Women's Role In The Middle Ages

The Middle Ages were known as the most religious time period, where the Catholic Church played a significant role and people were constantly praying. The Catholic Church and the Catholic Religion dominated Europe during Medieval Times. Religion’s purpose was to purify society and to dominate the world, ridding the world of Jews and Muslims. The Church was very powerful and had a lot of influence over the beliefs of the people. The Roman Catholic Church was quite wealthy, had political power, and had much influence over the peoples lives, including art, architecture, and education. A woman's role in society required her to be subservient to a man and seems as if her role was to also have no political rights. Her family's social standing determined

The wife is characterized as a greedy woman that is quite elegant. Chaucer identifies the wife as exaggerated with a strong opinion on continuing to remarry. In the Middle Ages, it was inconceivable for a woman to marry more than once, and she would be considered unholy. The wife is proud that she has had five husbands when she states “Of husbands at the church door I’ve had five”(Chaucer 6). She insinuates that she is an expert on marriage and believes that she is in a position of power over the husband, which mocks the fact that in reality, women in society were powerless. Chaucer creates a woman that is anything but powerless, therefore mocking the Medieval social system. Moreover, Chaucer utilizes irony to criticize the Church’s view on virginity when Alice declares, but “were organs made for reproducing man/Who’s made in such a wise and perfect way?/They were not made for nothing, safe to say”(116-118).Chaucer portrays Alice as not fitting the mold of a perfect person because she is not a virgin. He criticizes the church with the Catholic Church’s belief on virginity. This is satirical because of the irony that if one is a virgin, they cannot reproduce, but one is given the organs to do so. The satire shines the light on the church teachings of remaining pure. Chaucer’s creation of Alice mocks what the society believed in based off the bible. Chaucer continues to manipulate the teachings of the Catholic Church when Alice states, “For as the Apostle says, then I am free/To wed in God’s name when it pleases me./It’s no sin to be married.../For if you’re burning, better to be wed”, (53-57). The wife supposes it is better to be sinning against one’s lord if one is married then to not be sinning at all. Even though it is against the Catholic religion, the wife has been married five