Women in the Middle Ages: The Hidden Half of History
Medieval women faced societal norms and childbirth risks, yet their enduring strength and resilience shone through in daily life.
Being a woman in the Middle Ages was not easy. The social norms dictated that she stayed inside her household most of the time. Legal criteria varied across Europe, but most of them stated that a woman is not sui juris – she needed a legal custodian in all transactions. The Church considered women weak and sinful; men wrote the philosophy of the time. The Middle Ages were rough, criminality was high, and those who wanted to stay safe had to rely on brute force, which is lacking in most women.
To make things even worse, medieval medicine knew nothing about the importance of hygiene, was impotent in healing diseases, and could not deal with complications during childbirth. The result was a high mortality rate of women concerning birth, miscarriages, and the postpartum period. And the high mortality among children did not help either.
The article was originally published in the magazine Culture Frontier, you can read it here on this link.