Women’s Literacies and Devotional Texts in Medieval and Early Modern Europe
Studies in Honour of Veronica O’Mara
Hardback (Forthcoming)
(January 2027)
ISBN: 9782503622514
Price: $144.00
Focuses on medieval women religious, both lay and vowed, and their participation in intellectual culture.
Women’s Literacies and Devotional Texts in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: Studies in Honour of Veronica O’Mara explores the diverse and often collaborative ways women shaped religious culture through reading, writing, commissioning, and circulating texts. Building on the foundational Nuns’ Literacies in Medieval Europe volumes, this collection widens the lens to include both vowed religious and lay women working within and across institutions and local communities. Drawing on meticulous archival research, the essays foreground women’s agency in the reception, production, and circulation of sermons, visionary writings, saints’ lives, and spiritual treatises, highlighting their roles as scribes, patrons, readers, and intellectual contributors. Spanning the medieval and early modern periods, the volume considers women associated with Augustinian, Benedictine, Birgittine, and Carmelite traditions alongside laywomen from diverse social backgrounds. Organised into four thematic sections — Production and Reception; Patronage and Dissemination; Edification and Learning; Devotion and Practice — the collection showcases women’s multifaceted literacies and their active engagement within textual culture. This volume considers female scriptoria and libraries, religious imaginary available to both lay and religious women, and the forms of their devotional practices at the micro and macro levels. Together, the essays underscore the richness of the surviving record and affirm the continuing importance of archival research, while pointing to the vast, still untapped potential for research into women and their role in Europe’s premodern history.
Other Titles in this Series
The Sisterbook of Master Geert’s House, Deventer
The Lives and Spirituality of the Sisters, c. 1390-c. 1460
Volume 33
Thomas of Cantimpre
The Collected Saints' Lives: Abbot John of Cantimpre, Christina the Astonishing, Margaret of Ypres, and Lutgard of Aywieres
Volume 19
Medieval Women – Texts and Contexts in Late Medieval Britain
Essays in Honour of Felicity Riddy
Volume 3
Mystics, Goddesses, Lovers, and Teachers
Medieval Visions and Their Legacies / Studies in Honour of Barbara Newman
Volume 31
Virgins and Scholars
A Fifteenth-Century Compilation of the Lives of John the Baptist, John the Evangelist, Jerome, and Katherine of Alexandria
Volume 10
The Knowing of Woman’s Kind in Childing
A Middle English Version of Material Derived from the Trotula and other Sources
Volume 4
Three Women of Liege
A Critical Edition of and Commentary on the Middle English Lives of Elizabeth of Spalbeek, Christina Mirabilis, and Marie d'Oignies
Volume 23
Send me God
The Lives of Ida the Compassionate of Nivelles, Nun of La Ramee, Arnulf, Lay Brother of Villers, and Abundus, Monk of Villers
Volume 6
Saints Edith and Aethelthryth: Princesses, Miracle Workers, and their Late Medieval Audience
The Wilton Chronicle and the Wilton Life of St Aethelthryth
Volume 25
The Manere of Good Lyvyng
A Middle English Translation of Pseudo-Bernard's 'Liber de modo bene vivendi ad sororem'
Volume 30
Medieval Women and their Spiritual Texts
Helfta Writings, Margery Kempe, and Beyond. Essays in Honour of Naoë Kukita Yoshikawa
Volume 34
Sacred Communities, Shared Devotions
Gender, Material Culture, and Monasticism in Late Medieval Germany
Volume 29
Saints’ Lives for Medieval English Nuns, II
An Edition of the 'Lyves and Dethes' in Cambridge University Library, MS Additional 2604
Volume 32
Living Saints of the Thirteenth Century
The Lives of Yvette, Anchoress of Huy; Juliana of Cornillon, Author of the Corpus Christi Feast; and Margaret the Lame, Anchoress of Magdeburg
Volume 20
