Category:Women Authorship--1600s

The page: Women Authorship--1600s, includes (in chronological order) scholarly and fictional works on Second Temple Judaism (Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Origins), authored by Women in the 17th century, or from 1600 to 1699.

Elizabeth Cary

Artemisia Gentileschi

Margaret Fell

Madeleine de Scudéry

Jeanne-Marie Guyon

The Tragedy of Mariam, the Fair Queen of Jewry (1604) by Elizabeth Cary was the first original tragedy by a woman written in English and the earliest English handling of the story of Herod and Mariamne, based on Josephus.

In Italy Artemisia Gentileschi distinguished herself as one of the most accomplished painters of her generation. Her favorite subjects were female biblical characters, like Judith, Susanna, Elizabeth and Mary of Nazareth.

Great sensation caused in 1642 the publication of the Lettres de Bérénice à Titus by Madeleine de Scudéry. The sister of French novelist Georges de Scudéry received an abnormally well-rounded education for a woman of her time, not only in the arts but also in ancient history and languages. She reinvented the characters of Titus and Berenice as fictional protagonists of one of the most intriguing love story of antiquity.

In 1666 for the first time Quaker leader Margaret Fell openly reclaimed the right of women to preach. A generation of women mystics would emerge in those years.

In Spain, under the leadership of Maria de Agreda, the convent of Agreda established itself as one the centers of Spanish spirituality. The charismatic abbess wrote in 1637-43 and 1655-60 the Mística Ciudad de Dios, a biography of Mary of Nazareth, from her conception to her assumption to heaven, based on visions the author supposedly had from Mary herself. The book was published posthumously in Madrid in 1670.

In France Jeanne-Marie Guyon published her first mystical commentaries to the Bible and so did Jane Lead in Britain with her books of visions.

The work of these women arouse great controversy and was met with strong opposition. Margaret Fell and Jeanne-Marie Guyon experienced persecution and imprisonment. The visionary work of Maria de Agreda was initially condemned by the Inquisition in 1681 (being eventually approved only in 1729). And yet, thanks to their pioneering works, the voice of women was heard for the first time in the Church in Europe.

@2015 Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan

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