and published by Boydell & Brewer Ltd. This book was released on 2014 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An investigation into aphrodisiacs challenges pre-conceived ideas about sexuality during this period.


Infertility in Medieval and Early Modern Europe

Infertility in Medieval and Early Modern Europe

Author: Regina Toepfer

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2022-11-22

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 3031089774

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This book examines discourses around infertility and views of childlessness in medieval and early modern Europe. ​Whereas in our own time reproductive behaviour is regulated by demographic policy in the interest of upholding the intergenerational contract, premodern rulers strove to secure the succession to their thrones and preserve family heritage. Regardless of status, infertility could have drastic consequences, above all for women, and lead to social discrimination, expulsion, and divorce. Rather than outlining a history of discrimination against or the suffering of infertile couples, this book explores the mechanisms used to justify the unequal treatment of persons without children. Exploring views on childlessness across theology, medicine, law, demonology, and ethics, it undertakes a comprehensive examination of ‘fertility’ as an identity category from the perspective of new approaches in gender and intersectionality research. Shedding light on how premodern views have shaped understandings our own time, this book is highly relevant interest to students and scholars interested in discourses around infertility across history.


Book Synopsis Infertility in Medieval and Early Modern Europe by : Regina Toepfer

Download or read book Infertility in Medieval and Early Modern Europe written by Regina Toepfer and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-11-22 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines discourses around infertility and views of childlessness in medieval and early modern Europe. ​Whereas in our own time reproductive behaviour is regulated by demographic policy in the interest of upholding the intergenerational contract, premodern rulers strove to secure the succession to their thrones and preserve family heritage. Regardless of status, infertility could have drastic consequences, above all for women, and lead to social discrimination, expulsion, and divorce. Rather than outlining a history of discrimination against or the suffering of infertile couples, this book explores the mechanisms used to justify the unequal treatment of persons without children. Exploring views on childlessness across theology, medicine, law, demonology, and ethics, it undertakes a comprehensive examination of ‘fertility’ as an identity category from the perspective of new approaches in gender and intersectionality research. Shedding light on how premodern views have shaped understandings our own time, this book is highly relevant interest to students and scholars interested in discourses around infertility across history.


Vernacular Bodies

Vernacular Bodies

Author: Mary E. Fissell

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2004-11-25

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0191533564

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Making babies was a mysterious process in early modern England. Mary Fissell employs a wealth of popular sources - ballads, jokes, witchcraft pamphlets, Prayer Books, popular medical manuals - to produce the first account of women's reproductive bodies in early-modern cheap print. Since little was certain about the mysteries of reproduction, the topic lent itself to a rich array of theories. The insides of women's reproductive bodies provided a kind of open interpretive space, a place where many different models of reproductive processes might be plausible. These models were profoundly shaped by cultural concerns; they afforded many ways to discuss and make sense of social, political, and economic changes such as the Protestant Reformation and the Civil War. They gave ordinary people ways of thinking about the changing relations between men and women that characterized these larger social shifts. Fissell offers a new way to think about the history of the body by focusing on women's bodies, showing how ideas about conception, pregnancy, and childbirth were also ways of talking about gender relations and thus all relations of power. Where other histories of the body have focused on learned texts and male bodies, this study looks at the small books and pamphlets that ordinary people read and listened to - and provides new ways to understand how such people experienced political conflicts and social change.


Book Synopsis Vernacular Bodies by : Mary E. Fissell

Download or read book Vernacular Bodies written by Mary E. Fissell and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2004-11-25 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Making babies was a mysterious process in early modern England. Mary Fissell employs a wealth of popular sources - ballads, jokes, witchcraft pamphlets, Prayer Books, popular medical manuals - to produce the first account of women's reproductive bodies in early-modern cheap print. Since little was certain about the mysteries of reproduction, the topic lent itself to a rich array of theories. The insides of women's reproductive bodies provided a kind of open interpretive space, a place where many different models of reproductive processes might be plausible. These models were profoundly shaped by cultural concerns; they afforded many ways to discuss and make sense of social, political, and economic changes such as the Protestant Reformation and the Civil War. They gave ordinary people ways of thinking about the changing relations between men and women that characterized these larger social shifts. Fissell offers a new way to think about the history of the body by focusing on women's bodies, showing how ideas about conception, pregnancy, and childbirth were also ways of talking about gender relations and thus all relations of power. Where other histories of the body have focused on learned texts and male bodies, this study looks at the small books and pamphlets that ordinary people read and listened to - and provides new ways to understand how such people experienced political conflicts and social change.


Attitudes Towards Infertility in Early Modern England and Colonial New England, C.1620-1720

Attitudes Towards Infertility in Early Modern England and Colonial New England, C.1620-1720

Author: Marisa Noelle Benoit

Publisher:

Published: 2014

Total Pages: 580

ISBN-13:

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Book Synopsis Attitudes Towards Infertility in Early Modern England and Colonial New England, C.1620-1720 by : Marisa Noelle Benoit

Download or read book Attitudes Towards Infertility in Early Modern England and Colonial New England, C.1620-1720 written by Marisa Noelle Benoit and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 580 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:


'Make Me a Fruitfull Vine'

'Make Me a Fruitfull Vine'

Author: Daphna Oren-Magidor

Publisher:

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13:

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Reproduction was of crucial social and cultural importance in early modern England. It mattered because of the need to produce heirs for families that had property and to create more working hands in families where labor was necessary for survival. In less practical terms, childbirth was also understood as one of the main justifications for marriage and as an essential component of the fulfillment of gender roles for both married women and married men. Because reproduction was so important in this society, infertility - the failure to reproduce - created a crisis. It was a personal and emotional crisis for the couple involved. It was also a medical crisis, one which was discussed at length in popular gynecological manuals and for which women sought treatment primarily among their experienced peers, but also from physicians and other medical practitioners. It was a crisis of gender ideals, inviting mockery and satire of the femininity of barren women and the masculinity of childless men. Finally, it was a religious crisis, because infertility could be seen as a punishment of sins or as a test of faith. This dissertation focuses on the experience of infertility and reproductive disorders in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and examines this topic not only from a medical perspective but also from its cultural, gendered and emotional dimensions. It explores fertility problems defined broadly to include difficulties in conception, miscarriages and stillbirths. The study offers a comprehensive view of how infertile couples understood their condition, gave meaning to it, and ultimately sought to treat it. The dissertation also uses infertility as a lens through which to explore broader issues in early modern English culture. It examines how medical views of the bodies influenced ideas of morality, explores how women and physicians negotiated matters of expertise relating to the reproductive body, looks at women's communities and mutual support networks and discusses the impact of the Reformation on therapeutic practices.


Book Synopsis 'Make Me a Fruitfull Vine' by : Daphna Oren-Magidor

Download or read book 'Make Me a Fruitfull Vine' written by Daphna Oren-Magidor and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reproduction was of crucial social and cultural importance in early modern England. It mattered because of the need to produce heirs for families that had property and to create more working hands in families where labor was necessary for survival. In less practical terms, childbirth was also understood as one of the main justifications for marriage and as an essential component of the fulfillment of gender roles for both married women and married men. Because reproduction was so important in this society, infertility - the failure to reproduce - created a crisis. It was a personal and emotional crisis for the couple involved. It was also a medical crisis, one which was discussed at length in popular gynecological manuals and for which women sought treatment primarily among their experienced peers, but also from physicians and other medical practitioners. It was a crisis of gender ideals, inviting mockery and satire of the femininity of barren women and the masculinity of childless men. Finally, it was a religious crisis, because infertility could be seen as a punishment of sins or as a test of faith. This dissertation focuses on the experience of infertility and reproductive disorders in England in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and examines this topic not only from a medical perspective but also from its cultural, gendered and emotional dimensions. It explores fertility problems defined broadly to include difficulties in conception, miscarriages and stillbirths. The study offers a comprehensive view of how infertile couples understood their condition, gave meaning to it, and ultimately sought to treat it. The dissertation also uses infertility as a lens through which to explore broader issues in early modern English culture. It examines how medical views of the bodies influenced ideas of morality, explores how women and physicians negotiated matters of expertise relating to the reproductive body, looks at women's communities and mutual support networks and discusses the impact of the Reformation on therapeutic practices.


Vernacular Bodies

Vernacular Bodies

Author: Mary Elizabeth Fissell

Publisher:

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0199269882

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Making babies was a mysterious process in seventeenth-century England. Fissell uses popular sources - songs, jokes, witchcraft pamphlets, prayerbooks, popular medical manuals - to recover how ordinary men and women understood the processes of reproduction. Because the human body was so often used as a metaphor for social relations, the grand events of high politics such as the English Civil War reshaped popular ideas about conception and pregnancy. This book is the first account of ordinary people's ideas about reproduction, and offers a new way to understand how common folk experienced the sweeping political changes that characterized early modern England.


Book Synopsis Vernacular Bodies by : Mary Elizabeth Fissell

Download or read book Vernacular Bodies written by Mary Elizabeth Fissell and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Making babies was a mysterious process in seventeenth-century England. Fissell uses popular sources - songs, jokes, witchcraft pamphlets, prayerbooks, popular medical manuals - to recover how ordinary men and women understood the processes of reproduction. Because the human body was so often used as a metaphor for social relations, the grand events of high politics such as the English Civil War reshaped popular ideas about conception and pregnancy. This book is the first account of ordinary people's ideas about reproduction, and offers a new way to understand how common folk experienced the sweeping political changes that characterized early modern England.


The Hidden Affliction

The Hidden Affliction

Author: Simon Szreter

Publisher: Rochester Studies in Medical H

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 452

ISBN-13: 1580469612

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Multidisciplinary collection of essays on the relationship of infertility and the "historic" STIS--gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis--producing surprising new insights in studies from across the globe and spanning millennia.


Book Synopsis The Hidden Affliction by : Simon Szreter

Download or read book The Hidden Affliction written by Simon Szreter and published by Rochester Studies in Medical H. This book was released on 2019 with total page 452 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Multidisciplinary collection of essays on the relationship of infertility and the "historic" STIS--gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis--producing surprising new insights in studies from across the globe and spanning millennia.


Reproductive Rituals

Reproductive Rituals

Author: Angus McLaren

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 1984-01-01

Total Pages: 206

ISBN-13: 9780416374506

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Geburtenkontrolle / Geschichte.


Book Synopsis Reproductive Rituals by : Angus McLaren

Download or read book Reproductive Rituals written by Angus McLaren and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 1984-01-01 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Geburtenkontrolle / Geschichte.


Reproductive Rituals

Reproductive Rituals

Author: Angus McLaren

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-07-02

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 9780367434519

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Originally published in 1984 Reproductive Ritual examines fertility and re-production in pre-industrial England. The book discusses both through anthropological research and reviews of contemporary literature that conscious family limitation was practised before the nineteenth century. The volume describes a surprising number of rules, regulations, taboos, injunctions, charms and herbal remedies used to affect pregnancy, and shows the extent to which individual women and men were concerned with controlling the size of their families. The fertility levels in England - as in Western Europe as a whole - were a very long way from the biological maximum in these centuries, and the book discusses the various reasons why this was so. The book reviews traditional ideas concerning the relationship between procreation and pleasure, drawn from a range of contemporary sources and discusses ways in which earlier generations sought both to promote and limit fertility. The book also examines abortion and shows how much evidence there is for its actual practice during the period and of traditional views towards it. This book provides a detailed understanding of historical attitudes towards conception family planning in pre-industrial England.


Book Synopsis Reproductive Rituals by : Angus McLaren

Download or read book Reproductive Rituals written by Angus McLaren and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-07-02 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1984 Reproductive Ritual examines fertility and re-production in pre-industrial England. The book discusses both through anthropological research and reviews of contemporary literature that conscious family limitation was practised before the nineteenth century. The volume describes a surprising number of rules, regulations, taboos, injunctions, charms and herbal remedies used to affect pregnancy, and shows the extent to which individual women and men were concerned with controlling the size of their families. The fertility levels in England - as in Western Europe as a whole - were a very long way from the biological maximum in these centuries, and the book discusses the various reasons why this was so. The book reviews traditional ideas concerning the relationship between procreation and pleasure, drawn from a range of contemporary sources and discusses ways in which earlier generations sought both to promote and limit fertility. The book also examines abortion and shows how much evidence there is for its actual practice during the period and of traditional views towards it. This book provides a detailed understanding of historical attitudes towards conception family planning in pre-industrial England.