1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910787511203321

Autore

Wilson Adrian <1947-, >

Titolo

Ritual and conflict : the social relations of childbirth in early modern England / / Adrian Wilson

Pubbl/distr/stampa

London ; ; New York : , : Routledge, , 2016

ISBN

1-4094-6814-3

1-317-06250-7

1-317-06249-3

1-315-60661-5

1-4094-6813-5

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (270 p.)

Collana

The history of medicine in context

Disciplina

618.2

Soggetti

Childbirth - England - History

Families - England - History

Birth customs - England - History

Medicine - England - History

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

First published 2013 by Ashgate Publishing.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Cover; Contents; Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1 Legitimate and Bastard Births; Illegitimacy as a Risk; Regimes of Punishment; The Impact of Punishment; The Problem of Maintenance; The Fate of the Single Mother; Desperate Remedies; 2 The Bonds of Marriage; The Solemnisation of Matrimony; Worldly Goods; 'With my body I thee worship'; To Obey and Serve; Enforcing Obedience; The 'Patriarchal Family'?; 3 Gender and Power; Skimmingtons and Shrews; Narratives of Gender-relations; The 'Original' of Masculine Government; Collusion, Resistance, Contests; 4 The Ceremony of Childbirth; A Female Ritual

The Midwife's OfficeLying-in; Baptism; The Meaning of the Ceremony; Churching: A Safe Deliverance; Conclusion; Counter-power, Collective Culture, Interests; The Bodily and the Social; Bibliography; Index

Sommario/riassunto

This book places childbirth in early-modern England within a wider network of social institutions and relationships. Starting with illegitimacy - the violation of the marital norm - it proceeds through marriage to the wider gender-order and so to the 'ceremony of



childbirth', the popular ritual through which women collectively controlled this, the pivotal event in their lives. Focussing on the seventeenth century, but ranging from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century, this study offers a new viewpoint on such themes as the patriarchal family, the significance of illegitimacy, and the struct