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Women's Role In The Middle Ages Essay

1532 Words7 Pages

Introduction Women in the Middle ages were treated as the second class members within their social class. They were taught to be obedient to their husbands and were expected to run the household and raise children. Their role in the society, however, was much more complex, while some medieval women achieved a high level of equality with men. In the Middle Ages women had a secondary role, coming second after men. Women’s life was divided between family, marriage and religion. The women’s main concern and responsibility was the procreation. In those times, family was very big so the typical role of the woman was that to be a good wife and a good mother. Some of them tried emancipation but they were blamed by society for this. These were the witches, …show more content…

The Catholic Church was not only a system which contended with secular potentates for governing power, it also maintained an ideal of morality. From the earliest times there appears to have existed among the Teutonic and Celtic peoples so much respect for women as to form a foundation on which the Christian doctrine of marriage, virginity and equality of sexes could be built. Monogamy was the common practice, but polygamy was not unknown, especially among the Danes and Northmen. As soon as those nations were converted to Christianity, the Church assumed the regulation of morals. Monogamy was insisted upon, divorce and re-marriage became more difficult. Concubinage, though it could not be abolished, ceased to be lawful. A general rule is that respect for women is only found in a society in which monogamy is the rule. We must distinguish between the affected idolatry which was enjoyed by the customs of chivalry and the equality which was upheld by the Church. The doctrine of the spiritual equality of women, the sanctity of the marriage, and the rules of consanguinity, divorce and remarriage, though sometimes perverted to ambitious purposes, nevertheless were powerful engines influencing the Roles of Women in the Middle Ages, and raising their condition in the

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