[MR] medieval "world's oldest profession" (Fwd: Aoife-Links Digest, Vol 10, Issue 4)

Sun Jul 24 09:03:44 PDT 2005

In a message dated 7/23/2005 1:04:34 PM Eastern Standard Time,  
aoife-links-request at scatoday.net writes:

Today's Topics:

1. Loose Women: Attitudes about  the Oldest Medieval    Profession
(Aoife)

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Message:  1
Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 23:00:59 -0400
From: "Aoife"  <aoife at scatoday.net>
Subject: [Aoife-Links] Loose Women: Attitudes  about the Oldest
Medieval    Profession
To:  <aoife-links at scatoday.net>
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Greetings My Faithful Readers!

This links  list is about medieval attitudes regarding Prostitution and 
Women's  Sexuality. I learned a lot while researching this list. For 
instance, for  many of our medieval counterparts, Prostitutes were considered 
a necessary  part of society. Doctors and Church Fathers were polar opposites 
regarding  whether or not abstinence was healthy. And, since most young men 
didn't  marry until age 24 or later, you can readily see how the attitude 
that  prostitutes saved the "gentle women" (that'd be the noble Mom, 
Daughter,  and Sister) from certain ravishment came about.

If you read this  particular list for titillation, you might be surprised at 
what your find.  Only one site is light-hearted, and even that one manages to 
spread some  information with it's cheesy illustrations of fancy women. Oh 
yes--there  are no illustrations of naked people in this links list.  Sorry 
to  disappoint you, but there you have it. We're safe in knowing that this  
list is Completely Visually Clean.There is, however, the odd reference to  
body parts and bodily function.

So, dive in, learn something, and  understand our chosen culture a little  
better.

Cheers

Aoife

m/k/a Lisbeth  Herr-Gelatt
Riverouge
Endless Hills
Aethelmearc

Tanja Garrett:  Thesis
http://mcel.pacificu.edu/history/dept/students/theses2000/garrett/garrett.html
(Site  Excerpt) Augustine did not condone "unnatural sex," but he understood  
human nature in that there would always be a demand for sex, "Banish  
prostitutes.and you reduce society to chaos through unsatisfied  lust."

Brown University: Prostitution in the Middle Ages: Prostitution  and Canon  
Law
http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Italian_Studies/dweb/society/sex/prostitution
.shtml
(Site  Excerpt) It was accepted as fact that young men would seek out sexual  
relations regardless of their options, and thus prostitution served to  
protect "respectable" townswomen from seduction and even rape. In 1358,  the 
Grand Council of Venice declared that prostitution was "absolutely  
indispensable to the world".

Medieval Sourcebook:
Corpus Iuris  Civilis: The Digest and Codex:
Marriage  Laws
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/cjc-marriage.html
(Site  Excerpt) Where a freedwoman is living in concubinage with her patron, 
she  can leave him without his consent, and unite with another man, either in 

matrimony or in concubinage. I think, however, that a concubine should not  
have the right to marry if she leaves her patron without his consent,  since 
it is more honorable for a freedwoman to be the concubine of a  patron than 
to become the mother of a family.

ORB: Rape and  Prostitution
http://www.the-orb.net/textbooks/anthology/beidler/rape.html
(Site  Excerpt)  They also institutionalized prostitution as a form of rape  
control. In an age when economic and social conditions were such that few  
men married before the age of 24 (women tended to marry at a younger age),  
those who managed the cities openly recognized the need to protect their  
wives and daughters by providing for regulated and organized prostitution.  
Indeed, the city leaders often set aside a specific part of town--usually  
away from the center but not too far away--for  prostitution.

Brothels, Baths and Babes
Prostitution in the  Byzantine Holy Land
Claudine  Dauphin
http://www.ucd.ie/classics/96/Dauphin96.html
(Site Excerpt)  Graeco-Roman domestic sexuality rested on a triad: the wife, 
the concubine  and the courtesan. The fourth century BC Athenian orator 
Apollodoros made  it very clear in his speech Against Neaira quoted by 
Demosthenes (59.122)  that 'we have courtesans for pleasure, and concubines 
for the daily  service of our bodies, but wives for the production of 
legitimate  offspring and to have reliable guardians of our household  
property'.

HOOKER HEROES
Prostitutes Who Changed the World
by  Blake Linton Wilfong
http://wondersmith.com/heroes/index.htm
(Site  Excerpt) Of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, only the pyramids 
of  Egypt remain standing today--and according to legend, one of them was  
built for the famous prostitute Rhodopis. Originally a Greek slave,  Rhodopis 
lived in the sixth century B.C. During her childhood, she worked  in the same 
household as the slave Aesop, the renowned author of fables.  She was 
eventually taken to Egypt to work as a prostitute. In what is  surely one of 
history's greatest true love stories, a Greek wine merchant  named Charaxus 
became so enamored of Rhodopis that he paid a huge sum of  money to buy her 
freedom.

Sex, Society, and Medieval  Women
***Warning: Frank talk about Bodily  Functions***
http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/medsex/medsexfrm.htm
(Site  Excerpt) Moral authorities grudgingly acknowledged sex to be not  
inherently sinful, but very strictly delineated the ways in which sex  could 
be used without spiritual consequences. Medical authorities, by  contrast, 
considered sex to be an essential part of bodily health, noting  that 
abstention could lead to a dangerous buildup of the "seminal  humor."

History 398Y, "Sex in History"
Essay 2: Analytical  Essay
http://alcor.concordia.ca/~shannon/398YBibliographies.htm
While  this is an assignment for a college course, sources are given for the  
subject material.

About: Romanesque Churches and Sexual  Symbols
http://goeurope.about.com/cs/sex/a/sexual_carvings.htm
(Site  Excerpt) I am not necessarily a fan of Cathedral gazing when I travel. 

This year, a book I read, called "Images of Lust: Sexual Carvings on  
Medieval Churches" by Anthony Weir and James Jerman, changed all that.  
"Sexual imagery in cathedrals? Is he mad?," I can hear you asking. Well,  
madness is besides the point--I have pictures.

Casting  Stones:
the Theology of Prostitution
by Rita Nakashima  Brock
http://www.mlode.com/~ra/ra3/castingstones.htm
(Site Excerpt)  While the money paid to prostitutes is paid for an unlawful 
purpose,  according to Aquinas, the giving itself is not unlawful and the 
woman  could retain what she received. In other words, prostitutes protect 
the  "good" women of the family from the demands of male sin.

Ruth Mazo  Karras
Professor of History
University of  Minnesota
http://cla.umn.edu/rmk/
The home page of a noted expert on  Medieval Sexuality and women's roles in 
history. Her works are  listed.