‘Defending the castle like a man’: on belligerent medieval ladies

Abstract

Contemporary evidence shows that between roughly the eleventh and fourteenth centuries noble women not only defended and built castles and commanded troops, but sometimes even partook the fighting. In fact, the examples of women being involved in warfare are so numerous it cannot be doubted that they must have received some sort of military education. This article is concerned with the question why medieval sources, if female participation in war acts was indeed so widespread, played down this female involvement to the point of hushing up women’s roles role in military events almost completely. It will be suggested that the main reasons for this were, one, that is was considered very unladylike to fight, even though it was a necessary evil when things got out of hand, and, two, that the necessity for women to fight reflected badly on the men. The least said about female participation in warfare was therefore considered the better.