Nantes prostitutes in the eighteenth century were on average twenty-five years old and single. Usually coming from a poor background, they received very little training in their youth and described themselves as seamstresses, thread and needle makers or laundresses. They…
Category: Women’s History
Historical Lessons from the Worsley Case
The last two posts at the blog have told the story of the Worsley scandal. This post explores some of the press reactions to the case and thinks about what sort of emotions it produced it eighteenth century audiences and…
Seymour Dorothy Fleming (1757-1818), part 2
Richard’s vengeance had badly backfired. He and his sexual proclivities were now the talk of London society. For the press, Richard’s hobby of collecting ancient art and showing it off to the public, gave rise to the question of whether…
Seymour Dorothy Fleming (1757-1818), part 1
Born in October 1757, Seymour Dorothy Fleming was the fourth of five children of Irish career soldier, Sir John Fleming and his wife, Jane Colman, granddaughter of the Duke of Somerset. Seymour was the surname of the Somerset dynasty and…
Are Women People?
Women (With rather insincere apologies to Mr. Rudyard Kipling.) I went to ask my government if they would set me free, They gave a pardoned crook a vote, but hadn’t one for me; The men about me laughed and frowned…
Women’s History: Approaches from the History of Emotion
At particular moments in history, women have thought to be more emotional than men. The Victorians thought women were more emotionally unstable and inclined to hysteria. As late as 1912, one prominent doctor in the UK was arguing that women…
Lily, Duchess of Marlborough (1854—1909): A Portrait with Husbands
“If I had a daughter or a sister, I should teach her adaptability, and that learned I should have no further anxiety for her future,” observed Lily, Duchess of Marlborough, in 1890. “Let her please, not men alone, but people,…
Happy New Year!
Bringing in the New Year in Germany There is plenty of dancing going on in Germany. Glee-wine, a sort of negus and puneh, is brought in after supper and just before twelve o’clock. Every one is on the watch to…
An Australian Christmas.
A glorious sun rose on Christmas-day, and the moments were melting ones. The weather had been very wet through June, July and August; September, October, and November had been almost perfect. The bright beautiful green clothing the valleys and hills,…