Essential and despised: Images of women in the First and Second Crusades, 1095-1148

• Main Author: Brady, Laura A
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01-01-1992
• Subjects: European history; Medieval history; Middle Ages; Middle Eastern history
• ISBN: 0315788674; 9780315788671

The influence and presence of women is noticeable in a number of areas. First, the imagery of femineity influenced the language used both to precipitate and sustain the military venture. That is, womanliness as a universal concept was utilized by the men who preached the crusade as a means of inducing support and of continuing the war. Women attended the movement to the Middle East and played crucial roles in the wars against the Muslims, becoming pivotal during the settlement phase of the crusades, when they became desirable as mothers and wives. Most significantly, the presence of women on crusade was regarded as a potential source of sin for men, and a suspicion and dislike for women pervades the writing. Finally, the image of Muslims further illustrates the social values of the crusaders. Muslim men were perceived as innately perverse and sexually deviant. The image of Muslim women in the chronicles marginalizes them as insignificant or, when they converted to Christianity, presents them as trophies of war and evidence of the bravery and virility of Christian knights. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)