This study sets John Milton’s Paradise Lost in dialogue with Lucy Hutchinson’s Order and Disorder, concentrating on each poem’s portrayal of the Christian redemption narrative as interpreted through typology. Specifically, I focus on the absence of a positive feminine type in Books 11 and 12 of Paradise Lost and relocate it in Order and Disorder in the characters, Sarah and Rebecca. In regard to typology, Milton adheres to a traditional typology steeped in patriarchy, which devalues women’s participation, whereas Hutchinson recognizes both paternal and maternal types. Furthermore, Hutchinson views Sarah and Rebecca as vital to the redemption narrative and shapes them as types for Mary, therefore making an original contribution to typology. This study concludes with a reading of Hutchinson’s use of typology through twentieth-century contemporary feminist theology and suggests that Hutchinson’s role as theologian challenges that of Milton’s.

The Scottish perspective of the Glorious Revolution of 1688 has received limited scholarly attention. The opposite is true of the Union of 1707 and this defining moment, which resulted in the loss of Scottish independence, continues to stimulate debate. The lives of Scottish noblewomen in the years from Revolution to Union have generally been disregarded. This thesis will demonstrate that acknowledging and exploring the experiences of noblewomen augments understanding of this momentous era. Investigating the lives of Scottish noblewomen using their letters to explore how they lived through the Revolution, the ‘ill years’ of King William’s reign, the Darien venture, European war and ultimately the negotiation of Union provides fresh perspectives on the social, economic and political life of Scotland. Recovering the experience of noblewomen engages with a wider process in Scottish history which has transformed understanding in some areas of historical study but has by no means permeated all. Redefining female political activity has illuminated the influence of elite English women in the later eighteenth century. Scottish noblewomen require similar extensive study. The research presented here supports the argument that political analysis alone cannot provide the fullest assessment of this period. Women are revealed as a vital element within social aspects of political manoeuvring and both created and maintained family networks. This research challenges the constricting framework of the public and private dichotomy. It aims to reveal and redefine the responsibilities of noblewomen within an expanded sphere of activity and suggests a much more inclusive role for women than has previously been considered. The formation of a British parliament in 1707 reduced the number of Scots parliamentarians and changed the role of the governing elite in Scotland but did not diminish Scottish women’s influence and participation. This thesis argues that Scottish noblewomen operated with autonomy within patriarchal parameters to support menfolk, exert authority and in some cases wield influence. Demonstrating their roles, abilities and a new form of social politics at work in Scotland is a vital part of understanding the post Union period and the development of British politics.

The burgh of Canongate, situated next to Edinburgh, was deeply affected by the British Civil Wars (1638-49). The Canongate kirk session records, the parish-based bureaucratic and disciplinary records of the Reformed (Presbyterian) Kirk, provide a detailed portrait of daily life in Canongate during that tumultuous period. The records are particularly revealing of early modern gender history as they show how both men and women interacted with the local kirk, and reveal key social trends in the burgh, especially relating to sex and marriage. Illicit sex and its issue adultery, fornication and illegitimacy were a common and serious concern for the Reformed Kirk, and their persecution was more of a national preoccupation than in England or other parts of Europe. This concern is reflected in the large number of fornication and adultery cases that came before the Canongate kirk session between 1640 and 1650. The marital partnership, as the economic and social cornerstone of early modern society, was also an important issue in Canongate, and the kirk session records provide a glimpse at the nature and significance of marriage in the parish. Scotlands kirk session records offer one of few windows into the daily lives of early modern women, and they allow us to see some of the many ways in which women were active agents in the kirks system of godly discipline. Through the Canongate kirk session records, therefore, it is possible to glean understanding about Scottish womens lives in relation to one of the most rigorous disciplinary systems of early modern Europe.

The burgh of Canongate, situated next to Edinburgh, was deeply affected by the British Civil Wars (1638-49). The Canongate kirk session records, the parish-based bureaucratic and disciplinary records of the Reformed (Presbyterian) Kirk, provide a detailed portrait of daily life in Canongate during that tumultuous period. The records are particularly revealing of early modern gender history as they show how both men and women interacted with the local kirk, and reveal key social trends in the burgh, especially relating to sex and marriage. Illicit sex and its issue adultery, fornication and illegitimacy were a common and serious concern for the Reformed Kirk, and their persecution was more of a national preoccupation than in England or other parts of Europe. This concern is reflected in the large number of fornication and adultery cases that came before the Canongate kirk session between 1640 and 1650. The marital partnership, as the economic and social cornerstone of early modern society, was also an important issue in Canongate, and the kirk session records provide a glimpse at the nature and significance of marriage in the parish. Scotlands kirk session records offer one of few windows into the daily lives of early modern women, and they allow us to see some of the many ways in which women were active agents in the kirks system of godly discipline. Through the Canongate kirk session records, therefore, it is possible to glean understanding about Scottish womens lives in relation to one of the most rigorous disciplinary systems of early modern Europe.

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Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of English, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 59-61).

The childbirth metaphor adopts imagery from female bodies carrying and delivering children to describe the effort and relationship of a poet to his/her poem. This was a commonly used trope in the renaissance, particularly by male authors. This thesis examines the way early modern woman poet, Aemilia Lanyer uses the childbirth metaphor in her poem, Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum. Lanyer ultimately considers not only the physical realities of childbirth in her use of the metaphor, but also the emotional, social, and theological consequences. By doing so, I argue that Lanyer reclaims the metaphor from her male contemporaries in order to justify women's participation in literature and theology. Lanyer adopts a position analogous to the Virgin Mary as she "births” her poem. As she situates all women as powerful procreators, she claims a poetic priesthood through motherhood.

<p>In seeking to explain why male authors assumed female pseudonyms in seventeenth-century literature, this dissertation explores male-to-female cross-dressing in Jacobean drama, effeminizing representations of parliament in Civil War propaganda, and parodies of women’s sexualized, political speech during the Interregnum and Restoration periods. My dissertation concludes that the sexualized female persona evolved over the course of the seventeenth century as a vehicle through which male authors could critique rival iterations of patriarchal hierarchy forwarded by Stuart kings and by parliament without challenging their own positions of masculine privilege within those hierarchies.</p> <p>My first chapter explores the political critiques of Jacobean absolutism embedded in the cross-gender performance narratives of Ben Jonson’s <em>Epicoene </em>(1609)<em> </em>and the anonymous play <em>Swetnam the Woman-Hater </em>(1620). In my second chapter I link male-to-female drag’s ability to critique an absolutist patriarchal paradigm to the satirical attacks on parliamentary models of polyvocal patriarchal rule in 1640s print. My final chapter investigates how female authors often find themselves shut out of the political discussions that female impersonations spark by taking up Sarah Jinner’s almanacs of 1658-60. Jinner’s almanacs combine predictions of rampant sexual wantonness with a critique of the waning Protectorate regime. I examine how the pseudonymous response to those almanacs from “Sarah Ginnor” depoliticizes Jinner’s sexual commentary on the Protectorate government.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The early modern period of a time of religious renewal and upheaval that resulted in a wealth of new religious orders, particularly those for women. During this period of change, Catholic women responded to the threat of Protestantism by adapting the convent to their own needs. One of the most successful orders for women was the Congregation of the Visitation, founded by Jeanne de Chantal and François de Sales. The history of the Visitation tends to focus on de Sales rather than its cofounder de Chantal. This thesis attempts to reconcile this omission, detailing de Chantal's ability to demonstrate and enact her authority through the mode of letters. In doing so, this paper enters into a conversation on religious revival in the early modern period by illustrating the porous nature of the early modern convent and the role women had in shaping early modern religiosity. / History