Abstract
Although for a long period of time Erasmus shared with many the prejudice that women were incapable of learning or being taught, at a certain point—following Thomas More’s successful teaching experience with his daughters—a significant change took place in his educational thought, namely the recognition that women are capable of learning, whether literary or religious studies. Furthermore, he now raised a voice to enhance their education. Apparently, this non-conventional intellectual stance did not prevent him from sticking to old traditional prejudices about the inferior nature of women. Thus, the love of literature may provide protection to women from yielding to their natural failings. Education may serve as a means to secure women’s chastity, to assure spotless behavior and protect her honor.
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Notes
- 1.
William Barker, review of Nathan Ron, Erasmus and the “Other”: On Turks, Jews, and Indigenous Peoples (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), in Renaissance and Reformation 43 (2020): 273–276 (275).
- 2.
For Erasmus’s main educational texts: CWE, vols. 23–24; Erika Rummel, The Erasmus Reader (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990), 51–122. For modern research, see Jean-Claude Margolin, Érasme, précepteur de l’Europe (Paris: Julliard, 1995); idem, “Erasmus 1467?-1536,” Prospects: The Quarterly Review of Comparative Education 23 1/2 (1993): 333–352; William Harrison Woodward, Desiderius Erasmus Concerning the Aim and Method of Education (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1904; paperback edition, 2013); Christine Christ-Von Wedel, Erasmus of Rotterdam: A Portrait (Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 2020), 17–22.
- 3.
J. K. Sowards, “Erasmus and the Education of Women,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 13 (1982): 77–89 (77).
- 4.
CWE 27, 95; ASD IV-3, 90: “[…] animal videlicet stultum quidem illud atque ineptum, verum ridiculum et suaue, quo conuictu domestico virilis ingenii tristiciam sua stulticia condiret atque edulcaret […] Quemadmodum iuxta Graecorum prouerbium simia semper est simia, etiam si purpura vestiatur, ita mulier semper mulier est, hoc est stulta, quamcunque personam induerit.”
- 5.
Erika Rummel (ed.), Erasmus on Women (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996), 3–4.
- 6.
Ibid., 4–5.
- 7.
CWE 8, 296; Ep. 1233: 51–53: “[…] nouo quidem hactenus exemplo, sed quod breui plures, nisi fallor, sint imitaturi: adeo feliciter succedit.”
- 8.
Ibid.; ibid.: 73: “Nullam illic videbis ociosam, nullam ineptiis muliebribus occupatam.”
- 9.
Ibid., 297; ibid.:106–107: “Etenim quum duabus rebus potissimum periclitetur puellaruni castitas, ocio ac lasciuis lusibus.”
- 10.
Ibid., 297; ibid.:117–118: “[…] ne minus habeant morigeras, si doctas habeant.”
- 11.
Ibid.,298 ; ibid.: 123–127: “Ad haec quum iucunditas firmitasque cuniugii magis ab animorum beneuolentia quam corporum amore profiscitur […] Magisque veretur maritum uxor quem agnoscit et praeceptorem.”
- 12.
Ep. 1404: 23–28; Sowards, “Erasmus and the Education of Women”: 77–89 (81).
- 13.
M. Heath, in CWE 69, 204 (introductory note).
- 14.
CWE 69, 423; ASD V-6, 236–237: “Sunt qui puellarum absolutam educationem existimant, si vsque ad nuptias sic inclusae teneantur vt nec aspieiant nee aspiciantur a viris, quum interim viuant inter stultas et ineptas mulierculas, vnde plus hauriunt corruptelae quam si cum viris agerent […] Vulgus ineptum existimant puellas institui literis, at qui sapiunt, comperiunt nihil esse vel conducibilius ad bonam mentern vel tutius ad pudoris custodiam […] Certe vigilantiorem custodiam requirit aetas puellae iam grandescentis quam pueri […] et animus est imbecillior.”
- 15.
CWE 69, 424; ASD V-6, 238: “Vis autem audire quam anxia custodia debetur pudicitiae virginis, docet hoc nos sapiens ille Sirach: Filii, inquit, tibi suni? erudi illos, et curua illos a pueritia illorum. Filiae tibi sunt? serua corpus illarum, et non ostendas hilarem [aciem tuam ad illas […] Imo quoniam vere diligis filias tuas, ob hoc ipsum dissimulabis hilaritatem vultus erga illas.”
- 16.
CWE 69, 400–401; ASD V-6, 219: “Duobus vitiis potissimum obnoxius est sexus muliebris. Appetit placere cultu; is affectus nascitur ex inanis gloriae siti. Deinde impatiens est iniuriarum auidusque vindictae. Hoc malum proficiscitur ab imbecillitate rationis et ignorantia verae celsitudinis […] Proinde mulier quoniam affectibus ducitur rebus externis metitur honestatem suam, et in his vinci non patitur.”
- 17.
CWE 69, 312; ASD V-6, 150: “[…] ita superstitione nihil praefractius. Ea pestis foeminis quam viris est familiarior. Est tamen aliqua leuis superstitio ad quam aequum est virum conniuere donec proficiat vxor.”
- 18.
CWE 69, 239; ASD V-6, 84: “Maritus foris vel in foro vel in republica vel in prouincia vel in negociatione versans auget patrimonium; uxor parta seruat ac dispensat, domi curans liberos teneros ac familiam. Eandem prouinciam gerunt maritus et uxor, sed habet suam vterque functionem.”
- 19.
CWE 69, 364; ASD V-6, 191: “Rursum maritus sic obsecundet vxori vt supercilium aliquando deponat, autoritatern nunquam; saepe comem sese praebeat, abiectum nunquam. Hoc praescribit natura, idem docent sacrae literae […]”
- 20.
CWE 69, 340; ASD V-6, 172: “Mulieres, inquit, subditae estote viris, sicut oportet, in Domino. Eoque natura toruum quiddam ac feroculum addidit maribus, blandum ac molle foeminis.”
- 21.
CWE 69, 342; ASD V-6, 174: “Recte igitur consulunt qui monent vt primus sponsae cum sponso congressus careat omni molestia.”
- 22.
CWE 69, 344; ASD V-6, 176: “Qua quidem in re monendae sunt virgines vt neque prouocent vltro sponsos suos ad coitum—minuit ea res amorem—neque petentibus nimium tetricas ac praefractas sese praebeant quorum illud.”
- 23.
CWE 69, 388–389; ASD V-6, 210: “[…] sed sobrietatis potius ac pudicitiae templum. Idem lectulus conscius sit precum viro cum vxore communium, vesperi quum itur cubitum et mane quum surgitur, qui conscius est permissae castaeque voluptatis.”
- 24.
M. Heath, CWE 69, 206 (introductory note).
- 25.
This survey is based on Jennifer Tolbert Roberts, CWE, 66, 178–180 (introductory note).
- 26.
CWE 66, 187; ASD V-6, 266: “Tanta malorum procella quem non virum deiiceret? At haec tempestas tam saeua, tam impia, tam atrox in te puellam incubuit. Philippi patris praematura mors, mox paterni maternique aui te paruulam adhuc pullatam reddidit. Nuper fleuisti Isabelam sororem, pro regina exulem, mox pro viua mortuam. Vidisti sororem alteram pro regina viduam.”
- 27.
CWE 66, 188; ASD V-6, 266: “Quae vero tam muliebri est animo, quam non pudeat impotentius discruciari, miserandis lamentationibus indecoras voces emittere, modo te conspiciat puellam sic natam, sic educatam atrocissimam sortem forti infractoque animo perpeti?”
- 28.
CWE 66, 219; 253 (respectively).
- 29.
CWE 66, 243–244.
- 30.
CWE 66, 193; ASD V-6, 272: “lam si spectemus exempla, pudet dicere, sed tamen res dilucidior est quam vt inficiari liceat. Plura propemodum religionis ac pietatis exempla suppeditat foeminarum ordo quam virorum.”
- 31.
For the Latin text: Henri Corneille Agrippa, De nobilitate et praecellentia foeminei sexus. Edition critique d’après le texte d’Anvers 1529. Préface de R. Antonioli. Etablissement du texte par Ch. Béné. Traduction de Mme O. Sauvage. Notes de R. Antonioli, Ch. Béné, M. Reulos, O. Sauvage. Sous la direction de R. Antonioli (Genève: Librairie Droz S.A., 1990). English translation: Henricus Cornelius Agrippa, Declamation on the Nobility and Preeminence of the Female Sex. Translated and edited with an introduction by Albert Rabil Jr. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996). For a discussion on Erasmus’s Judith, see Von Wedel, Erasmus of Rotterdam: A Portrait, 137–139.
- 32.
CWE 66, 191–192; ASD V-6, 271: “Christus certissimus autor sic in compendium redactam philosophiam coelestem nobis explanauerit, vt nulla aetas, nullus sexus, nullum ingenium hominis non huius docile sit, modo mentem adferat mitem, obsequentem ac tractabilem. Atque hoc ipsum Deus praestat homini, per quod docilis redditur, modo ne se subducat benignitati numinis.”
- 33.
CWE 66, 193.
- 34.
Ep 2133: 102–111: “Ab Helisabetha virgine salutem lubens accepi, quam illi multo cum foenore vicissim opto. Bellum est eum sexum ad prisca exempla sese postliminio recipere. Habemus Angliae Reginam foeminam egregie doctam, cuius filia Maria scribit bene Latinas epistolas. Thomae Mori domus nihil aliud quam Musarum est domicilium. Caesaris germana Maria Latinos codices habet in deliciis: cui nuper scripsi Viduam Christianam. Id effiagitarat a me quidam ecclesiastes illi charissimus. Scena rerum humanarum inuertitur; monachi literas nesciunt, et foeminae libris indulgent.” Sowards, “Erasmus and the Education of Women,” 81.
- 35.
Rummel, Erasmus on Women, 4.
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Ron, N. (2021). Erasmus on the Education and Nature of Women. In: Erasmus. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-79860-4_4
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