Common women
Subtitle: prostitution and sexuality in Medieval England
By: Ruth Mazo Karras.
Series: Studies in the history of sexuality
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 221
Subjects: Prostitution -- England -- History; Prostitutes -- England -- Social conditions; Social history -- Medieval, 500-1500; England -- Social conditions -- 1066-1485
Description: "Common women" in medieval England were prostitutes, whose distinguishing feature was not that they took money for sex but that they belonged to all men in common.

Common Women: Prostitution and Sexuality in Medieval England tells the stories of these women's lives: their entrance into the trade because of poor job and marriage prospects or because of seduction or rape; their experiences as street-walkers, brothel workers or the medieval equivalent of call girls; their customers, from poor apprentices to priests to wealthy foreign merchants; and their relations with those among whom they lived.

Through a sensitive use of a wide variety of imaginative and didactic texts, Ruth Karras shows that while prostitutes as individuals were marginalized within medieval culture, prostitution as an institution was central to the medieval understanding of what it meant to be a woman. This important work will be of interest to scholars and students of history, women's studies, and the history of sexuality.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-213) and index.