Gender and Political Culture in Early Modern Europe, 1400?1800
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GENDER AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN EARLY MODERN EUROPE, 1400–1800 Gender and Political Culture in Early Modern Europe, 1400 –1800 investigates the gendered nature of political culture across early modern Europe by exploring the relationship between gender, power, and political authority and influence. This col- lection offers a rethinking of what constituted ‘politics’ and a reconsideration of how men and women operated as part of political culture. It demonstrates how underlying structures could enable or constrain political action, and how political power and influence could be exercised through social and cultural practices. The book is divided into four parts – diplomacy, gifts and the politics of exchange; socio-economic structures; women and gendered politics at court; and voting and political representations – each of which looks at a series of interre- lated themes exploring the ways in which political culture is inflected by questions of gender. In addition to examples drawn from across Europe, including Austria, the Dutch Republic, the Italian States and Scandinavia, the volume also takes a transnational comparative approach, crossing national borders, while the conclud- ing chapter, by Merry Wiesner-Hanks, offers a global perspective on the field and encourages comparative analysis both chronologically and geographically. As the first collection to draw together early modern gender and political culture, this book is the perfect starting point for students exploring this fascinating topic. James Daybell is Professor of Early Modern British History at Plymouth Univer- sity. His previous publications include The Material Letter in Early Modern England: Manuscript Letters and the Culture and Practices of Letter-Writing, 1512–1635 (2012) and (as editor) Women and Politics in Early Modern England, 1450 –1700 (2004). Svante Norrhem is Associate Professor of History at Lund University. His previous publications include Flattering alliances: Scandinavia, diplomacy and the Austrian–French balance of power, 1648–1740 (with Peter Lindström). This page intentionally left blank GENDER AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN EARLY MODERN EUROPE, 1400–1800 Edited by James Daybell and Svante Norrhem First published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2017 James Daybell and Svante Norrhem for selection and editorial matter, individual contributions © the contributors The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Daybell, James, 1972- editor of compilation. | Norrhem, Svante, 1962– editor of compilation. Title: Gender and political culture in early modern Europe, 1400–1800 / edited by James Daybell and Svante Norrhem. Description: London ; New York : Routledge, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016003990 | ISBN 9781138667419 (hardback : alkaline paper) | ISBN 9781138667426 (paperback : alkaline paper) | ISBN 9781315542188 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Sex role—Political aspects—Europe—History—To 1500. | Sex role—Political aspects—Europe—History—16th century. | Sex role—Political aspects—Europe—History—17th century. | Political culture—Europe—History. | Power (Social sciences)—Europe— History. | Authority—Social aspects—Europe—History. | Men—Political activity—Europe—History. | Women—Political activity—Europe— History. | Europe—Politics and government. | Europe—Social conditions. Classification: LCC HQ1075.5.E85 G445 2016 | DDC 305.309409/024—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016003990 ISBN: 978-1-138-66741-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-138-66742-6 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-54218-8 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Apex CoVantage, LLC For Anne Laurence This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Contributors x Acknowledgements xv Conventions xvi List of Figures and Tables xvii Introductions 1 1 Introduction: rethinking gender and political culture in early modern Europe 3 James Daybell and Svante Norrhem 2 Gender, politics and archives in early modern England 25 James Daybell PART I Diplomacy, gifts and the politics of exchange 47 3 The gendered power of porcelain among early modern European dynasties 49 Susan Broomhall and Jacqueline Van Gent 4 Diplomats and kin networks: diplomatic strategy and gender in Sweden, 1648–1740 68 Peter Lindström and Svante Norrhem viii Contents PART II Socio-economic structures, gender and politics 87 5 The opportunity to profit from favourable circumstances: a widow’s benefits of holding crown fiefs in Norway in the 1520s 89 Randi Bjørshol Wærdahl 6 Regional and family networks: the hidden role of sisters and sisters-in-law 107 Barbara Harris 7 Widows’ political strategies in traditional communities: negotiating marital status and authority in eighteenth- century France 123 Elise Dermineur PART III Women and gendered politics at court 141 8 ‘For ye, young men, show a womanish soul, yon maiden a man’s’: perspectives on female monarchy in Elizabeth’s first decade 143 Victoria Smith 9 Strategies for survival: women at the court of the Medici (1565–1578) 158 Sarah Bercusson PART IV Voting and political representation 177 10 Gender, place and power: controverted elections in late Georgian England 179 Elaine Chalus 11 Gender, politics and voting in early modern Scandinavia 197 Peter Lindström, Hilde Sandvik, and Åsa Karlsson Sjögren Contents ix CONCLUSION Global perspectives 215 12 Gender and cultural power in global perspective 217 Merry Wiesner-Hanks Index 237 CONTRIBUTORS Sarah Bercusson is an independent scholar living in San Francisco California. She was a lecturer in history at York St John University from 2010 to 2014 before leaving to join her husband in the USA. Dr. Bercusson completed her PhD in Ital- ian Renaissance History and Material Culture at Queen Mary College, University of London in 2009. Her doctoral dissertation focused on the activities of three Habsburg Archduchesses, Eleonora, Giovanna and Barbara, who married into the Gonzaga, Medici and Este families, respectively, in the second half of the sixteenth century. Her comparative essay, ‘The Duchess’ Court in Sixteenth-Century Italy’, appeared in Moving Elites, edited by Giulia Calvi and Isabelle Chabot (2010). She has written on fashion and dress in Florence: ‘Giovanna d’Austria and the Art of Appear- ances: Textiles and Dress at the Florentine Court’ (Renaissance Studies, 2014) and she is the author of a chapter: ‘Joanna of Austria and the Negotiation of Power and Identity at the Florentine Court’ in Medici Women: The Making of a Dynasty in Grand Ducal Tuscany (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2015), edited by Giovanna Benadusi and Judith C. Brown. Her current research focusses on the networks and strategies of groups of elite women, in particular female members of ruling dynasties, in the Italian courts of the mid sixteenth century. Susan Broomhall is Professor of Early Modern History at The University of Western Australia and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. She is author of a series of studies of women and gender in early modern France and the Low Countries, including most recently (with Jennifer Spinks) Early Modern Women in the Low Countries: Feminising Sources and Interpretations of the Past (Ashgate, 2011) and, as editor, Gender and Emotions in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: Destroying Order, Structuring Disorder (Ashgate, 2015) and Authority, Gender and Emotions in Late Medieval and Early Modern England (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), and (with Jacqueline Van Gent) Dynastic Colonialism: Gender, Materiality and the Early Modern House of Contributors xi Orange-Nassau (Routledge, 2016) and Gender, Power and Identity in the Early Modern House of Orange-Nassau (Ashgate, 2016). Her monograph, Gender, Emotions and the Dutch East India Company, is forthcoming with Amsterdam University Press. She currently holds an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship, researching the strategic emotional rhetoric in the correspondence of Catherine de Medici. Elaine Chalus is Professor and Head of the Department of History at the Uni- versity of Liverpool, and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. She has a long- standing interest in gender and political culture in the long eighteenth century and has published widely on the subject. Her monograph, Elite Women in English Political Life c.1754–1790 (2005) examines women’s political involvement through family, custom, patronage and practice. She is currently working on a biography exploring the intersection of family, navy and nation in the developing Victorian service elite through the life of diarist Elizabeth Wynne Fremantle (1778–1857).