Sex and the Early Modern Public House

Seminar questions

 

• In which ways did the worlds of public drinking and sexuality intersect?
• Did public houses foster the 'sexualization' and 'marginalization' of women in early modern society?
• DEBATE: Were early modern public houses a 'mass school' for illicit sexual activities?

 

Core reading

 

Martin, A. Lynn, Alcohol, Sex and Gender in Late Medieval and Early Modern EuropeLink opens in a new window (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2001), esp. chapters 'Sex & Alcohol' and 'Alehouses, Taverns and Prostitutes'

 
E-resources

 

• The Diary of Samuel Pepys (online edn) contains many amorous adventures: see e.g. Thursday 9 July 1663, 15 November 1664 or 20 April 1666 and search using terms like 'alehouse' ...
• Many tavern-related sexual offences appear in jurisdictional records like e.g. Hitchcock and Shoemaker, Old Bailey Proceedings 1674-1834 (for late 17/18thC London) or the consistory court minutes of the Reformed rural parish of Neuenegg (Bern/Swiss Confederation, late 17thC)
• Extracts from primary and secondary materials relating to Geneva, Florence, England, Nuremberg and the Swiss Confederation
• e-lecture: Catherine Ellis, 'Food and Sex Work in Eighteenth-Century Paris' (recorded for Durham MEMSA Community Course, 2021), highlighting the role of cabarets, cafés and restaurants alongside markets, butcher shops and brothels

 
Further Reading

 

Beneder, Beatrix, Männerort Gasthaus? Öffentlichkeit als sexualisierter Raum (Frankfurt,
1997)

Classen, Albert (ed.), Sexuality in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Times (Berlin, 2008), e.g. chapter 'Sausages, Nuts & Eggs'

Dabhoiwala, Faramerz, The Origins of Sex: A History of the First Sexual Revolution (2013)

Foyster, Elizabeth, Manhood in Early Modern England: Honour, Sex and Marriage (London, 1999)

Flather, Amanda, Gender and Space in Early Modern England (Woodbridge, 2006)

Gowing, Laura, Domestic Dangers: Women, Words, and Sex in Early Modern London
(Oxford, 1998)

Ingram, Martin, Church Courts, Sex and Marriage in England, 1570-1640 (Cambridge, 1987)

Naphy, W. P., Sex Crimes: From Renaissance to Enlightenment (2004)

Rocke, Michael, Forbidden Friendships: Homosexuality and Male Culture in Renaissance Florence (1996)

Wiesner, M., Christianity and Sexuality in the Early Modern World: Regulating Desire, Reforming Practice (2nd ed, 2010) [survey work illustrating the broader thematic & chronological context]

Sigmund Freudenberger, 'Scene outside a Wine Cellar' (drawing, late 18thC). Kunstmuseum Bern.