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What Did Women Do During The English Renaissance

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Recommended: Elizabethan era women's roles

Alexis Hill
Mrs. Imboden
Honors English 9
21 February 2023
Life for Women During the English Renaissance It is a myth that women during the English Renaissance were meek and powerless. Some say they were strong-minded and fearless. Most men could not have done their jobs without the help of a woman. In the 16th century, women had an abundance of duties and responsibilities however, men saw women as inferior to them, and the only exception to this was Queen Elizabeth. In contra, not all women had the same jobs and responsibilities because they based their lives on social order. It was believed that God had formed these social ranks and that he blessed some, more than others. During the English Renaissance, the daily life of women was vastly different between the upper, middle, and lower classes. Upper-class citizens were sought out to be the most superior group of women during the English Renaissance. They were the wealthiest and known to live extravagant lives …show more content…

High-class women were the most wealthy and they had an abundance of luxurious chattels. Nonetheless, what elite women gained in worldly items, they lacked in their ability to have freedom and independence. Middle-class women made up most of the working class. They were the ones who were trained on specific trades to work and support their family. They were able to live comfortably, and although not all was easy, they had adequate lifestyles. On the contrary, the women of the peasant class had debatably the hardest lives. They worked tirelessly throughout the year, helping their husbands with their jobs, while still keeping the house and family in order. During this time, the class one was born into was ultimately where they stayed for the rest of their life. Social order made everyone's lives extremely different, and even after centuries, these ideas are still alive

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Working class women, on the other hand, had to work to ensure the survival of their family. Working in factories and in domestic services as maids were common jobs, but aside from that, it was uncommon for many women to have jobs. Being brought up into the world of male supremacy, women stayed home and looked after

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Furthermore, both the aristocrats and middle class were able to afford luxuries and could educate their children. Women of these classes were also not required to work but often watched over the affairs of the families plantations since the men were busy in government or other

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The upper-class women were at a high level that could afford things that the poor women couldn’t. Upper-class women were held to their homes or the court. There were people that had to go along with them when they had to go to the market, church, or special civic or religious events. Poor people, women's such as those called middle-class women spent a lot of time working in fields if they were peasants or in households if they were servants. The church defined kin as having a relationship through marriage or consanguinity as being of the same blood or origin, and advantageous in-law relationships were the main reason for many marriages.

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(2016).Only women of the highest class were given the chance to distinguish themselves, and this only rarely. Unlucky women, such as peasant women had to work in the field and run the home all in the same day for continuous days (Italian Renaissance (1330-1550) (2017). With all this working women were not even allowed to work by themselves or even live alone (Gender Roles of Women in the Renaissance. (2016).Being a women in the middle age probably made you wish you were a teenager

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