A few things for International Women's Day
Magdalene College Cambridge has discovered a treasure trove of women’s intellectual history (I am always narked at claims of 'Ahead of Her Time' when obviously she was very much part of it): and I will describe this as 'lost in the patriarchal stacks of an institution which did not admit women until 1988': The college was the last to accept female students in 1988 - a decision that was greeted by protestors wearing black armbands, in the fine old Cambridge tradition towards gurlz treading on their territory...
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Okay, we may be talking different kinds of circles, in different places, that would not necessarily have overlapped, but I am always going to raise my eyebrows just a little when women getting together to discuss things that aren't just gurleee things is unusual and rad: we know about this because she was high profile and records survive, even if people have concentrated on Mancini's position as Royal Nooky: Restoration influencer: how Charles II's clever mistress set trends ahead of her time: Hortense Mancini’s celebrated London salon allowed her female peers the freedoms men enjoyed. I am also, was this really ahead of her time rather than maybe bringing the culture of the precieuses to London?
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The future Prince Regent/George IV - horrible entitled upper-class creep, Y/N? This is not a love story: Mary Hamilton and George IV. That sounds like an awful enough job (Fanny Burney found attendance at court ennuyant in the extreme) without being pursued by a horny adolescent with masses of privilege: [A] woman of Hamilton’s class wasn’t trained or conditioned to work for a living - and so, she had no ability to generate her own income. If she wanted to be a part of the thriving social and intellectual culture of London - which, being intelligent and sociable, she did - she’d need to either marry a man who could support her, or else stay single but live very frugally and rely on the generosity of friends who would offer her hospitality, introductions and favours such as the loan of a carriage, books, or their servants’ services. Her ability to make that marriage or preserve those friendships - her social capital, if you like - derived largely from her reputation for virtue and respectability. It’s well-known that severe double standards operated in Georgian high society around the chastity of young men and young women, and that the ton could be ruthless to young women whose virtue was in question. Any whisper of an illicit liaison with the Prince would have cast Hamilton as an immoral gold-digger, incurred the wrath of the King and Queen, shocked and alienated her friends, and tarnished her marriage prospects for good.
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I thought this was going to be ho-hum, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu revisited - The women who pioneered vaccines throughout history - and it does include her discovering variolation in Turkey and introducing it in Britain: but it also includes a number of Jenner-fans I had not heard of. They are referred to somewhat misleadingly as 'aristocratic': Women like Jane Marcet (1769-1858), best known for her ‘Conversations on Chemistry’, (1806), wrote in support of the vaccine. Or like Lady Charlotte Wrottesley, whom Jenner described as an “early pupil”, and who, under his instruction, vaccinated thousands of poor children in Staffordshire. Or like Mrs Bayley of Hope Hall, near Manchester, who corresponded with Jenner and then set about vaccinating the poor in the surrounding area. Clearly an expert on public relations, Mrs Bayley promised 5s. to anyone who contracted smallpox after vaccination. She succeeded in vaccinating over 2500 people in Manchester and in that time only one (highly dubious) claim was made for that 5s.
Mrs Marcet!
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This is an older piece, but, like its subject, still relevant: 'How To Suppress Women's Writing:' 3 Decades Old And Still Sadly Relevant.
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