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Women and contentious speech in fifteenth-century Brabant

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 November 2017

JELLE HAEMERS  and
CHANELLE DELAMEILLIEURE
JELLE HAEMERS
Affiliation:
University of Leuven (both authors).
CHANELLE DELAMEILLIEURE
Affiliation:
University of Leuven (both authors).
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Abstract

This article revalorises women's protest and popular political ideas in history. A case study focusing on three cities of the Low Countries shows that not only men, but also women were involved when it came to spreading subversive ideas, undermining the authority of urban governors, and mobilising discontent. The analysis of fifteenth-century records of repression from Antwerp, Mechelen and Leuven demonstrates that both male and female commoners permanently strove to change the governmental practices in town by using contentious speech.

Femmes et discours contestataire en brabant du xve siècle

Cette étude conduit à revaloriser les mouvements de protestation des femmes et les idées politiques de la population dans le passé. Une étude de cas, centrée sur trois villes des Pays-Bas, montre que des femmes – et non seulement des hommes –, furent impliquées dans la propagation d'idées subversives, sapant l'autorité des gouverneurs urbains et mobilisant, entre autres, le mécontentement. L'examen des archives concernant les actions de répression correspondantes, à Anvers, Malines et Louvain au cours du XVe siècle, démontre que les gens du peuple, hommes et femmes ont cherché en permanence à changer les pratiques gouvernementales en milieu urbain, adoptant un discours contestataire.

Frauen und streitsüchtige sprache in brabant im 15. jahrhundert

In diesem Beitrag geht es um die historische Aufwertung der Rolle von Frauen im Protest und für volkstümliche politische Ideen. Eine auf drei Städte in den Niederlanden bezogene Fallstudie zeigt, dass nicht nur Männer, sondern auch Frauen beteiligt waren, wenn es darum ging, subversive Ideen zu verbreiten, die Autorität der städtischen Obrigkeit zu unterminieren oder Unmut zu schüren. Eine Analyse der über die Repression in Antwerpen, Mechelen und Leuven im 15. Jahrhundert berichtenden Quellen zeigt, dass sowohl Männer als auch Frauen aus dem einfachen Volk permanent danach strebten, durch streitsüchtigen Sprachgebrauch die städtische Herrschaftspraxis zu verändern.

Type
Research Article
Information
Continuity and Change , Volume 32 , Issue 3 , December 2017 , pp. 323 - 347
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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References

ENDNOTES

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2 ‘Dat zij quade, felle ende onredelike woorde gesproken heeft op te heeren van der wet.’ CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 121v.

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20 As has been shown for Flanders: Dumolyn, J. and Haemers, J., ‘“A bad chicken” was brooding: subversive speech in late medieval Flanders’, Past and Present 214 (2012), 45–86 Google Scholar; see also Dumolyn, J., Haemers, J., Herrer, R. Oliva and Challet, V. eds., The voices of the people in late medieval Europe: communication and popular politics (Turnhout, 2014)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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26 On education in the late medieval Low Countries, see Boone, M., de Hemptinne, T. and Prevenier, W., ‘Gender and early emancipation in the late Middle Ages and early modern period’, in Munns, J. and Richards, P. eds., Gender, power and privilege in early modern Europe (London, 2003), 24–5, 37Google Scholar; T. de Hemptinne, ‘Des femmes copistes dans les Pays-Bas au bas Moyen Age (14e–15e siècle): approche d'une activité féminine mal connue’, in de Hemptinne, Boone and Blockmans, Secretum scriptorum, 133–4.

27 Bardyn, ‘Women in the medieval society’, 285; Howell, Women, production, 12–44; Klapisch-Zuber, C. and Herlihy, D., Tuscans and their families: a study of the Florentine Catasto of 1427 (New Haven, 1985), 200–11Google Scholar.

28 Kerremans, C., Étude sur les circonscriptions judiciaires et administratives du Brabant et les officiers placés à leur tête par les ducs antérieurement à l'avènement de la maison de Bourgogne (1406) (Brussels, 1949), 143–51Google Scholar; Van Dyck, M., ‘Concurrence entre justice urbaine et justice centrale en Brabant à la fin du Moyen Age: le cas des villes d'Anvers, Bois-le-Duc et Malines’, in Dauven, B. and Rousseaux, X. eds., Préférant miséricorde à rigueur de justice: pratiques de la grâce, XIIIe–XVIIe siècles (Louvain-la-Neuve, 2012), 16–82 Google Scholar. In Antwerp and Mechelen the bailiff was called the ‘schout’, in Leuven the ‘meier’.

29 These registers contain final judgements of lawsuits made in front of the court of the aldermen. For Leuven, it is called Dbedevaertboeck, in City Archives of Leuven (hereafter CAL), Oud archief, no. 584; for Antwerp it is called the Vierschaarboeck, in Felixarchief, Antwerp (hereafter FAA), Correctieboeken, no. 234; and for Mechelen it is called Bannen, submissien en correctien, in CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1. We have studied the accounts of the Leuven bailiff for 1420–30, 1450–60 and 1475–85. State Archives Brussels (hereafter SAB), Chambre des comptes, nos. 12654, 12655, 12656, 12658, 12659

30 Horodowich, E., ‘Civic identity and the control of blasphemy in sixteenth-century Venice’, Past and Present 181 (2003), 33 Google Scholar; Cressy, D., Dangerous talk: scandalous, seditious, and treasonable speech in pre-modern England (Oxford, 2010)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Martines, L., Strong words: writing and social strain in the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore, 2001)Google Scholar.

31 An inspiring theoretical perspective can be found in Bourdieu, P., Language and symbolic power (Oxford, 1991)Google Scholar, and in Burke, P., ‘The social history of language’, in Burke, P. and Porter, R. eds., The social history of language (Cambridge, 1987), 1–20 Google Scholar. For concrete cases, see Crouzet-Pavan, E., ‘Les mots de Venise: sur le contrôle du langage dans une Cité-État italienne’, in La circulation des nouvelles au Moyen Age (Paris, 1994), 210–12Google Scholar; Saint-Denis, A., ‘La punition des mauvaises paroles aux XIIe et XIIIe siècles’, in Garnot, B. ed., La petite délinquance du Moyen Age à l’époque contemporaine (Dijon, 1998), 403–16Google Scholar; Horodowich, E., ‘Speech and oral culture in early modern Europe and beyond’, Journal of Early Modern History 16, 4–5 (2012), 301–13Google Scholar.

32 Veldhuizen, M., De ongetemde tong: Opvattingen over zondige, onvertogen en misdadige woorden in het Middelnederlands (1300–1550) (Hilversum, 2014)Google Scholar. See also Van Herwaarden, J., Opgelegde bedevaarten: een studie over de praktijk van het opleggen van bedevaarten (met name in de stedelijke rechtspraak) in de Nederlanden gedurende de late middeleeuwen (ca. 1300–ca. 1550) (Assen, 1978)Google Scholar; Kittell, E., ‘Traveling for atonement: civilly imposed pilgrimages in medieval Flanders’, Canadian Journal of Netherlandic Studies 31, 2 (2010), 21–37 Google Scholar; Rousseaux, X., ‘Le pèlerinage judiciaire, pratique sociopolitique, économique et religieuse dans les villes des Pays-Bas’, in Offenstadt, N. and Mattéoni, O. eds., Un Moyen Age pour aujourd'hui: pouvoir d'État, opinion publique, justice: mélanges offert à Claude Gauvard (Paris, 2010), 258–69Google Scholar.

33 ‘ Wie rechtren, commoengiemeesters, scepenen,of eneghen van desen versprake onwerdelech, versmadelech oft dreichelec toesprake ’; Maes, L., Vijf eeuwen stedelijk strafrecht: bijdrage tot de rechts – en cultuurgeschiedenis der Nederlanden (Antwerp, 1947), 701 Google Scholar. For the – very similar – punishment of verbal crimes in Antwerp and Leuven, see an overview in J. Haemers, ‘Filthy and indecent words: insults, defamation, and urban politics in the southern Low Countries, 1300–1550’, in Dumolyn et al. eds., The voices of the people, 255.

34 Van der Tanerijen, W., Boec der loopender practijken der raidtcameren van Brabant, ed. Strubbe, E. (Brussels, 1952), 201 Google Scholar.

35 FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fos. 40r and 103v.

36 Van Caenegem, R., Geschiedenis van het strafrecht in Vlaanderen van de XIe tot de XVe eeuw (Brussels, 1954)Google Scholar; Glaudemans, C., Om die wrake wille: Eigenrichting, veten en verzoening in laatmiddeleeuws Holland en Zeeland (Hilversum, 2004)Google Scholar.

37 Kittell, E., ‘Women, audience, and public acts in medieval Flanders’, Journal of Women's History 10, 3 (1998), 76 Google Scholar. For a more theoretical approach of the ‘public’ character of medieval space, see the essays in Boucheron, P. and Offenstadt, N. eds., L'espace public au Moyen Age: débats autour de Jürgen Habermas (Paris, 2011)Google Scholar.

38 Van der Tanerijen, Boec der loopender practijken, 201: ‘om der plaetzen wille dair die geschiet, gelijc oft zij gedaen wordde voir tgerichte oft int openbair plaetze voir veele goede lieden’.

39 FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 11r.

40 Bourguignon, M.-A. and Dauven, P., ‘Une justice au féminin: femmes victimes et coupables dans les Pays-Bas bourguignons au XVe siècle’, Clio: Histoire, Femmes et Sociétés 35 (2012), 215–38Google Scholar; M. Naessens, ‘Judicial authorities’ views of women's roles in late medieval Flanders’, in Kittell and Suydam eds., The texture of society, 51–77.

41 ‘Waren zij ridderen, cnapen, vrouwen ocht joncvrouwen, edel of onedel, rijke of arm, men soude soe corrigeren dats andere exemple nemen souden hen te hoedene ende des en soude men niemen vedraghen'. Quote in Van Den Branden, J., ‘Clementeynboeck’, Antwerpsch Archievenblad 25 (1920), 316–17Google Scholar.

42 ‘Waert dat iement, ware hi man ochte wijf, van horen ambachte met waerden ochte met werken enech quaet opset ochte werringhe maken woude …’; Joossen, R., ‘Receuil de documents relatifs à l'histoire de l'industrie drapière à Malines (des origines à 1384)’, Bulletin de la Commission Royale d'Histoire 101 (1935), 450 Google Scholar.

43 Van Uytven, R., ‘1477 in Brabant’, in Blockmans, W. ed., 1477: Het algemene en de gewestelijke privilegiën van Maria van Bourgondië voor de Nederlanden (Kortrijk, 1985), 253–68Google Scholar; Haemers, J., For the common good: state power and urban revolts during the reign of Mary of Burgundy, 1477–1482 (Turnhout, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 See, respectively, CAL, Oud archief, no. 1236, fos. 43r–44r; and no. 5103, fo. 169v (‘die veeler quader eeden geswoeren heeft’).

45 ‘Mits dien dat zelieden quaedt ende ontamelijcke vergaderingen, commotien ende muterien gemaect hebben.’ CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 175r.

46 Examples for the neighbouring county of Flanders can be found in Kittell, ‘Women, audience’, 90, n. 14; and Cohn, Lust for liberty, 130–1. We can add one example of a woman distributing seditious letters from Tournai to Ghent within the context of the Flemish revolt of 1302, see Verriest, L., Les luttes sociales et le contrat d'apprentissage à Tournai jusqu'en 1424 (Brussels, 1912), 10–11 Google Scholar.

47 Hanawalt, ‘Of good and ill repute’, 75. See also Skoda, H., Medieval violence: physical brutality in Northern France, 1270–1330 (Oxford, 2013), 96–117 Google Scholar.

48 Van der Tanerijen, Boec der loopender practijken, 198: ‘Ghij sijt een dief ende valsch verradere.’

49 J. Goldberg, ‘Echoes, whispers, ventriloquisms: on recovering women's voices from the court of York in the later Middle Ages’, in Kane and Williamson eds., Women, agency, and the law, 31–41.

50 FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fos. 60v and 63v.

51 FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 33v.

52 ‘Met quaden fellen woorden overlast ende geloegenstreept heeft ende huer vuyst spitichlic op hem gebrongen.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 109v.

53 It concerns a case against Kateline Piermans in 1471. See FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 117v.

54 Austin, J., How to do things with words (London, 1971)Google Scholar; Fairclough, N., Critical discourse analysis: the critical study of language (Harlow, 2010)Google Scholar. See also Dumolyn and Haemers, ‘A bad chicken was brooding’, 47–51.

55 ‘Openbaerlic liedekens gesonghen heeft van den minderbroederen.’ CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 70v.

56 ‘In sceempte ene cleynicheid van den gerichte desselfs rectoirs.’ SAB, Chambre des Comptes, no. 12659, fo. 116r.

57 SAB, Chambre des Comptes, no. 12658, fos. 214r–v; no. 12659, fo. 30r. Also in CAL, Oud archief, no. 584, fo. 116r.

58 Burke, P., ‘Insult and blasphemy in early modern Italy’, in Burke, P. ed., The historical anthropology of early modern Italy (Cambridge, 1987), 96 Google Scholar. See also D. Garrioch, ‘Verbal insults in eighteenth-century Paris’, in Burke and Porter, The social history, 104–19; Lecharny, H., ‘L'injure à Paris au XVIIIe siècle: un aspect de la violence au quotidien’, Revue d'histoire moderne et contemporaine 36, 4 (1989), 559–85Google Scholar; Gonthier, N., Sanglant coupaul! Orde Ribaude! Les injures au Moyen Age (Rennes, 2007)Google Scholar; Lesnick, D., ‘Insults and threats in medieval Todi’, Journal of Medieval History 17, 1 (1991), 71–89 Google Scholar.

59 See, for example, CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 129v; SAB, Chambre des Comptes, no. 12658, fo. 277r.

60 Howell, ‘Citizenship and gender’, 39–40.

61 Van Leeuwen, J., ‘Municipal oaths, political virtues and the centralised state: the adaptation of oaths of office in fifteenth-century Flanders’, Journal of Medieval History 31, 2 (2005), 185–210 Google Scholar.

62 Farge, A., Dire et mal dire: l'opinion publique au XVIIIe siècle (Paris, 1992), 287–91Google Scholar.

63 Withington, P., ‘Public discourse, corporate citizenship, and state formation in early modern England’, American Historical Review 112, 4 (2007), 1016–38Google Scholar; Liddy, C., ‘“Sire ye be not king”: citizenship and speech in late medieval and early modern England’, The Historical Journal 60, 3 (2017), 571–96Google Scholar.

64 For examples of ‘retributive women’ in early modern times, see Beik, W., Urban protest in seventeenth-century France: the culture of retribution (New York, 1997), 37 Google Scholar; Wood, A., Riot, rebellion and popular politics in early modern England (Basingstoke, 2002), 12 Google Scholar.

65 ‘Vuyl boeve’, CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 33r. See also the example of a servant girl in Asse who advised the aldermen to tend pigs instead of administering justice, in Van Hemelryck, F., De criminaliteit in de ammanie van Brussel van de late middeleeuwen tot het einde van het ancien regime (1404–1789) (Ghent, 1968), 261 Google Scholar.

66 ‘Sekeren fellen ende dreycheliken woorden tot sinen deken gesproken van eenen deken doot te stekene omme sommige saken wille der welvaert van dese stad aengaende.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 130v. In the 1477 revolt in the city of Tienen (nearby Leuven) tailor Antonis Oedens said, ‘Let us beat into the bunch’ during a meeting of the craft guild. Obviously, he complained about the fact that the guild board had not yet undertaken action against the aldermen being accused of corruption: ‘Wat hebben wij mit deser vergaderingen te doene? Laet ons in den hoop slaen!’, SAB, Chambre des Comptes, no. 12680, fo. 205v.

67 ‘Te wetene dat hij wel woude dat hier in der stad alsoe qualic stonde alse hier over in Vlaenderen staet ende dat hem donlede vele te langhe verbeydt ende dat hij wel woude dattet bynnen dien avonde begonne soe soude hij ghelt moegen gecrigen.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 66r. On the revolt, see Haemers, J., De Gentse opstand (1449–1453): de strijd tussen rivaliserende netwerken om het stedelijk kapitaal (Kortrijk, 2004)Google Scholar. Also in Brussels, artisan Hennen van der Delft was inspired by the Ghent revolt when he said that the aldermen should ‘go into their coffins’ as in Ghent (‘Seggende dat men hier in der stad soude moeten maken also ment te Ghent gemaekt heeft ende in der lieden kisten gaen’, see City Archives Brussels, Cartulaires, no. 16, fo. 39r).

68 FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 66r.

69 ‘Veraders’, FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 154r.

70 ‘Dat sij een een quaet valsch vonisse gegeven hadde.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 154r.

71 SAB, Chambre des Comptes, no. 12654, fo. 344v.

72 ‘Dair deselve Jan met hoemoedighen worden seyde: “ziet dat ghi tander jare deken zyt, soe moeghdi oec beternisse ontfaen”.’ Van Den Branden, ‘Clementeynboeck, 1288–1414’, 54.

73 See examples in FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fos. 12v, 46v and 45r.

74 ‘Overmids dat hij aengetegen heeft eenen van der stad secretarysen dat hij de terminatie die hij van der stad wegen uitgesproken hadde anders in gescrifte gestelt soude hebben dan die bij der stad uutgesproken was.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 101r.

75 Lantschner, P., ‘Revolts and the political order of cities in the late Middle Ages’, Past and Present 225 (2014), 3–46 Google Scholar; Liddy, C., ‘Urban enclosure riots: rising of the commons in English towns (1480–1525)’, Past and Present 226 (2015), 41–77 Google Scholar; Telechea, J. Solórzano, ‘The politics of urban commons in northern Atlantic Spain in the later Middle Ages’, Urban History 41, 2 (2014), 183–203 Google Scholar; Haemers, J., ‘Révolte et requite: les gens de métiers et les conflits sociaux dans les villes de Flandre (XIIIe–XVe siècle)’, Revue Historique 677 (2016), 27–55 Google Scholar.

76 Thompson, E. P., ‘The moral economy of the English crowd in the eighteenth century’, Past and Present 50 (1971), 76–136 Google Scholar.

77 ‘Overseggende van valsscher zeghelingen die zij gedaen zouden hebben.’ CAM, Judicature des échevins, no. 1, fo. 66v.

78 ‘Waert sake dat het noch comen mochte, alsoet hier voertijts geweest heeft, wij en souden daer alsoe lichtelike nyet afscheijden als wij gedaen hebben, maer commen wij noch ter merct comen, wij sullen se noch anders versueken dan wij laest deden ende wij sullen noch wel weten waer dese acxzijse vaert, hier en comen gheen uutreysen, oft gheen oncosten, dit ghelt steken zij al in hueren poot.’ He continued: ‘Mochten wij de dekens ter cameren brenghen, wij souden se daertoe wel brengen dat wij een vergaderinge souden maken alsoe hier voertijts geweest heeft, want wij en souden der alsoe nyet afscheijden alsoe wij gedaen hebben, wij zijn alsoe arm als wij worden moegen, het voer ons liever qualic dan wel.’ FAA, Correctieboeken, no. 234, fo. 144v.

79 Dean, T., ‘Gender and insult in an Italian city: Bologna in the later Middle Ages’, Social History 29, 2 (2004), 231 Google Scholar.

80 Cohn, S., Women in the streets: essays on sex and power in Renaissance Italy (Baltimore, 1996), 98–136 Google Scholar.

81 Cohn, ‘Women in revolt’, 209–11. Other examples in V. Challet, ‘Un village sans histoire? La communauté de Villeveyrac en Languedoc’, in Dumolyn et al. eds., The voices of the people, 133; Lett, D., ‘Les voix du peuple à la fin du Moyen Age’, Médiévales 71 (2016), 175 Google Scholar.

82 The historiography and a debate on this issue can be found in Lipscomb, S., ‘Crossing boundaries: women's gossip, insults and violence in sixteenth-century France’, French History 25, 4 (2011), 408–26Google Scholar. See also Wickham, C., ‘Gossip and resistance among the medieval peasantry’, Past and Present 160, 1 (1998), 3–24 Google Scholar; Capp, B., When gossips meet: women, family, and neighborhood in early modern England (Oxford, 2003)Google Scholar; Cowan, A., ‘Seeing is believing: urban gossip and the balcony in early modern Venice’, Gender and History 23, 3 (2011), 721–38Google Scholar; Horodowich, E., ‘The meanings of gossip in sixteenth-century Venice’, in Cohen, T. and Twomey, L. eds., Spoken word and social practice: orality in Europe (1400–1700) (Leiden, 2015), 321–42Google Scholar.

83 ‘Quade tonge brect been; si en heiles niet.’ van Boendale, Jan, De Brabantsche Yeesten of Rymkronyk van Braband, ed. Willems, J. F. (Brussels, 1843)Google Scholar, vol. II, 155. This was a popular expression in fifteenth-century Brabant and beyond; see Veldhuizen, M., ‘“Tong breect been”: the sins of the tongue in middle Dutch religious didactic writings’, Journal of Dutch Literature 6, 2 (2015), 59–71 Google Scholar.

84 Murdie, A. and Peksen, D., ‘Women and contentious politics: a global event-data approach to understanding women's protest’, Political Research Quarterly 68, 1 (2015), 180–92Google Scholar.