Jewish History • Vol. 5, No. 1 • Spring 1991

Some Parallels in the Education of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women

Judith R. Baskin

We know too little about the education of European Jewish women during the Middle Ages. Our knowledge rests on only a few sources, Hebrew or otherwise. It may, however, be possible to fill in some of the gaps, if we interpret the little about which we are reasonably confident in terms of our more secure and broader knowledge about the education of Christian women. My purpose, therefore, is not so much to bring new materials to bear as to benefit from contrasting the fruits of earlier research.

My justification for employing this strategy is straightforward: the education and preparation for adulthood of both Jewish and Christian women, especially Christians belonging to the urban bourgeoisie, were often remarkably similar. Parallels are to be found, particularly with respect to literacy, religious training, and domestic and business knowledge. Yet there was at least one significant difference, related directly to the distinct Jewish and Christian cultures. Christian women occasionally achieved a thorough education, including a Latin one, but they usually did so in the convent. The few Jewish women who attained educational sophistication did so at home.

I

In Jewish Life in the Middle Ages, Israel Abrahams suggested that the average medieval Jew, but not the average Christian, knew how to read and write. ~ Abrahams may have been right about most medieval people who were agricultural peasants; he was not right about members of the Christian urban bourgeoisie. 2 Perhaps few of these Christians were skilled in Latin and the finer points of

42 Judith R. Baskin

theological study, but the percentage of Jews fluent in rabbinic literature was no doubt also restricted. It included, moreover, very few women. The education of Jewish women was limited to reading, some writing, domestic skills, and the religious knowledge that was essential to their daily lives. The same may be said for Christian women as well. 3

Jewish girls may have read in Hebrew, principally the liturgy. Any writing they did would have been in the Hebrew alphabet, although the language was probably some form of their local vernacular. Writing and arithmetic served them in their frequent participation in family business affairs. Urban Christian girls, from the twelfth century, read in the corresponding vernacular. They may also have read the Latin of the Psalter, and may have known how to sign their names. 4 Such a limited education contrasts significantly with that of boys. Jewish boys began to learn, usually in small groups with a tutor, at about the age of five, progressing from the Hebrew alphabet to biblical and halachic studies, and, if they were talented, to talmudic tractates, at about the age of eight. Such study continued for about five years. The most gifted went on to study the Talmud for the rest of their lives. 5 Able Christian boys of prosperous urban families also began advanced studies around the age of thirteen, especially after the rise of universities inthe thirteenth century.

Jewish girls concentrated on acquiring domestic skills. "May she sew, spin, weave, and be brought up to a life of good deeds," wrote parents when recording the birth of a daughter. 6 But Jewish domestic skills also included knowing the halachic rules applicable to the home and to married life, as well as the memorization of prayers. 7 Because of rabbinic literature's somewhat jaundiced view of the intellectual and even moral capabilities of women, as well as its advice against their acquiring advanced halachic knowledge, women generally were not exposed to the Talmud. This accords with the clear distinction in Judaism between male and female roles.8 Nevertheless, sources such as Sefer Hasidim insist that a girl have some religious training:

A man is obligated to teach his daughters the commandments, such as the accepted rulings .... The depths of the Talmud and the reasons for the commandments ... one does not teach a woman and a child, but the laws concerning the commandments he should teach her, for if she does not know the laws of the Sabbath, how will she keep them, and so too all the commandments? 9

We may assume that material such as this was often taught orally, in the vernacular, since Sefer Hasidim says that women may learn their precepts in any language.lO In contrast, instruction given to males was exclusively in Hebrew.

Clerical instructions for teaching Christian girls have a similar ring. Girls' education was to be minimal, limited to reading the prayers, absorbing the basic tenets of the faith, and developing the virtues of piety, modesty, and chastity. Clerics, like some rabbis, suggested that too much education might lead to unchastity. 11

Education of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women 43

There were rabbis who took exception to this minimalist position. Isaac of Corbeil, in his thirteenth-century Sefer Mitzvot Katan, wrote: "Reading and studying [the commandments] will benefit them [women] as the study of the Talmud benefits men."12 In 1357, Eleazar b. Samuel ha-Levi of Mainz wrote in his will: "If they can by any means contrive it, my sons and daughters should live in communities ... so that their sons and daughters may learn the ways of Judaism. Even if compelled to solicit from others the money to pay a teacher, they must not let the young, of both sexes, go without instruction. ''13 The difficulty in analyzing this text, of course, is our lack of precise knowledge of what "instruction in Torah" comprised, if it was the same for boys and girls of prosperous homes, and if it included textual study or simply oral exhortation concerning moral behavior and ritual observances. Such marked dedication to educating one's children, whatever the form that education took, apparently was not uncommon, and may be what Abelard's disciple was commenting upon when he said: "The Jew, even the poorest of the poor, even if he has ten children, will send them to learn . . . . not only the sons, but even the daughters."14 More prevalent, however, was the view expressed by Isaac's contemporary, Moses of Coucy, who taught that although "a woman is exempt from both the commandment to learn Torah and to teach her son, even so, if she aids her son and husband in their efforts to learn, she shares their reward for that commandment's fulfillment. ''15 This preference for the woman whose domestic and economic efforts enabled the men in her family to study persisted, to be recalled in the sixteenth century by Moses Isserles in his glosses to the Shulhan Arukh. 16

As for the instructors themselves, the preferred teachers of Jewish girls were women. For once, at least, one may accept Sefer Hasidim at face value, when it disapproves of men teaching women.17 However, a later source, Joseph ben Moses, a disciple of the authoritative Rabbi Israel Isserlein (1390-1460), mentions that the latter took a male tutor, albeit an older man, for Raidel, his daughter-in-law. It goes without saying that teacher and pupil met in a setting where they were never alone. 18

The home was also the setting for the education of most Christian women. The teachers were both male and female. 19 Some girls, however, were sent to town and convent schools. Their studies, like those of Jewish girls, emphasized domestic skills. When they finished studying, at about age twelve, they perfected these skills at' home, 20 until they married, usually at about age fourteen and up.21 Few girls, as noted above, acquired a more thorough literary education. Girls did not attend university.

II The will of Eleazar of Mainz admonishes his daughters to attend synagogue, occupy themselves with "Torah, the Psalms, and works of charity," and to "act circumspectly and modestly, and imbue their married lives with modesty, sanctity,

44 Judith R. Baskin

and reverence, acting amiably toward their husbands and always obeying them. ''22 Similarly, parallel Christian works viewed female education as preparation for daily life, emphasizing the inculcation of modesty, good manners, good religious practice, and good homecraft, but also insisting on at least some formal leaming.23 Like Eleazar, Louis IX of France, in the Enseignements written for his daughter, the Queen of Navarre,24 urged pity for the poor and the sick, the protection of one's reputation by keeping the company of irreproachable women, and obedience to one's spouse and parents out of love for them and for God. She also should not acquire clothing or jewelry beyond what is appropriate to her state.25 Of course, the noble Christian woman was not counseled about practical domestic duties. "Middle-class" Jewish women were, or at least their praise was spoken in terms of domestic achievement. In 1197, in an elegy for his murdered wife, Dolcia, Eleazar of Worms praised her for activities as diverse as sewing book bindings, catering weddings, and providing for and caring for her husband's male students and, of course, for Eleazar himself. Eleazar lauded similar qualities - spinning, sewing, and embroidery - in his martyred daughters, 13-year-old Bellette and six-year-old Hannah, whose singing he also praised. Hannah also knew the Shema, and Bellette the daily prayers. Both had been taught by Dolcia, who was a halachically knowledgeable teacher of other women,26 as Eleazar proudly noted.

Strikingly, Eleazar, who was partly building on the topos of the "woman of valor," could easily have borrowed his praises (halachic matters aside) from didactic Christian texts. Although the Treasure of the City of Ladies of the fifteenth-century writer Christine de Pisan was written much later, and although Christine herself was a unique woman who lived in anaristocratic milieu, the book commends the same virtues as did Eleazar.27

The wise lady or housewife ought to be very familiar with everything pertaining to the preparation of food .... She ought to see that her home is kept clean and everything is in its place and in order. She should see that her children are well taught and disciplined, even if they are small, and that they are not heard whining or making a lot of noise. She should ensure that her husband is well served and his peace and quiet are uninterrupted .... She will be cheerful to him all the time .... She will have very fine linen - delicate, generously embroidered, and well made - and will use it to serve the important people that her husband brings home, by whom she will be greatly esteemed, honoured and praised.28

Similar advice is given in the fifteenth-century "How the Good Wijf taughte Hir Doughtir, ''29 and in the fourteenth-century manual of the M6nagier of Paris, in which it was emphasized that merchants' daughters "would need to manage their household accounts and write letters to their husbands and sons, who were often away on business trips."3o Eleazar of Worms also had praised Dolcia's financial skills, which may have included preparing accounts.

FAucation of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women 45

III

Indeed, Dolcia, like many other Jewish women, and, after 1300, Christian women as well, may have been lending money at interest. 31 The twelfth-century English Licoricia of Winchester was one of several medieval Jewish women known to have become major lenders.a2 It has been noted that women's dowries often provided the capital for their family unit to do business.33 Women's work also made it possible for learned husbands to devote themselves full time to study. 34 Widows, especially, took over their late husbands' affairs, sometimes in parmership with a second woman.35 Book colophons from Renaissance Italy indicate that some printers' widows were sufficiently competent in their husbands' craft to pursue it on their own. 36 A few Jewish women may have practiced medicine; certainly some were midwives.a7 They probably learned through being apprenticed, as were a large number of Jewish girls in Renaissance Rome,38 although some may also have been acquainted with Hebrew obstetrical treatises. One gynecological treatise from the fourteenth century declares that in addition to being well-trained, gentle, prudent, compassionate, and God-fearing, the midwife should be literate (yoda'at sefer). 39 We may assume that similar practices of training or simply learning by observing parents prevailed elsewhere, in other vocations, and in earlier periods.

Once again, the parallels between Jewish and Christian women are instructive. Christian wives of craftsmen assisted their husbands, or occasionally plied a separate trade. 40 Women engaged in weaving, embroidery, brewing, and the supply of foodstuffs. The rights of "independent women" workers were protected by law. 41 These women, including widows, must have been literate and possessed of at least some knowledge of arithmetic. In Montpellier, notarial registers of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries reveal that Christian widows belonging to the merchant elite occasionally were appointed guardians of their minor children. These widows also lent at interest and bought and sold property. 42

IV

There were a few genuinely well-educated women. Whether Jewish or Christian, they most likely were the daughters of well-educated and prosperous men, who may also have been their teachers. 43 Some may have come from families possessed of wealth and learning, but without sons. Rachel, a daughter of Rashi (who, in fact, had no sons), reportedly copied a responsum of her father as he dictated. She must have had enough halachic knowledge to be able to record rabbinic Hebrew. 44 Dolcia, the wife of Eleazar of Worms, instructed women in laws of "the forbidden and the permitted," indicating more than elementary practical knowledge. 45 However, when certain women of the learned elite were permitted to give testimony in selected halachic disputes, it was not because they themselves were learned

46 Judith R. Baskin

(although some may have been), but because, as Isaac of Dampierre put it, they were "the daughters of the prophets and leaders of the generation and we may rely on their custom. ''46

Dolcia was well educated enough to have led women in prayer.a7 In the thirteenth century, Richenza of Nurenberg did the same, as did Urania of Worms, whose epitaph says: "[She was] the daughter of the chief of the synagogue singers. His prayer for his people rose up to glory. And as for her, she, too, with sweet tunefulness, officiated before the women to whom she sang the hymnal portions. ''48 These women prayer leaders may have even added to their service liturgical compositions of their own, reflecting female concerns and suggesting women's purposefully active role in synagogue life. 49

Far more information has been preserved about learned Christian women,50 although whether their proportional number was greater than that among Jews has yet to be established. It is clear, however, that Christian women had greater opportunities to learn through their enclosure (voluntary or obligatory) in monastic51 and similar settings, as was the case with the prolific late medieval visionary Hildegard of Bingen.S2 Yet, even outside the monastery, learned Christian women were often unmarried, placing them in an anomalous and even scorned social situation.53 Christine de Pisan, a widow, was described as a virilis femina, to which she responded: "Now I am truly a man."54 But whether all this means that fewer Jewish women attained advanced learning because almost all Jewish women married, and remarried, both of their own volition and by communal will, is still a moot point.

Nevertheless, higher learning among both Jewish and Christian women was far from the norm. It was, in fact, extraordinary enough to have bred fanciful literary accounts. The twelfth-century Jewish traveller Petachia of Regensburg wrote that the only daughter of Samuel b. Eli, the Suran Gaon, was so expert in Scripture and Talmud that men came to hear her lessons. So that they should not stare at her, however, she taught from behind a latticed window.55 This motif was a popular one. The fourteenth-century Miriam Schapira is said (in the sixteenth-century family chronicle of Johanan ben Aaron Luria) to have conducted a school for men from behind a curtain. 56 This motif had its Christian variations. Christine de Pisan, in a chapter of her Book of the City of Ladies entitled "Against Those Who Say It Is Not Good for Women To Be Educated," wrote that Novella, the daughter of an Italian professor of law, was so learned that she sometimes substituted for him in class. But because she was beautiful her father saved his students from distraction by covering her face with a veil. He also did something else, revealing exactly how exaggerated and untrustworthy these stories can be. Turning upside down the actual chronology of the Novellae of Justinian, after which the daughter, Novella, would logically have been named, Christine relates that the father, "in order to have her name remembered . . . . made one of his lectures into a legal text, which he named after his daughter."57

Education of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women 47

Stories like this teach us a great deal. In pursuing our search for the details of women's education during the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, on whatever level, the fact of shared storytelling indicates that we may assume a number of common educational aims for both Jews and Christians. Knowing them, we can better comprehend the parallels and divergences between Jewish and Christian daily life in both the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

48 Judith R. Baskin

NOTES

1. Israel Abrahams, Jewish Life in the Middle Ages (1896; reprint, New York, 1969), 340. 2. The growth of urban life after the First Crusade greatly enlarged the need for literacy as

commercial enterprises increased and bureaucracy expanded. In medieval towns and cities the number of institutions offering an elementary education, usually under Church sponsorship, rapidly increased. See James W. Thompson, The Literacy of the Laity in the Middle Ages (Berkeley, 1939). See, more recently, Brian Stock, The Implications of Literacy (Princeton, 1983), 13.

3. Jewish girls probably acquired such skills several centuries before the widespread expectation of their mastery by Christians with the rise of the medieval urban bourgeoisie.after 1100. See below, nn. 7-8.

4. Joan M. Ferrante, "'The Education of Women in the Middle Ages in Theory, Fact and Fantasy," in Beyond Their Sex. Learned Women of the European Past, ed. Patricia H. Labalme (New York and London, 1980), 9-42, 10. See Eileen Power, Medieval Women (Cambridge, 1975), 85, who writes that "women in the families of ordinary gentry and bourgeoisie seem often to have been able to read and write," and cites, among other evidence, wills of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries showing that women possessed books, "most often psalters and other service books, but sometimes romances and other books as well."

5. An intensive educational program was proposed for boys in Hukkei ha-Torah, a compilation probably composed in twelfth-century Germany or France. See Simha Assaf, Sources for the History of Jewish Education [in Hebrew], 4 vols. (Tel Aviv, 1925-42), 1:6-16; the text is translated in part in Irving A. Agus, The Heroic Age of Franco-German Jewry (New York, 1969), 318-22. On the education of Jewish men in the Ashkenazic Middle Ages, see Agus, "Rabbinic Scholarship in Northern Europe" and "Rashi and his School," in The World History of the Jewish People. Second Series: Medieval Period, vol. 2, The Dark Ages, ed. Cecil Roth (Tel Aviv, 1966), 189-248; Ivan Marcus, "Jewish Schools in Medieval Europe," The Melton Journal (Winter 1987): 5-6; and Ephraim Kanarfogel, "Attitudes Toward Childhood and Children in Medieval Jewish Society," Approaches to Judaism in Medieval Times 2 (Chico, CA, 1985), 1-34.

6. An inscription entered into a book used as a family register, cited by A. Berliner, Aus dem inneren Leben der deutschen Juden im Mittelalter (Berlin, 1900), 7. On medieval Jewish women and family life see references throughout. Also Kenneth R. Stow, "The Jewish Family in the Rhineland in the High Middle Ages: Form and Function," The American Historical Review 92 (1987): 1085-1100; and Judith R. Baskin, "Jewish Women in the Middle Ages," in Jewish Women in Historical Perspective, ed. Judith R. Baskin (Detroit, MI, 1991).

7. However, see Kenneth Stow and Sandra Debenedetti Stow, "Donne ebree a Roma nell'eta' del ghetto: affetto, dipendenza, autonomia," La Rassegna Mensile di Israel 52 (1986): 63-116, who note that the women of the Roman ghetto, albeit of a somewhat later period, were taught to read prayers in Hebrew.

8. On rabbinic Judaism's understanding of the separate roles and functions appropriate to men and women, and on talmudic views of education for women, see Judith R. Baskin, "The Separation of Women in Rabbinic Judaism," in Women, Religion and Social Change, ed. Y. Haddad and E. Findly (Albany, NY, 1985), 3-18; or Judith Romney Wegner, "The Image and Status of Women in Classical Rabbinic Judaism," in Jewish Women in Historical Perspective.

9. Sefer Hasidim, ed. J. Wistinetzki and J. Freimann (Frankfurt, 1924), 211, par. 835. It was the medieval rabbinic consensus, in both the Muslim and Christian worlds, that women should not be taught Talmud. See, for example, Moses Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Sefer ha-Madoh: Hilchot Talmud Torah 1:13; Moses of Coucy, Sefer Mitzvot Gadol, positive commandment 12; Jacob ben Asher, Tur: Yoreh Deah, ch. 246; Joseph Caro, Shulhan Arukh: Yoreh Deah, ch. 246:6.

10. Sefer Hasidim, 211, par. 835.

Education of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women 49

11. Shulamit Shahar, The Fourth Estate. A History of Women in the Middle Ages (London and New York, 1983), 155.

12. R. Isaac b. Joseph of Corbeil (d. 1280), Sefer Mitzvot Katan (New York, 1959), iv. 13. This will may be found in the original Hebrew with English translation in Israel Abrahams,

Hebrew Ethical Wills (Philadelphia, 1926; reprint, 1976), 207-18. The excerpt cited is on p. 210. 14. A. Landgraf, ed., Commentarius Cantabrigiensis in Epistolas Pauli e Schola Petri Abaelardi, vol.

2 (Notre Dame, Indiana, 1937), 434. 15. Moses of Coucy, Sefer Mitzvot Gadol, positive commandment l2. 16. See Shulhan Arukh: Yoreh Deah, ch. 246:6. 17. Sefer Hasidim, 211, par. 835. 18. Joseph ben Moses, Leket Yosher, ed. J. Freimann (1903), 2, 32a; cited with other examples in

Moritz Giidemann, Geschichte des Erziehungswesens und der Cultur der abendlgindischen Juden wgihrend des Mittelalters und der neueren Zeit, 3 vols. (Vienna, 1880-88), 3:100.

19. Power, Medieval Women, 80-84; Ferrante, "Education of Women," 9. 20. Shahar, Fourth Estate, 159, describes the fresco on the walls of the Doge's palace at Venice

depicting four stages in human life. In the second scene, depicting elementary education, boys are shown learning to read and holding books and writing implements, whereas girls are shown learning to weave.

21. Shahar, Fourth Estate, 186-87; Eileen Power, "The Mrnagier's Wife: A Paris Housewife in the Fourteenth Century," in idem, Medieval People (New York, 1924; reprint, 1954), 99-124. Early engagements, if not early marriages, were usual in the medieval Jewish community as well; see Agus, Heroic Age, 281.

22. Abrahams, Hebrew Ethical Wills, 209-10. 23. On such works specifically intended for women, see Power, Medieval Women, 80-86, and "The

Mrnagier's Wife," 99-124; Shahar, Fourth Estate, 142ff., 216-17; and Margaret Wade Labarge, A Small Sound of the Trumpet (Boston, 1986), 38-42, 142-47.

24. On the Enseignements, see Labarge, A Small Sound, 39-40. 25. Ibid. 26, A.M. Haberman, Sefer Gezerot Ashkenaz ve-Zarfat (Jerusalem, 1945; reprint, 1971), 164-67.

Translations into English of Eleazar's elegy, written in the form of a verse-by-verse commentary on Proverbs 31:10-31, are found in Haim Ben-Sasson, A History of the Jewish People (Cambridge, Mass., 1976), 523; and Ivan Marcus, "Mothers, Martyrs, and Moneymakers: Some Jewish Women in Medieval Europe," Conservative Judaism 38 (1986): 34-45, 41-42.

27. Christine de Pisan, Treasure of the City of Ladies; or, The Book of the Three Virtues, trans. Sarah Lawson (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, and New York, 1985). On Christine, see Charity Cannon Willard, "The Franco-Italian Professional Writer: Christine de Pizan," in Medieval Women Writers, ed. Katharina M. Wilson (Athens, GA, 1984), 333-63 (which also contains excerpts from her various writings).

28. de Pisan, Treasure of the City, trans. Lawson, 145-49. 29. For "How the Good Wijf taughte Hit Doughtir," see Labarge, A Small Sound, 40 and 146. The

text may be found in Babees Book, ed. F. J. Furnivall, Early English Text Society, Old Series 32 (London, New York, and Toronto, 1969; reprint of 1868 edition).

30. On the Mrnagier of Paris, see Labarge, A Small Sound, 40; Power, "The Mrnagier's Wife"; and Shahar, The Fourth Estate, 216-17.

31. Agus, Heroic Age, 295, 305. On the involvement of medieval Jewish women in moneylending, see William C. Jordan, "Jews on Top: Women and the Availability of Consumption Loans in Northern France in the Mid-Thirteenth Century," Journal of Jewish Studies 29 (1978): 39-56; Andrrc Courtemanche, "Les femmes juives et le crrdit ~ Manosque au touruant du XIVe si~cle," Provence Historique 37:150 (1987): 545-58. A caricature of a Jewish woman who was engaged in moneylending is found on a Tallage roll of 1233, preserved in the British Public Record Office. It portrays the wealthy financier, Isaac of Norwich, and two of his local agents, Avegaye and Mosse

50 Judith R. Baskin

Mokke; the drawing is reproduced in Ben-Sasson, History, plate 29; also in Michael Adler, "The Jewish Woman in Medieval England," in idem, Jews of Medieval England (London, 1939), 17-45. See Stow and Stow, "Donne ebree a Roma," for the moneylending activities of sixteenth- century Italian Jewish women. On moneylending activities of Christian women, see below, n. 40.

32. On Licoricia and her activities, see Adler, "The Jewish Woman," 39-42. 33. Agus, Heroic Age, 278, and see his "The Development of the Money Clause in the Ashkenazic

Ketubah," Jewish Quarterly Review 42 (1951): 221-56.

34. Agus, Heroic Age, 281. R. Eleazar's elegy for Dolcia, described above, makes clear that her financial activities enabled him to devote himself to teaching and study.

35. Adler, "The Jewish Woman," 38. On the unique opportunities available for widows see also Richard Emery, "Les veuves juives de Perpignan," Provence Historique 37:150 (1987): 559-56.

36. On the involvement of women in book production in Italy, see Howard Adelman, "The Educational and Literary Activities of Jewish Women in Italy during the Renaissance and the Catholic Reformation," forthcoming in the Shlomo Simonsohn Festschrift; and Raphael Posner and Israel Ta-Shema, The Hebrew Book. An Historical Survey (Jerusalem, 1975), p. 92, incunabulum 138; and p. 94.

37. On the general involvement in medicine of medieval women, see Labarge, "Women as Healers," 169-94, in A Small Sound; and Power, Medieval Women, 86-88. For references to Jewish women physicians, see Labarge, 173 and 177; Power, 88; Harry Friedenwald, The Jews and Medicine. 2 vols. (1946; reprint, New York, 1967), 1:217-20; and Marcello Segre, "Dottoresse Ebree nel Medioevo," Pagina di storia della medicina 14 (1970): 98-106. On Jewish women as midwives, in particular, see Ron Barkai, "A Medieval Hebrew Treatise on Obstetrics," Medical History 33 (1989): 96-I 19; 105-07, 114; and A. Cardoner Planas, "Seis mujeres hebreas practicando la medicina en el reino de Aragon," Sefarad 9 (1949).

38. Stow and Stow, "Donna ebree," 66-68.

39. Barkai, "A Medieval Hebrew Treatise," 107, referring to Sefer ha-Toledet, a Hebrew adaptation of a Latin gynecological text; British Library, Montefiore MS 420, fol. 26r.; see p. 99 for remarks on the date of this text.

40. On women's occupations, see Power, ch. 3 in Medieval Women. Labarge, A Small Sound, 145-54, writes that the general impression from the sources is that women were active in a wide range of urban occupations, that they generally were considered such an essential part of the family economic unit that they paid half of any tax imposed, and that women on their own often achieved middle-class comfort (p. 152). The essays in Barbara A. Hanawalt, ed., Women and Work in Preindustrial Europe (Bloomington, Indiana, 1986), provide detailed information about a number of medieval female vocational activities.

41. On the independent working woman, thefemme sole, see Power, 59. Ze'ev Falk, "The Status of Women in the Communities of Germany and France during the Middle Ages" [in Hebrew], Sinai 48 (1961): 361-67, compares the rights of Jewish and Christian women to act asfemmes soles.

42. Labarge, A Small Sound, 153; and see Kathryn L. Ryerson, "Women in Business in Medieval Montpellier," in Hanawalt, Women and Work, 115-44, particularly 132-38, in which she notes that "widows emerge as the most active group among Montpellier women. Because of their independence and potential means - they were free from their husbands' constraints and probably from their fathers' as well - widows were better equipped to participate in more diverse economic areas." On the comparable activities of Jewish widows, see above, n. 35.

43. One such woman was Christine de Pisan. See Natalie Zemon Davis, "Gender and Genre: Women as Historical Writers, 1400-1820," in Labalme, Beyond Their Sex, 153-60.

44. In Shibbolei Ha-Leket, a code of Jewish law compiled by the thirteenth-century Italian talmudist Zedekiah ben Abraham Anav, whose teachings were highly influenced by Rashi and his school. Rashi is quoted as having said that because of his infirmity, his daughter Rachel served as his secretary, recording one of his responsum. This is cited in Gtidemann, Geschichte des

Education of Medieval Jewish and Christian Women 51

Erziehungswesens 1:232, together with other medieval references to learned women of the rabbinic elite.

45. Haberman, Sefer Gezerot, 166. 46. A manuscript of Isaac b. Joseph of Corbeil's SeferMitzvotKatan, quoting Isaac of Dampierre, a

great-grandson of Rashi, cited in Giidemann, Geschichte 1:189. Giidemann cites several similar acceptances of women's testimony on practices permitted by various leaders of medieval Ashkenazic Jewry.

47. Haberman, Sefer Gezerot, 166. 48. On Jewish women who led women's prayers in the synagogue, see Emily Taitz, "Kol Ishah - The

Voice of Woman: Where Was It Heard in Medieval Europe?" Conservative Judaism 38 (1986): 46-61, particularly 53-56. During the late Middle Ages, various kinds of literature in the vernacular began to be developed for women and less educated men, and these texts, which included special women's prayers (tehinnot), some composed by women, proliferated rapidly with the invention of printing. See "Literature for Jewish Women in Medieval and Later Times," in The Jewish Woman. The Jewish Library 3, ed. Leo Jung (New York, 1934), 213-43; and Chava Weissler, "The Traditional Piety of Ashkenazic Women," in Jewish Spirituality. From the Sixteenth Century to the Present, ed. Arthur Green (New York, 1987), 245-75.

49. Although these prayer activities did not take place in "male space" in the public sphere, they did take place in the "public space" of the synagogue, and should be reckoned as communal activities. Medieval women were not counted as participants in male communal prayer groups, but they sometimes created their own prayer groups. See Taitz, "Kol Ishah," 54-56, on medieval women's synagogue activities.

50. On learned women, see, for example, Wilson, Medieval Women Writers, and Peter Dronke, Women Writers of the Middle Ages. A Critical Study of Texts from Perpetua to Marguerite Porete (Cambridge, 1984).

51. Labarge, A Small Sound, 29. 52. On Hildegarde, see Kent Kraft, "The German Visionary: Hildegard of Bingen," in Wilson,

Medieval Women Writers, 109-30; and Dronke, Women Writers, 14-201. 53. Labalme, "Introduction," Beyond Their Sex, 5. 54. Ibid. 55. Travels of Rabbi Petachia ofRatisbon, ed. and trans. A. Benisch (London, 1856; 2nd. ed., 1861),

19, reprinted in Elkan N. Adler, Jewish Travellers (New York, 1930; reprint, 1966), 64-91. 56. According to The Encyclopedia Judaica, s.v. "Luria," the genealogical document of Johanan b.

Aaron Luria was incorporated by his nephew Joseph b. Gershom of Rosheim into his Sefer ha-Miknah. The references to Miriam Shapira in this document can be found in M. Kayserling, Die Judischen Frauen in der Geschichte, Literatur und Kunst (Leipzig, 1879), 138.

57. Christine de Pisan, The Book of the City of Ladies, trans. Earl Jeffrey Richards (New York, 1982), 154, section II.36.3.

State University o f New York at Albany