Womens rights during the Elizabethan period
The social position of women in Elizabethan times was a surprisingly low one, given that Elizabeth, was well a woman, the traditional view taken of that, and during the period was one that had echo’d down the draughty corridors of history.
Women in Elizabethan English society was of one of that of a submissive baby machine owned by their husbands.
In a time before state control of education the Church provided and controlled the education system, you were taught to read and write and at the same time you gained an intimate knowledge of the bible. The church of the time instructed girls that they are inferior to boys and used the bible to prove the point.
Remember that to go against the church meant an uncertain future - often a very short one. People believe what they are told, it becomes ingrained. So when the girls reached adulthood they readily accepted that they are inferior to men, men on the other hand were taught they were superior, both sides accepted this ‘fact’.
Girls were taught to obey men, men of any standing be they related or not, men expected instant obedience.
With the majority of girls having no education as we would today recognise it, unless they were from a wealthy family, most would possess nothing other than domestic skills learnt from their mothers, women who themselves would have been taught the same thing and would have been in a position to heavily influence theirs daughters ideas and so it continued.
The ability to cook, clean and raise children correctly would be the limit of their formal education, girls from a better off background would have been taught decorative needlework etc. It was consider that to teach a girl to read and write was a waste of effort and wasn’t required anyway.
With an arranged marriage (Elizabethan marriages) on the cards life could be potentially bleak unless they were lucky and received a good husband who would be able to support them throughout their lives.
Once married the wife was expected to produce a male heir to continue the line onwards through time, women became pregnant on average once every twelve months at a time when having a child could really have been consider an occupational hazard for a married women.
Childbirth was a dangerous past time for women with no anaesthetic or clean equipment like we have today, the mum to be often made a will before she went into labour just in case she didn’t make it asmany didnt. Simple complications like the loss of blood with no means to resupply her body unlike today meant that death was only a stones throw away. Often the baby would be delivered by a female with experience of these things frequently an elderly woman known to the family if not a relative.
Beating your wife in Elizabethan times was seen as a perfectly natural act and a punishment that she must have brought on herself however should she kill her husband a charge of murder wouldn’t be brought but a charge of ‘petty treason’ carrying the death penalty should she be found guilty
In all life was pretty grim for women.
So have some Chocolate and get over it ! (Click here)
