Women on the Edge in Early Modern Europe (Gendering the Late Medieval and Early Modern World, 7)

Women on the Edge in Early Modern Europe examines the lives of women whose gender impeded the exercise of their personal, political, and religious agency, with an emphasis on the conflict that occurred when they crossed the edges society placed on their gender. Many of the women featured in this collection have only been afforded cursory scholarly focus, or the focus has been isolated to a specific, (in)famous event. This collection redresses this imbalance by providing comprehensive discussions of the womens lives, placing the matter that makes them known to history within the context of their entire life. Focusing on women from different backgrounds -- such as Marie Meurdrac, the French chemist; Anna Trapnel, the Fifth Monarchist and prophetess; and Cecilia of Sweden, princess, margravine, countess, and regent -- this collection brings together a wide range of scholars from a variety of disciplines to bring attention to these previously overlooked women. Contents List of Figures Acknowledgements 1. Introduction: Early Modern European Women and the Edge Section I. Life on the Edge 2. ‘At the mercy of a strange woman’ 3. Chemistry, Medicine, and Beauty on the Edge: Marie Meurdrac 4. Anna Stanislawska’s Orphan Girl of 1685 Section II. Witchcraft and the Edge 5. Touching on the Margins 6. Anna Trapnel: Prophet or Witch? Section III. Courtly Women on the Edge 7. Wife, Widow, Exiled Queen 8. On the Edge of the S(h)elf: Arbella Stuart 9. Cecilia of Sweden: Princess, Margravine, Countess, Regent 10. ‘Elizabeth the Forgotten’ Epilogue. The Early Modern Edge in the Twenty-first Century 11. Catalina de Erauso—‘the Lieutenant Nun’—at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century Index This book examines the lives of women whose gender impeded the exercise of their personal, political, and religious agency, especially when they were expected to occupy the spheres society believed their gender should.