Saints and scandals: representations of elite women in the writings of Bede and Gregory of Tours

Coughlan, Jenny

Restricted to everyone for three years. Restriction lift date: 2021-02-12T13:16:58Z

Saints and scandals: representations of elite women in the writings of Bede and Gregory of Tours

dc.check.date	2021-02-12T13:16:58Z
dc.check.embargoformat	E-thesis on CORA only	en
dc.check.entireThesis	Entire Thesis Restricted
dc.check.info	Restricted to everyone for three years	en
dc.check.opt-out	No	en
dc.check.reason	This thesis is due for publication or the author is actively seeking to publish this material	en
dc.contributor.advisor	Scully, Jeremiah D	en
dc.contributor.author	Coughlan, Jenny
dc.contributor.funder	Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences	en
dc.contributor.funder	University College Cork	en
dc.date.accessioned	2018-02-13T13:16:58Z
dc.date.issued	2017
dc.date.submitted	2017
dc.description.abstract	This thesis analyses and compares the representations of elite women in the writings of Bede (c.673-735) and Gregory of Tours (c.538-594), primarily in their histories: Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum and Gregory’s Decem Libri Historiarum. Bede’s and Gregory’s representations of women have never been compared in a dedicated fulllength study, but comparing their differences and similarities can provide valuable insights into the authors’ attitudes towards women and into other key, related issues in their narratives. Bede had read Gregory’s history, and this thesis, which prioritises Bede, uses Gregory’s history to better understand Bede’s concerns. It identifies and investigates common themes in their treatment of secular and religious women. In relation to secular women, the thesis examines the theme of marriage and conversion to Christianity. For religious women, the thesis explores accounts of good behaviour, virginity and religious leadership, and accounts of bad behaviour involving scandal in religious life, sin and punishment. In order to fully understand Bede’s and Gregory’s representations of women, the thesis examines the authors’ contemporary circumstances and their historiographical and exegetical contexts, with particular reference to providential and eschatological frameworks. This thesis challenges the view that Bede’s representation of women was motivated by misogyny or a degree of gendered prejudice. It argues that though writing in patriarchal societies, both Bede’s and Gregory’s representations of women were primarily driven by pastoral rather than gendered considerations. Bede and Gregory used representations of women (and men) to encourage contemporary moral reform and save souls in the last age of this world. Their message of reform was aimed at both women and men. Bede’s and Gregory’s histories are very different in tone, and depict women in different ways and in different situations, but their representations of women had a similar urgent positive pastoral function in both authors’ narratives.	en
dc.description.sponsorship	Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences (Postgraduate Scholarship); University College Cork (School of History tutorial scholarship scheme)	en
dc.description.status	Not peer reviewed	en
dc.description.version	Accepted Version
dc.format.mimetype	application/pdf	en
dc.identifier.citation	Coughlan, J. 2017. Saints and scandals: representations of elite women in the writings of Bede and Gregory of Tours. PhD Thesis, University College Cork.	en
dc.identifier.endpage	224	en
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/10468/5456
dc.language.iso	en	en
dc.publisher	University College Cork	en
dc.rights	© 2017, Jenny Coughlan.	en
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/	en
dc.subject	Bede	en
dc.subject	Gregory of Tours	en
dc.subject	Medieval women	en
dc.subject	Anglo-Saxon women	en
dc.subject	Merovingian women	en
dc.subject	Medieval historiography	en
dc.thesis.opt-out	false
dc.title	Saints and scandals: representations of elite women in the writings of Bede and Gregory of Tours	en
dc.type	Doctoral thesis	en
dc.type.qualificationlevel	Doctoral	en
dc.type.qualificationname	PhD (Arts)	en
ucc.workflow.supervisor	d.scully@ucc.ie