1413 Quotes

“[...] In a rather sad and humiliating scene we see the couple celebrating Midsummer Eve in 1413. Her husband asks:

'Margery, if there came a man with a sword who would slice off my head unless I should have sex with you as I have done before, tell me the truth from your conscience — for you say you will not lie — whether you would allow my head to be sliced off or allow me to be intimate with you, like in the past?' She replies, 'Truthfully, I would rather see you be slain than that we should turn again to the impurity of sexual activity.'

She goads him further, asking why he won't try to have sex with her, even though they sleep in the same bed. He says: 'He became so afraid when he touched her that he dared not do more.' A far cry from the domineering husband we might expect from a medieval marriage. Margery adds insult to injury, explaining that she still lusts after other men but is sickened by her own husband.”
― Janina Ramírez, Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, Through the Women Written Out of it