Description

Magic rings; seductive she-devils; satyrs bound and whipped on stage; a woman sexually coerced in the confessional; a boy caught masturbating over a midwifery manual; a marriage of true minds between two men; a prince led to repentance at the sight of a naked girl prepared to give her life for his. These varied manifestations of medieval and early modern sexuality–each at the center of one of the essays in this volume–suggest the ubiquity and diversity of eroticism in the period. The erotic is the stuff of legend, but also of daily life. It is inextricable from relations of power and subordination and it plays a fundamental role in the heirarchical social structures of the period. The erotic is also very much a part of the spiritual realm, often in morally ambiguous ways. The seven essays collected in this volume explore the role the erotic played in early modern notions of happiness or fulfillment, in clerical life, in Jewish legend, heretical magic and Christian marriage, in poetry, on the public stage, and in medical manuals.