Housewives of Sixteenth-Century England

Upon first examination, Gervase Markham's The English Housewife (1615) appears extremely misogynistic. Markham gives detailed explanations of the numerous tasks, chores, and responsibilities that women were expected to perform and reasons why women are better suited for these tasks than men. After considering the vastness and intricacies of domestic tasks, one begins to wonder if Markham's observations about the housewife's duties were ultimately in praise of women's capabilities and in awe of the sheer scope of her talents. The diaries and letters of women during the early modern period show that although housework consumed a good portion of women's identity, this portion was not viewed negatively by women. The fact that housewives wrote about domestic chores at all implies their importance to women, and, surprisingly, their feelings toward housework betray a sense of pride if not simply a sense of duty and satisfaction. The letters of Maria Thynne and the diaries of Anne Clifford and Lady Margaret Hoby all make frequent addresses to their domestic lives and provide an adequate sampling of women's opinions about their own status as goddess of the home and also how their domestic lives compare to Markham's "ideal" English housewife.

Markham seems to have had a high respect for the completely necessary tasks that women as housewives had to carry out. Markham calls her, "our English housewife, who is the mother and mistress of the family" (7). Although this is a smilingly positive comment for Markham to make, he makes an implicitly negative comment at the same time: the English husbandman is the father and master of the family. He also attaches a possessive 'our' to the term housewife, declaring ownership over her and the work she must complete. While not altogether discrediting the housewife's importance to England, to the home, and to the husband, he does not set her above the husband's role and does not necessarily even consider her role equal in value. She is a woman, after all, and what he talks about in his book is women's work. Unsuitable for men to concern themselves with, but completely necessary for England's cultural survival and even a family's literal survival, the tasks that Markham describes in The English Housewife are designated as the calling of faithful wives.

Wendy Wall discusses Markham's The English Housewife in her book Staging Domesticity: Household Work and English Identity in Early Modern Drama (2002). Wall states that "the book forays beyond cooking, preserving, and distilling to include chapters on physic and surgery, spinning, woolmaking and dyeing, maltmaking, brewing, wine-making, and dairying" (26). The sheer size of the book and the vastness of its topics display that Markham understood the enormous talent and power that women exercised in the home. The book, although not necessarily helpful in its entirety, would have been a useful compilation of common recipes and remedies. According to Wall, the structure of the manual stresses Markham's desire to "preside over a newly Englished and systematized field of knowledge . . . the book is a reference tool for readers who, failing to find all of the advice useful, look to navigate efficiently through the text" (Staging Domesticity 39). Some parts of the handbook, however, describe tasks that were undergoing or had already undergone the process of industrialization. Markham's ideal home is one that could be completely self-sufficient, as Wall puts forth. She states that Markham's goal in writing The English Housewife "was to promote efficiency and thrift so that the English home can remain as insulated as possible from professionalization and the market economy" (26). Wall does not consider Markham to have been ignorant of the industrialization process; he knew that most women took their wool into town to be dyed and often could purchase malt rather than concoct it at home. Wall states that "although aware of these changes [of industrialization], Markham fantasizes that the housewife still controls all forms of production" (39). In this way, Markham's obsessively detailed examination of women's tasks and his insistence that these tasks be completed within the home do not necessarily prove him to be chauvinistic; rather, as Wall concludes, Markham viewed the housewife as capable of keeping England's economy afloat by keeping the main social structure, the family, completely self-sufficient.

Considering the difference between a manual and an actual practice, one must examine the writing of women during the early modern period in order to understand the general attitudes that were held concerning domesticity. The letters of Maria Thynne and the diaries of Anne Clifford and Lady Margaret Hoby offer an intimate view into the lives and concerns of three upper class housewives. By examining the letters and diaries of these upper-class English housewives, readers can understand that the activities of domesticity that these women performed were relatively pervasive in their lives. Women of the time were, of course, encouraged from all sides that following the calling of domesticity is the true road to happiness and fulfillment. Religion stringently stressed the importance of women's submission and servitude to her husband, who "is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church . . . Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything" (Ephesians 5:23-4). In this way, submission and obedience to the husband is considered a manner of worship to God for housewives, and any rebellion against the husband is as sinful as rebelling against God. In their book Women in Early Modern England (1998), Sara Mendelson and Patricia Crawford state that "While they prided themselves in running their households smoothly and sparing their husbands from trouble and anxiety, godly women were under no illusions: they work was of secondary importance" (311).

Even if women considered their work of secondary importance, the fact that women chose to write about domestic tasks in their diaries and letters proves that women considered these tasks to be important and worthy of writing down. Kim Walker describes the importance of diary and letter-writing to women in the early modern period in Women Writers of the English Renaissance (1996): "Suspended between 'life' and 'art,' the diary-or the letter-provides a space for the coalescing of experience and the self" (44). Maria Thynne writes letters to family members that include her daily experiences with domestic tasks, alluding to her pride in these tasks and also the overwhelming part that housework played in her life, even though she was relatively affluent. Anne Clifford's diary tells of her daily experiences, especially about her accomplishments with sewing. Her accounts include not only the performance of domestic duties but also a celebration of completing them, proving that Clifford enjoyed completing her projects even if she considered performing them a burden. Lady Margaret Hoby wrote her diary for mostly religious reasons, "outlining . . . periods of prayer, pious reading, and meditation before and after meals," but Hoby also chooses to include details about "other activities, household duties, and acts of charity that occupied the remainder of her time" (37). What begins as "the diary of one of God's chosen" quickly becomes "the diary of a busy gentle woman whose role is to support the public activities of her husband with her own domestic industry" (Walker 39). Hoby's valuing of her religious activities is blatantly evident in her constant and repetitive accounts of daily prayers, devotions, examinations, and sermons; the increasingly constant mention of her household tasks can also be seen as her changing opinion toward domesticity. Whether Hoby considered these tasks a burden or a privilege is not clear, but the importance of domesticity to Hoby as a housewife cannot be denied. In all of these cases, husbands, fathers, and other male authorities are downplayed; they will be mentioned in passing, but not involved with the domestic chores about which the women write.

One of the main responsibilities of women in early modern England was the production of textiles. Anything that was made of cloth fell into women's hands for creation and upkeep. Markham considers the manufacturing of textiles to be one of the most important of her duties: "Our English housewife, after her knowledge of preserving and feeding her family, must learn also how, out of her own endeavours, she ought to clothe them" (146). This statement, of course, places clothing her family below the housewife providing food and medical care. The task of creating clothing and other cloth-made objects should not be belittled, however. Sara Mendelson and Patricial Crawford write in Women in Early Modern England about women's work with textiles:

the care of linen was labour intensive. To wash lace, for example, involved a series of
activities spread over several days. Needlework was so pervasive an activity for a
gentlewoman that it was frequently referred to as her 'work'. Pillows, cushions, and bed-
hangings were produced by female labour. Recipes to preserve textiles from moths were
exchanged and included in the compendiums of household hints which literate women
compiled (309).

Men played a relatively insignificant role in the manufacturing of textiles. Markham even admits this by noting the following: "It is the office of the husbandsman at the shearing of his sheep to bestow upon the housewife such a competent proportion of wool as shall be convenient for the clothing of his family" (146). Once the husband dumps a pile of crude wool in his wife's lap, he has, in Markham's mind, every right to think he has held up his end of the deal. The rest of the process was considered the women's responsibility; cleaning and carding the wool, spinning it into thread or yarn, dying the wool into desired colors, weaving it into cloth, sewing it into clothing, washing, ironing, removing stains from, and mending the clothing all were the housewife's responsibility. If he has given her adequate wool to make the clothing, any lack of proper clothing in the family (including the servants) would have been considered the failure of the housewife to perform her duties.
Clothing in the early modern period played a somewhat more essential role in the health of the family; the cleaning of clothing prevented the infestation of parasites that could transmit potentially deadly diseases. The warmth that a well-sewn outfit provided could prevent the wearer from suffering from the harsh winter climate and, in turn, prevent the development of a serious illness such as pneumonia. If a woman was particularly talented at making clothing, she could use her talent to enhance her family's income. Anne Lawrence observes in Women in England 1500-1760 (1994) that "in many rural areas, women did specialized work which supplemented the family income, and which was separate from any household industry like textile manufacture" (119). Sewing, spinning, weaving, mending, washing, and ironing were tasks that consumed hours of any typical housewife's workday. A whole world of chores could circulate around just the production and maintenance of textiles, and women's diaries and letters certainly reflected this fact.

Anne Clifford might be considered the early modern version of a sewing machine; her references to sewing in her diary are numerous and sometimes repetitive, much like the actual tasks must have seemed to women of the time. Although these passages in her diaries are often brief, her language emphasizes the difficulty, pervasiveness, and importance of these tasks to her life as a gentlewoman and housewife: "Upon the fourth day I sat in the drawing chamber all the day at my work" (75). Working all day at the same task could be very difficult, especially if the task were not particularly interesting or varied. The fact that the activity consumed an entire work day, which is a very long period of time, exemplifies how pervasive work with textiles actually was to women in the early modern period. The importance of work with textiles is also stressed in this brief entry because if the work was not considered a priority, Clifford would not have devoted an entire day to it. Other tasks were no doubt vying for her attention, but she remained steadfastly attentive to one until its completion: her "work" with cloth. In another entry Clifford writes, "I wrought very hard and made an end of one of my cushions of Irish stitch work" (72). The "very hard" adverb in this entry was not an exaggeration. The Irish stitch was a fashionable embroidery stitch that covered the entire surface of the cloth; this particular stitch involved delicate patterns and numerous colors, both of which would add to the time spent in creating such a delicate piece of textile.

Clifford writes again about Irish stitch in this entry: "Upon the 28th we made an end of dressing the house in the forenoon, and in the afternoon I wrought Irish stitch and my Lord sat and read by me" (75). While the housewife could participate in the entertainment of a group reading, she was still expected to be carrying out a useful assignment. The housewife was not permitted to simply enjoy recreation activities; housework even followed the wife through these relatively 'relaxed' periods in her day, even if these periods were scarce. Sometimes when work was scarce, which was probably a rare occasion indeed, women felt obligated to entertain themselves with the very tasks that already consumed so much of their lives. Clifford writes again concerning the Irish stitch: "Upon the twelfth I made an end of the long cushion of Irish stitch which my coz. Cecily Neville began when she went with me to the bath, it being my chief help to pass away the time to work" (76). Working was considered one of the only valid ways to pass time for women, and the manufacturing of textiles seems to be Clifford's work of choice.

Textiles were involved in Clifford's life in other ways, too. Women were also responsible for the upkeep of the home and the preparing of certain rooms for specific tasks. She writes this passage after a funeral has taken place in her home: "Upon the 24th in the afternoon I dressed the chamber where my Lady died and set up the green velvet bed, where the same night we went to lie there" (75). The specific mentioning of the "green velvet bed" proves Clifford's involvement with the task; she was responsible for the way the room looked for the funeral, which was considered a very significant in the early modern period. Work with sewing could also involve a certain sentimentality to women. Clifford recalls, "Upon the 22nd I did string the pearls and diamonds left me by my mother into a necklace" (76). Making this necklace, although certainly classified as a domestic task involving textiles, offered a creative and emotional outlet for Clifford, allowing her to incorporate her family heritage and her skills as an artist into a piece of jewelry that could be worn with pride.

Lady Margaret Hoby also wrote about sewing and textiles in her diary. One entry in particular stands out as a testament of her toil: "After I had prayed I wound yarn till dinner time" (74). Winding yarn, just one task in the list of chores that involved the making of clothing, consumed one entire morning's worth the work. Even though this task is obviously second priority to her religious practices, sewing and other cloth-related tasks were considered very important and worthy of the housewife's time and effort.

The second responsibility that housewives were expected to tend to was the production, preparation, and presentation of food. Although the husband played a large role in the production of meat and vegetables, women were often in charge of the house's garden and the butchering of animals for meat. Very far from a modern perspective of the kitchen as a clean and tame environment, the kitchen in early modern England involved blood and gore as often as it involved spices. In Staging Domesticity: Household Work and English Identity in Early Modern Drama, Wall guesses that "part of the pleasure of housework, then, might involve the fantasy of taming, displaying, barbing, and splatting bodies" (4-5). A woman could assert herself physically inside the kitchen, violently mastering the meat and fibers of the food she was preparing for her family. She also expressed some power in being able to provide nourishment for her family, which Markham suggests is the housewife's most important duty. He argues that having a knowledge and talent about cooking was the housewife's "first and most principle duty" (60). Markham believes this for two reasons: one, cooking is "a duty really belonging to a woman" and two, the housewife that cannot cook well "can then but perform half her vow; for she may love and obey, but she cannot serve and keep him with that true duty which is ever expected" (60). Performing her sexual and social duties is not sufficient to uphold the wife's end of the marriage bargain. It would appear that to Markham that a wife's knowing her way around the kitchen would come as a close second to her fidelity in marriage, or perhaps even tie with it. Markham admits that not just any woman can be particularly efficient in the kitchen: "she must not be butter-fingered, sweet-toothed, nor faint-hearted; for the first will let everything fall, the second will consume what it should increase, and the last will lose time with too much niceness" (64). According to Markham, a wife could not be clumsy, gluttonous, or squeamish these qualities would inhibit her ability to perform her duty efficiently. The mention that she could not be "faint-hearted" is especially interesting because it admits the particular brutality that activities in the kitchen involved on a regular basis.

Wendy Wall notes that aside from pleasing the husband, which was no doubt the utmost goal in mind for every housewife, a talented performance in the kitchen could lead to social advancement for the housewife's family. Wall asserts that "housewifery, defined as the making of domestic objects, became one of several skills necessary for social advancement, including the crafting of expensive conserves and banqueting dishes that displayed conspicuous consumption and marked social status" (26). Being able to throw a party with grace, style, and delicious food was a sign a refinement; a woman who could cook very well could make her skills relatively famous and her husband socially popular. This fact only adds to the importance of food-related activities to women's lives.

Lady Margaret Hoby journals about a day that involved a large amount of work in the kitchen: "after I had dined I was busy in the kitchen and at my accustomed time went to private prayers and so to supper" (71). She writes again about a day mostly consumed with food-related activities: "After private prayers I was busy in the Kitchen Just as tasks with cloth could easily consume half of a work day, work in the kitchen was equally time-consuming. Work in the kitchen was a relatively contained process because women grew, harvested, prepared, cooked, and served the food to her family. The process could involve people outside the family, as Hoby illustrates in this entry: "after I walked a while and spake to John Dowson for Malt and so went to work till prayer time" (73). Malt was used for brewing beer, which was a woman's task according to Markham's text. Hoby used this instance to extend her duties in the kitchen to the world outside the home. She spoke with Dowson about the malt while out on a walk; in this way, this meeting could be described as a business discussion because beer-brewing was considered part of Hoby's business as a housewife, and she discusses the purchasing of malt with a person outside of her family. This assertion of power outside the home proves that women did not limit themselves to the kitchen. Although they were still carrying out their duties, the walls of the home were no longer a barrier that separated them from the rest of the world or belittled their jobs as homemakers.

In her letter to Joan Thynne, Maria Thynne writes, "I confess (without shame) it is true my garden is too ruinous, and yet to make you more merry you shall be of my council, that my intent is before it be better, to make it worse, for, finding that great expense can never alter it from being like a porridge pot, nor never by report was like other, I intend to plow it up and sow all variety of fruits at a fit season" (81). This passage is a housewife's own admission to failure at one particular aspect of her wifely duties. She is not ashamed at this failure and even defends her unsuccessful gardening by noting that no amount of time or effort could bring the garden to its rightful order. Instead of apologizing for her shortcomings in her garden, she presents her proposal for its improvement; these improvements are tasks she plans to do herself, and she obviously expresses some pride in the plan.

Women's third responsibility in the home was the prevention and treatment of illnesses and injuries. Anne Lawrence states that "women were responsible for much of the treatment of illness in the household, and they had at their command considerable numbers of home-made remedies for the commoner complaints" (104). Women truly held the keys to life and death during the early modern period because they were often the only person in the household to diagnose, prescribe, and administer treatment to an invalid; her medical administrations could be needed for toothaches, childbirth, broken bones, infectious wounds, and contagious sicknesses. Anne Laurence notes that even though the health and survival of her family was entirely in the housewife's responsibility, "there was no training for nursing . . . Caring for the very young, the old and the sick fell to women. Nursing was considered not just a woman's work, but her duty... Caring for the sick or the old, since it generally took place at home, was seen as part of women's normal activities" (137). This responsibility, even more than the cooking, helped bring women's authority outside the walls of the home into the community, allowing the housewife to share her expertise in administering medicine. Laurence states, "as an extension of their household responsibilities, some women became known in their communities for their skill in medical matters...This kind of help added to women's authority in the community" (104-5). Women who were renowned for their skills in birthing children, for example, would be called upon to aid other women in the community during their childbirth experiences. Laurence further states that "After members of the household, the most important part in the care of the sick was by local women who had a reputation for knowledge in medical matters. These self-employed [women] might be paid by the parish for caring for the local poor" (138). These women could be considered professionals in their area of expertise, and their authority could extend out into the larger community instead of remaining tied to her home and husband.

Wendy Wall discusses the psychological effects of women's medical treatment on both the housewife and her patients. Wall writes that "the ailing human, waiting to ingest home remedies, might well have quivered in the face of the housewife, who so evidently had her finger on the pulse of life and death" (4). According to Wall, when the husband was well, he was the king of his castle, but when he was under the weather, "he found himself in the uncomfortable position of submitting to his wife's and servant's medical ministrations" (7). Markham obviously felt uncomfortable with this idea, as most men of his time did. He comments that although "the preservation and care of the family touching their health and soundness of body consisteth most in her diligence . . . the depth and secrets of this most excellent art of physic is far beyond the capacity of the most skillful woman, as lodging only in the breast of the learned professors" (8). Of course, these 'learned professors' would be male. During the industrialization, the medical field was gradually being yielded to men as the women's medical practices, although tried and true for the most part, were considered unscientific and rudimentary. Although Markham belittles women's role as doctor to her family and community, his list of home-made remedies extend from the purely cosmetic, such as teeth whitening, to the gravely serious, such as ointments for serious burns and concoctions to ease child birthing. Very few possible medical treatments are left out of Markham's detailed chapter on physic, proving that the 'learned professors' had not yet taken over women's responsibilities and power completely.

In her diary, Anne Clifford presents a difficult situation of administering to a patient over long distance. Clifford writes, "the afternoon came Humphry Goddings son with letters that my mother was exceeding ill, and as they thought, in some danger of death, so as I sent Rivers presently to London with letters to be sent to her and certain cordials and conserves" (68). Even when Clifford was not physically present to observe her mother's illness, she trusts her own abilities as an expert in medicine enough to prescribe treatment that she sends to her mother. Her treatment does not remain inside her home; when she hears of an ailment and knows how to treat it, the fingers of her talent extend far beyond the walls of her husband's house.

In a letter to her husband, Thomas Thynne, Maria Thynne expresses her concern about her husband because of rumors about the plague being spread. Instead of begging him to return home, she believes that her husband will trust her medical advice. The manner in which she presents this recipe is particularly interesting. Rather than ordering her husband to take this remedy and flaunting her knowledge about the illness, she merely suggests a treatment that she knows has worked for others and expresses her deep love and concern for his well-being. Her letter reads as follows:

I have since thy going learned an approved medicine for the plague if it be used in time etc. take dragon water a good draught, and mingle therewith as much treacle or mettridott in quantity as an ordinary walnut, and add to this so much readdinge pounded as a great hazel nut (such readdinge as is given pigs for the murraine), stir all this together and drink it, if you do but never so little suspect your self, I know thou wilt laugh to hear me preach physic so long before hand, but consider medicine comes too late when the disease is past cure, good sweet be not without something to take in an instant, in good faith I assure you this hath been tried by many, if you could endure to eat in a morning but 3 or four leave of rue putt in to some raisins of the Sun, you would find it with god's help a good preservative against infection (77).

Thynne also allows her husband to take part in this remedy by allowing him to concoct it himself with her detailed recipe. Her loving humor-"I know thou wilt laugh to hear me preach physic so long before hand"-is then backed with a sage warning-"medicine comes too late when the disease is past cure." Thynne completes her responsibility as a wife even though her husband is away from the home. Her treatment leaks out of the home's walls and goes wherever she sends it.

Lady Margaret Hoby was often called upon to dress sores, which was apparently her area of expertise in her community. She writes in her diary: "I wrote notes in my bible of the chapters after I dressed the sore I had in hand" (75). Again she writes, "When I was come home I dressed some sores" (75). She administers the same type of treatment to two men in this passage: "after prayers and sermon I Came home and dressed Blackbourns foot . . . after sermon I dressed a poor mans hand and after that I walked a broad and so Came to private examination and prayer" (74). The housewife's medical responsibilities did not stop at her family, servants, and neighbors-she even administered to her husband's livestock since the treatments for injuries would have been nearly the same for animals as they were for people. Hoby writes: "After I had read and prayed I went about the house made a salve for a sore beast then I Came to work into my chamber and so went to dinner" (73). Women's knowledge and talent in the medical field made them supreme inside and outside their homes, allowing them to exert their power over life and death in a visible and important way.

Markham's text seems to reflect the beliefs and concerns of many of the men of his time. Framing women's responsibilities so they could and ought to be completed within the home was deemed of utmost importance to the husband. Controlling the manner in which she completed these tasks by writing detailed instructions for them may have been Markham's manner of regaining control over the large parts of existence that women dominated. In doing so, Markham admits his own awe, respect, and fear for women's power in the home. As the letters and diaries of Maria Thynne, Anne Clifford, and Lady Margaret Hoby illustrate, these tasks were difficult, time-consuming, and tedious. However, domestic tasks also helped women form an identity for themselves apart from their husband. If they excelled in a field of domesticity, their influence could extend over her husband and even over the community. Far from being restrictive, the domestic tasks involving textiles, food production, and medical treatment enabled women in early modern England to be who they really were: the goddess of the home.

Works Cited
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Markham, Gervase. The English Housewife. (1615) Ed. by Michael R. Best. Kingston: McGill-Queen's U P, 1986.
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Thynne, Maria. "Letter to Thomas Thynne." Trill 77.
---. "Letter to Joan Thynne." Trill 80-1.
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