Introduction

There is no doubt that married women in the Middle Ages were mostly subject to patriarchal rule, being generally forced to submit under their husbands following social and familial pressure. This general statement, however, does not really take us very far in our critical assessment because apart from the nominal rule by the pater familias, there were countless situations that did not comply with the presumed norm. Noble ladies often held enormous power as individuals and were regarded as co-regents with their husbands, if they did not rule by themselves after the king’s death. Once a husband had died, many women inherited all the property and rose impressively in wealth and power. In the religious world, we know of countless nuns, abbesses, mystics, beguines, and anchorites who certainly held their own and were widely respected by society at large. Of course, they were not married and so did not have to contend with a male partner, but they still demonstrated how much influence medieval women could exert depending on the circumstances. Even in a very repressive society, absolute dominance by one gender over the other can barely if at all be confirmed unless the male authorities make huge and systematic efforts to repress women at large, as might be the case currently in Afghanistan (such as in 2026).

In the premodern era, the situation for women, either within marriage or outside, was certainly highly complex, but our modern criteria to assess those tend to be rather imprecise, generalizing, and in detail often even incorrect. Of course, we hear of wife beating in various sources, and also of rape, but it is pretty questionable whether those forms of domestic violence were actually approved by the male authorities – the laws against sexual violence were rather strict throughout medieval Europe – whether women could not defend themselves, or whether they did not find any support from an entire network. Both Wolfram von Eschenbach in his Parzival (the ‘Gawan’ books, ca. 1205) and Geoffrey Chaucer in his “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” (in his Canterbury Tales, ca. 1400) explicitly condemned sexual violence in very specific terms, and the same applies to medieval laws at large, among other textual evidence (such as Eike von Repgow’s famous Saxon Mirror, ca. 1225).

Both historical sources and literary narratives can assist us in a more finely tuned approach to this issue, although we will always have to accept a fairly high degree of contradictions within one and the same document or documents. As research has already broadly recognized, we cannot simply assume that there were, throughout times, stark gender conflicts, when in reality, a gender discourse has always been in place, as convincingly developed by Joan W. Scott. She strongly appeals to us: “We need a refusal of the fixed and permanent quality of the binary opposition, a genuine historicization and deconstruction of the terms of sexual difference. We must become more self-conscious about distinguishing between our analytic vocabulary and the material we want to analyze. We must find ways (however imperfect) to continually subject our categories to criticism, our analyses to self-criticism” (Scott 1986, 1065).As Maanvender Singh and Aqsa Aghaappropriately summarize: “Gendered discourses highlights the relationship between knowledge about sex and gender and power relations. This relationship must be implicitly positioned within normalized assumptions and generalizations as it is not directly expressed in their meaning. Such as different communication styles or vocabularies of men and women, heterosexual desires, gender-specific pronouns, and discourses of parenthood, to name a few” (Singh and Agha; no date; online). The differences in social classes also would have to be taken into consideration because peasant women certainly fared differently than noble ladies. Scholarship on this topic is rich, varied, extensive, but also somewhat contradictory because the focus could easily shift depending on the source selections.

Materials and Methods

It is one of the banes of humanity that people tend to turn to domestic violence within the private sphere. This has already been discussed by many different scholars, but the problem is not easily tackles, if it ever can be overcome. But we are in a fairly good situation to examine the conditions, the history, the reflections on domestic violence, and this both in modern and medieval literature. Even though the European Middle Ages were deeply determined by patriarchy, the available literary evidence paints a rather mixed picture. This paper will take up a selection of highly popular verse narratives (mæren) by the Middle High German poet Der Stricker (The Knitterer) where we observe an intensive debate about the standard gender relationship as it evolved within marriage. The critical analysis of the poet’s many diverse and even contradictory comments will reveal the extent to which fear, aggression, but then also personal weakness were relevant factors in that discourse. Moreover, by discussing the various poems, we will recognize how much the issue – gender violence, gendered authority – was of great relevance already in the Middle Ages, as mirrored by many different poets. After a discussion of a variety of major literary texts where the topic emerges explicitly, the paper will focus on the works by Der Stricker as a relevant voice that has not yet been adequately discussed in that context.

Results

The interpretation of a number of different verse narratives by Der Stricker will illustrate how problematic all discussions of domestic violence have been, and this already in the Middle Ages. We will recognize how much this poet both adulated and abhorred women at the same time, giving much praise to smart and even wise wives and condemning them for their slyness and deceptiveness. We can thus identify here ‘classical’ examples of the discursive nature of the topic of gender relationship and violence.

Research Overview

Diane Bornstein, for instance, states in an exemplary fashion what we could mostly identify our consensus: “For most women, marriage was the only available career. The only choices open to aristocratic women were to marry or enter a convent. A father or a rich male relative provided an upper-class girl with either a dowry to buy her a husband or a contribution to gain her entrance into a convent. . . . The middle-class girl either married or was apprenticed to a trade, but she was in a much better position as the wife or widow of a tradesman” (Bornstein 1983, 46-47). Moreover, she also introduces women as rulers and women as workers, whereas rural women are not profiled here. Curiously, even though we easily find tremendous if not horrifying expressions of medieval misogyny, this does not mean at all that those male comments have to be taken as reflections of actual social conditions. As R. Howard Bloch has already warned us more than two decades ago, “as long as we are satisfied merely to assert the resemblance, or even the reciprocity, of the twin essentializations of woman as absolute evil and absolute good, our own analysis risks falling into the trap of re-essentializing of the feminine” (Bloch 1991, 165). Undoubtedly, marriage has always constituted a powerful institution which fathers utilized to consolidate their personal power and that of their dynasty/family, and it was mostly the norm that they decided whom their daughters would marry, as Dick Harrison noted regarding the early medieval period (Harrison 1983, 348). Later in their lives, however, when women were widowed, they commonly held much more power over their own lives than before, which Harrison also confirms and what more recent scholarship has also observed extensively (Fischer2002; Kruse 2007;Foerster 2018;Cavallo and Warner, eds., 1999).

Whatever the concrete situation on the ground might have been, the Church viewed marriage as a sacred institution determined by the “idea of companionship and love,” though the women were supposed to submit unto their husbands, at least according to Saint Paul’s letter (5:28) (Shahar 1983, 66). Shulamith Shahar points out, for instance, that as much as Christ was the head of the Church, so the husband was the head of the wife (Shahar 1983, 67). It is also worth noting, as she adds: “Concomitantly with this description of marriage as resembling the ties of Christ to the Church, we find the reverse image: of the links between Christ and the Church resembling those between man and wife, and evoking of images from the sphere of marriage and even erotic images to picture the Church establishment and the religious experience” (Shahar 1983, 66). Nevertheless, as Jonathan Seelye Martin has now observed, both the theological and the literary discourse during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries more or less insisted on the ideal of a harmonious relationship between husband and wife without him exerting absolute power, and with the young woman credited with the authority to make up her own mind before she agreed to a marriage (Martin 2025).

The most influential legal scholar during the twelfth century, Peter Lombard, had, for instance, emphasized that Eve had been created out of Adam’s rib because Eve had not been supposed to dominate him (creation out of his head) or because Adam would have been allowed to subjugate her (creation out of his foot) (LaPrete and Evergates 1999, 2). It is, after all, simply not true that medieval sources do not tell us enough about women and their social, moral, political, economic, and cultural conditions; yet, until recently, historians have not paid enough attention to women who only allegedly linger in the shadows of the past, whereas in reality they matter centrally in countless historical and literary documents, not to mention medieval artworks (Wilson and Margolis, eds., 2004). It is true that the public discourse during the early Middle Ages did not include major references to women and that only the emerging discourse on courtly love (troubadours and trouvères) ‘rediscovered’ women as a worthwhile topic Nevertheless, even in early medieval epics do we hear quite often about powerful, influential women, as regents or wives to the protagonists.

Of course, this dearth of critical perspectives has now changed quite radically over the last few decades, as the study by Henrietta Leyser, for instance, confirms (Leyser 1995, ch. 6). Entire encyclopedias have been dedicated to medieval women and female issues, including sexuality, health, marriage, widowhood, etc. (Leyser 1995, 14). But it seems that until today, we are often looking into these issues only from the outside and are not fully entitled to examine the emotional conditions closely enough. It is one matter to lament women’s hardship under a violent husband or their suffering from sexual violence (Classen 2011). It is another matter to analyze in depth the various narrators’ intentions, mindsets, perspectives, and agendas concerning the issue discussed in his/her text. There is no doubt that domestic violence was quite common in medieval society (Roberts, ed., 1998), but we cannot claim that this problem has lessened in a dramatic fashion in our own world, both East and West. It would be much more important to examine the responses to this violence both by the author of a specific text and the expected reaction among the audience. In other words, to be more informed and cognizant about the conflicts between the genders, especially within marriage, we need to gain more access to relevant documents from that time and recognize in that process the discursive nature of this relationship especially within marriage.        

Discussion

Gender Debate in Medieval Literature: A Few Impressions

When we examine the lais by the Anglo-Norman poet Marie de France (ca. 1160–ca. 1200), for instance, which are all situated within the world of the aristocracy, we encounter many examples of unhappy marriages, and at times indirect forms of violence, but Marie never talks about physical violence by the husband directed against the wife. There are cases of a very unhappy marriage because the old husband has basically bought his bride, such as in “Guigemar” and “Yonec,” and now keeps his wife basically as a prisoner. But in “Bisclavret,” where the husband turns into a werewolf three days per week, the wife betrays him and thus condemns him to stay in that beastly shape until he is given an opportunity by King Arthur to recover because his clothing are presented to him again in private. As a werewolf, Bisclavret knows exactly what had happened behind his back, so when he sees the knight who had helped his wife to steal the hidden clothes, he viciously attacks him, and when he encounters his former wife, he rushes up to her and bites off her nose as a punishment for her betrayal. Otherwise, however, there is no hint of physical violence involving this beast in whom the king actually recognizes a noble creature that deserves his respect (Waters, ed. and trans., 2018; the relevant research literature can be found there).

Nevertheless, when we turn to the near-contemporary Parzival, we hear of a bad case of violence against a women, though not within marriage – King Arthur in any of the countless pan-European romances highlighting him never acts out violently against his wife. When young Parzival appears at King Arthur’s court, Lady Cunneware, Duchess of Lalant, laughs about his odd appearance, which actually prophesies his future rise to the throne of the Grail kingdom, the court steward Keie badly beats her up as a punishment for her alleged misbehavior because he thought that this breaking of her silence was nothing but an insult to courtly demeanor. Parzival regards this as a serious insult but is not able to rush to her assistance, but later he avenges her thoroughly (Wolfram von Eschenbach 2018). Similarly, in Hartmann von Aue’s Erec, the first Arthurian romance in Middle High German literature (ca. 1170), based on Chrétien de Troyes’s Erec (ca. 1150), the male protagonist gets extremely angry at his wife Enite whom he blames for his own social failure to uphold the norms of the court, and then he abuses her increasingly harshly up to a point where he himself collapses following his fight against giants. A count takes both her and the seemingly dead husband with him and tries to force Enite to marry him. When she then screams in her desperation when the count begins to beat her, she awakens Erec out of his coma who then immediately comes to her rescue and escapes with her. From then on, the couple cooperates with each other in a loving and non-violent relationship based on mutual respect and love (Tobin, Vivian, Lawson, trans. with commentary, 2001.

Both the members of the Arthurian court and, as we must assume, the contemporary audience felt highly uncomfortable with Erec’s brutal behavior toward his innocent wife, but no one intervenes in explicit terms, despite all the criticism directed against the husband. We recognize here a familiar pattern of domestic violence that continues until today, with the social group on the outside not willing to get involved with the private affair of that couple, which makes it possible for the husband to continue completely untrammeled with his physical brutality.

One of the most (in)famous examples of the perennial conflicts within marriage can be found in Boccaccio’s collection of one hundred stories in his Decameron (ca. 1350) (McWilliam, trans., 1972/1995) It deserves to be touched on here as well before we turn to the actual focus of this paper because in this most unsettling story we are confronted with an extreme case of a husband’s cruelty against his wife. Marquise Gualtieri, the protagonist of the tenth story on day ten, at first does not want to marry because he is not interested in women or does not trust them, but then, being pushed by his counselors and friends, he finally decides on a poor peasant woman, Griselda, whose mother has already died leaving the impoverished family behind. Gualtieri is in serious doubts as to his wife’s loyalty and trustworthiness, so he puts her on a whole sequence of tough tests without her knowing that fictional situation. He takes away both their children without letting her know their destiny, and then he decides, at least seemingly, to dismiss Griselda and to marry another woman. This miserable female protagonist never speaks up against any of his mistreatments and only begs him to be kinder to the new and much younger bride who might not be as strong as she herself is. Only then does Gualtieri reveal his secret intentions and welcomes her back, now embracing her with full trust and confidence because she has demonstrated her full submissiveness under him. Although he does not abuse her physically, his cruelty is of a psychological kind, and thus probably an even worse case of male brutality against women (Cavallini 1980, 175–200).

Both Boccaccio’s contemporaries such as his friend Petrarch and countless other voices have protested against this highly misogynist narrative, and in the course of time, Griselda has emerged as one of the most famous symbols of female suffering at the hands of their husbands (Rüegg2019;Aurnhammer and Schiewer, eds., 2010; Landi 2001; Classen 2026). We find ourselves in a highly ambivalent situation because the female protagonist proves to be extremely humble but also very strong as an individual who does not let the external conditions determine her character or personality. She is not emotionless and deeply suffers, but she does not let those feelings overwhelm her, keeping them consistently within her. At the same time, Gualtieri ‘only’ intended to test his wife’s loyalty but thereby performed in most cruel manner possible. And, in the end, the marquise completely turns around and embraces his wife full of love, just as Erec did with Enite in Hartmann von Aue’s romance (see above). Is there any justification for his behavior, and should that in itself serve as a model for other husbands?

Considering that Boccaccio presented a wide range of female characters with diverse influence, authority, and independence, and taking into account that the women storytellers comment very critically about this cruel husband, we just cannot take this final story in the Decameron at face value and ought to accept it as the poet’s ultimate provocation of his audience to engage in the same old discourse on gender relationships and the severe problematics of domestic violence (Santinelli-Foltz 2022). Granted, Gualtieri emerges as the dominant figure in physical terms since he as the marquis commands everything, especially in Griselda’s life, but the more he acts out his role as a virtually reckless husband, the less his contemporaries (intradiegetically) and the audience (extradiegetically) approve of him, even though this poor female victim cries tears of happiness once the truth has been revealed and the family has been reunited.

She seems to forgive him all his meanness toward her, recognizing it as his way of testing her (unnecessarily), but considering the highly discursive nature of the entire collection of tales in the Decameron, which ultimately asks us to get involved and respond to the materials and ideas presented, it would make the most sense to recognize here Boccaccio’s meticulously developed strategy to provoke and challenge us to think highly critically of domestic violence as something that really ought to be condemned outright (Cartlidge 1997).                 

In short, then, marriage proves to be one of the most significant topics in medieval discourse, both in theology and in history, both in art and literature (Brundage 1987). Both Andreas Capellanus with his highly complex and really contradictory treatise De amore (ca. 1185) and Christine de Pizan with her strong appeal to women to claim their own identity and political territory in her La cité des dames (1405), and countless other authors contributed to this centrally important issue. And if we widened our perspective, we would easily recognize the extent to which this discourse deeply determined the history of religion during the age of Reformation/Counter-Reformation and subsequent epochs (Classen 2008;Classen 2005;Nirenberg 1996).

Domestic Violence in Medieval Literature: The Case of Der Stricker

Every society defines itself through its approach to and handling of violence, both in the Middle Ages and today, whether this pertains to external wars, domestic conflicts, social tensions, or civil unrest. Not surprisingly, whenever we hear medieval poets addressing the issue of marriage, violence hardly ever tends to stay away far enough as not to matter critically, as I have established so far. But we also need to recognize the full extent to which violence was hence a matter of a global discourse because so many power players clashed against each other (Skoda 2032;Spierenburg 2008;Classen, ed., 2004). Although many scholars have examined the history of women and marriage in the pre-modern world, one of the most influential voices in late medieval German literature has not yet been sufficiently considered. The Middle High German poet Der Stricker (fl. ca. 1220–ca. 1240/50) has long been recognized as a major figure during his time, especially because he created a wide range of texts in various genres (heroic, courtly, didactic, religious, erotic, etc.) (Resler 1994; Der Stricker, ed. Moelleken, 1973–1978).

Not surprisingly, he also addressed marriage numerous times, and hence also domestic violence, offering us an at first puzzling kaleidoscope of contradictory perspectives particularly regarding the constantly changing relationship between the genders (Moelleken 1974). Scholarship has already noticed this thematic emphasis (Classen 1991), but we still need to understand the dialectics of the poet’s strategy when he presented examples of a husband’s cruelty versus that carried out by a wife, all depending on the literary context and poetic intentions. Even though it first seems to be a clear-cut case regarding men’s complete control over their wives and their uninhibited tendency to resort to physical punishment under whatever circumstances, a careful examination will demonstrate that we really face a highly complex situation resulting from the poet’s realization that in marriage much depended on an individual’s character, self-reliance, authority, and personal strength (Martin 2025). Even in the case of Boccaccio’s Griselda, what mattered most was neither his violence nor her submissiveness, but her honor, virtues, independence, and her inner freedom. As G. Cavallini emphasizes: “Griselda è sottoposta . . . siribalta in un’esperienzacompletamentediversa, fatta di mite capacità di sopportazione, di umileubbidienza, di pazienza, di sublime semplicità, di eroismo puro e assoluto, in unaparola: di santità . . .” (187; although Griselda is repressed, she turns it into a completely different experience determined by a mild capacity to support, to display humble obedience, patience, sublime simplicity, pure and absolute heroism, in short, into sanctity).

To be sure, as Peter Strohschneider commented, “Der Stricker was one [of] the great innovators in medieval German literature” (Strohschneider2004, 112). Fully aware of the intense tensions within secular society and also among the contemporary theologians regarding the gender relationship and the significant role of marriage for the well-being of society (see now Martin 2025, though he limits himself to the great courtly romances from ca. 1170 to ca. 1220), he engaged in an elaborate discourse on individuality, power, subjugation, violence, but also love, mutual respect, rhetorics, communication, and role reversals. Whereas many historians have investigated women’s lives and social conditions through the lenses of chronicles, letters, and other documents (Erler and Kowaleski, eds. 1988;Newman Williams, M. and Echols , eds. 1994; Baker 1978; Giuducci 1980, Giesand Gies 1978;Evergates, ed. 1999), the literary evidence, such as those stories by Der Stricker, have not yet been adequately examined. His numerous verse narratives represent important sources for cultural history because they reflect, in one way or the other, the dominant discourse on marriage in the first half of the thirteenth century, which most scholars have not paid attention to (see the contributions to Olson and Kerby-Fulton, eds., 2005).

The large number of manuscript copies containing some, many, or even all of Der Stricker’s mæren confirms that these stories were widely read or performed and hence reached many different courtly audiences and subsequently also urban readers/listeners far into the late Middle Ages (for a comprehensive listing of all manuscripts containing his works, especially his mæren, see https://handschriftencensus.de/werke/366; last accessed on July 20, 2026). Here we encounter hilarious, terrifying, confusing, or surprising situations in married life, which altogether seem to have mirrored social reality more accurately than we might assume. It is certainly valuable to investigate exclusively what literary medieval German women produced (Brinker-Gabler, ed., 1988), but we should not ignore the other side in that process, that is, entertaining and didactic narratives by male authors who deeply appealed to their audiences particularly because they addressed most common concerns and satirized individuals and their words and deeds, that is, particularly within marriage. The case of Der Stricker proves to be highly relevant in that regard because he investigated conflicts in marriage on numerous occasions without simply taking one side, reflecting also on the various ways how men were supposed to treat and respect noble ladies.        

The Literary Analysis: Der Stricker’s mæren

In his “Frauenleben und Pfaffenleben” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 3.1, 1975, pp. 196–99), the poet outlines his global understanding of people and their moral and ethical development, comparing clerics with women. Everything depends on an individual’s decision to turn toward the good or the evil, so clerics might use all their learning either to live up to their expectations or to become the devil’s followers. The same would apply to women who could develop into the “allerbeste” (v. 30: the very best), or move into the opposite direction: “oderwirtdazallerbo(e)stewip” (v. 32; or she becomes the worst woman). In other words, there cannot be any stereotype in terms of gender, and this from a male perspective. If a woman manages to escape from being the object of rumors and can abstain from all seduction attempts, she has the potentials to be a supreme role model of virtues – certainly a remarkable statement by a thirteenth-century male poet granting women simply freedom to choose their own path through life, irrespective of their social class or legal standing.

In his “Frauenehre” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 1, 1973 no. 3, pp. 15–91), the poet laments that people no longer sing good women’s praise and view them rather with hostility and contempt without any real reason. In fact, he curses those who malign women simply out of hatred (vv. 178–79). Anyone with a clear understanding would know that women instill joy in men’s heart because they are so much filled with virtues: “und isteinlobelichezrecht, / dazeinetstlichsinnick man, / der vrowen lob gesprechenchan” (vv. 200–02; it is praiseworthy law that truly reasonable men can sing a song of praise on women). Moreover, in spiritual or religious terms, God created the woman to spread joy and dignity here on earth (vv. 222–30). In fact, the poet goes so far as to call upon his audience to join him in admiringand glorifying women as the crown of all creation:

DAZ reht ist mangen reht obe,
daz man die vrowen immer lobe.
ir lob sol sin ein steter ruf,
sit got der werlt ir lop geschuf,
zu dem suzestem done.
sie sint der vreude ein chrone. (429–34)

[This is the highest law/expectation
that we always give praise to women.
their praise ought to be a constant call
since God had created praise for the world
in the sweetest tones.
They are a crown of joy.]

In ever new images and phrases, the narrator intensifies his admiration of women who have the power to instill happiness in all people if they accept them and admire them. After all, there is no limit in their virtues and graces: “ir lip, irherze und ir mut, / die sint der trewen so vol, / daz man in nihtgelichen sol” (vv. 1236–38; their body, their heart, and their mind are so filled with loyalty that one cannot compare anyone to them). A man who would have the opportunity to gaze at any of those completely virtuous women would not be able to help himself but “werdeirinneklichen holt” (v. 1349; to fall in love with her). It remains inexplicable how God could have created such a perfect human being, filled with wisdom, smart, completely beautiful, and blissfulness in persona (vv. 1430–34).

Remarkably, women thus emerge as the critical disciplinary force helping men to control themselves and to learn civic behavior: “dazisteinschonervrowen list, / dazsi den wildengedanken, / irvriheit und irwanken / also benemenchunnen” (vv. 1524–27; it is the skill of beautiful women that they can remove men’s uncontrolled/wild ideas, their lack of discipline [freedom], and unsteadiness). Consequently, according to Der Stricker, since women “tuntiebaz und baz / und werdentdar an nimmerlaz, / sulnsi den pris behalten” (1581–83; perform better and better und never let go in that matter, they deserve to receive the [highest] reward).

Finally, concluding with a metaphoric image comparing the world of agriculture (plowing and growing grain) with human society, the narrator underscores that the world would not be able to survive due to the absence of women who create joy in people’s heart (vv. 1735–42). Without this “vreude” (v. 1758), knights would not deserve to live and are thus subject to an early death: “er sol anevreudesterben” (v. 1761; he will die without any joy). Insofar as this joy results from women, knights who disregard or even slander women, will succumb to his demise v. 1781). Hence, many women would suffer innocently from mistreatment or disrespect, and without women, all joy would disappear from the world (vv. 1801–02).

Altogether, as he states, he pays greatest respect to any (good) woman who deserves more praise than twenty men (v. 1860). They are characterized by more goodness than the poet can even identify (vv. 1865–66). The man who would not respect women in God’s name, would actually disrespect himself and not live a good life: “sin herzeist immer leides vol” (v. 1884; his hear is always filled with grief). The poem concludes with the almost hypertrophic formulation: “von irminneclichengotheit / wirtnochvilwundersgeseit” (vv. 1895–96; people say still many wondrous things about woman’s divine love).

When we then turn to some other mæren by the same poet, we are considerably shocked because Der Stricker could easily pursue a very different perspective, such as in his “Die eingemauerte Frau” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 4, 1977, no. 118, pp. 91–107). Despite the complexity of this story, we can easily summarize the essential features that shed gruesome light on a husband’s treatment of his wife, almost as in the last story of Boccaccio’s Decameron. Here, a man and his wife are in a bitter conflict with each other because she constantly contradicts him and does not submit under his rule and is not afraid of any physical pain. First, he beats her up terribly, and almost kills her, for which there are no comments by the narrator. However, she continues to defy him, so eventually he imprisons her in a little cell within his living room with just one little window, indirectly forcing her to be an anchorite. He constantly works on forcing her relatives to reject her and to support him by means of financial privileges he hands out to them, and he enjoys his own time with dinners, drinking, and loose women, which she all observes from her cell, helplessly realizing that she has no chance whatsoever to change the situation.

Once this miserable woman has understood that there won’t be any help coming her way, she finally breaks down, submits completely under her husband, and transforms into a medium for patriarchal society to convince all other women not to oppose their husbands under any circumstance. In a way, she accepts her enslavement, as she internalizes her subordinate role as a wife who has no freedom, no individuality, and no rights against her husband. Moreover, she accepts the authority of the Church and begs the priest to help her to safeguard her soul, confessing to him that she had been the worst possible woman (vv. 125–38). For the priest, the simple answer consists of the advice to turn into a “gu(o)twip” (v. 142; a good wife), that is, to assume the same role which Griselda was later expected to embrace. All this manipulation works so well that she completely internalizes her own faults and wrongdoings against her husband, a phenomenon we might call today the “Stockholm Syndrome.”

The entire company demonstrates great happiness about her transformation into a mouthpiece of male society, as a female voice warning all other women about any possible attempt to stand up to their husbands and to fight against his absolute control within their marriage. Uppity women are not welcome there. This goes so far that she expresses gratitude to her husband for not having killed her as a punishment for her evilness although he would have been completely entitled to do so (vv. 169–72). In fact, she admits that she did not really deserve his ‘kindness,’ refraining from further and then even possibly deadly violence against her. All her male relatives welcome this change of heart in her and encourage her to pursue this new perspective of the completely submissive wife.

We could naively take this one story, written in utter disregard of the presumably earlier and much longer “Frauenehre” and assume that here the patriarchal author gave vent to his true feelings, urging all women to act like the victim here. Curiously, she is identified since then as a saint (vv. 393–94), and this especially because of her utter submissiveness with which she fully accepts her husband’s absolute patriarcal authority, which sets an example for all other women, and this in utter disregard of Der Stricker’s “Frauenehre.” Indeed, she is a female ‘saint,’ but this only for the men in her society, serving as a dire warning for wives not to rise up against or contradict their husbands.

Contrastive Perspectives

If that were really all true, however, and if we were taking Der Stricker’s one verse narrative as the guiding light for all his other texts, as if he were a fully nasty patriarchal writer, we would badly misread his works and misunderstand the discursive nature of all comments about gender relationships. Already his “Frauenehre” spoke a very different language. And when we turn to other mæren, such as “Der begrabene Ehemann” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 2, 1973, no. 27, pp. 207–17), we can easily recognize the diversity of perspectives and the playful strategies regarding the gender discourse pursued by this poet. However, this does not necessarily mean that he would entirely drop his misogynist trend, at least in this story. But, whereas in the previous account the husband had been the perpetrator of domestic violence, here it is the wife who assumes all power at home and subjugates her husband so badly that he eventually loses his life.

During a conversation between the couple, both confirm their strong love for each other, whereupon she demands from him to demonstrate his feelings for her by way of believing anything she might tell him. Women find it most irritating and painful when their husbands “daz er des nihtgeloubenchan” (v. 34; cannot believe her). In other words, she wants a blanco check from him whatever she might say to him, and his foolishness, he actually promises her: “ich wildirswerneineneit, / wan du mir so wolbehagest, / swaz so du mir gesagest, / daz ich dazallesgeloubenwil , / sin siwenich ode vil” (vv. 40–43; I will swear an oath to you, because I love you so much, that I will believe everything whatever you might tell me). Since he believes that she loves him as much as he loves her, he trusts their mutual understanding, assuming that she would not deceive him (vv. 45–46).

At first, the wife is not so convinced that she has him completely under her control, but in a series of tests she can manipulate him so badly that he ultimately accepts everything she states without questioning even the most absurd statement by his wife. First, she pretends that it is nighttime during the noon hour, then that ice-cold water in a bathtub is actually hot, and finally that he must not believe that she had had an affair with the priest in her bedroom although he witnessed her leaving it while the priest was still inside. Every time he dares to voice any opposition to her claims, she rages against him so violently that he completely submits under her and assures her that he would never contradict her again, being terrified that he might lose her love. As the narrator emphasizes, she has finally trained him so well that he is firmly convinced, “‘ich handazallerbestewip, / diuiegewanwibes lip” vv. 165–66; “I have the very best wife who has ever lived”).

Once she has prepared the final stage, she insinuates to her husband that he is mortally sick, has him lie down on a bier and accept her ‘game’ – or test of his trustworthiness – but this with a deadly consequence. Until the very end, he firmly believes that the entire process is nothing but a staged act to ensure that she can believe him completely, but when he is then buried alive and begins to scream for help, the priest and the wife quickly throw soil on the coffin and claim that the devil is calling from the grave. Both, in fact, commit a devilish act, but it is she who has wrapped him entirely around her little finger, and it is he who allows her to play with him as she likes. Domestic violence in this case thus proves to be the result of the woman’s doing, not the other way around.

Of course, we are dealing here with a satire, simply turning the model of the Griselda motif upside down, demonstrating that violence can be the making of either marriage partner. But there is also a misogynistic strain in the account because the narrator warns his audience: “den schaden muse er des habn, / daz er satzteeintumbezwip / zemeister uber sinen lip” (vv. 246–48; he will be harmed who makes a foolish woman to the master over his own life). His desperate attempt to make sure that his would would guarantee her love for him turns over all the control to this evil woman, so the audience is really invited to laugh about this naive and weak person who is willing to accept the very opposite of reality as truth only because his wife is telling him to do so.

Ironically, he knows, of course, that his wife is deceiving him, but he accepts all challenges as tests that he must pass to secure her love for himself. In that process, he actually reveals that he knows nothing of love and mistakes it as a form of possession, and his wife realizes only too quickly his weakness, so she makes him to her laughingstock, then falls in love with the priest and, with his help, succeeds in burying her husband alive.

In Der Stricker’s “Ehescheidungsgespräch” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 5, 1978, no. 163, pp. 257–63), by contrast, a husband seems to be very angry with his wife and threatens her with divorce. At first, he sets the limit of a year until that would happen, and then he constantly shrinks that amount of time to one day. To justify his reasons, he unleashes a torrent of vile charges against her: he saw her in company with the devil (v. 36); she is evil and vicious (v. 39), she looks old and shriveled (v. 41); and she smells badly from her mouth (v. 42). If he had a bag full of money, he would happily give away if it were to buy him freedom from her: “wær ich von den ougen din, / wærallezertrich min, / dazwolde ich allezdarumbegeben, / wan ich behalteandersniht min leben” (vv. 47–50; if you disappeared from my eyesight, the entire world would belong to me; I would give everything because I cannot survive any other way).

His wife at first seems to agree and insists that the divorce should happen, although this would have to wait until the next morning. Even if he might be in the danger of not surviving for seven more days living with her, she insists that this would have to be the case. Next, he has to wait two weeks, then four weeks, and so forth, until she tells him straightforward that he will never be allowed to depart from her until their death (vv. 91–95). If that were not enough, she then intensifies the argument and threatens to rip him apart like a chicken “sprichesteinez wort da wider” (v. 97; if you dare to say a word against it).

This concludes this part of the conversation, with him having been completely defeated and crushed. In fact, he then bows his head and begs her for forgiveness and her love. Moreover, now he admits that he does not even know what he had said, probably because of his drunkenness: “sprach ich ihtandersdannewol, / dazgeschachallez von dem wine” (vv. 106–07; if I said anything than was proper, then that happened as a result of the wine). He appeals to Christ to save him in this situation from his own stupidity and to recover his wife’s love, especially because he now admits that she is, in his eyes, the best woman on earth: “du bistvorallenwiben / samdiusunnevor den sternen” (vv. 116–17; you are, above all women, like to sun blinding the stars). In fact, the husband seems to pick up some of the phrases used by the narrator in Der Stricker’s “Frauenehre”: “ich gesachniewip so rein. / dinnamswebetvor got obe / allenwibenmit lobe” (vv. 120–22; I have never seen such a virtuous woman. Your highly praised name stands before God above in front of all women).

Once this exchange has come to a conclusion, she forgives him, and they both kiss each other, hold their hands, and go together to bed, “da ergieeinsune under in, / diugrozzevroudemachet” (vv. 132–33; there a penance took place that gives great joy). Afterwards, they both burst out in laughter, kiss each other again, and sing a song in a highly melodious tone (as to laughter in the Middle Ages, see the contributions to Classen, ed., 2010). The outcome for both is harmony and happiness, as expressed both by their sexual union and their laughter and singing together. Even though the husband had tried to provoke her with his vile claims against her, she knew well how to counter him effectively and to ridicule his entire arguments. Once she has achieved victory, he does not hesitate to accept his defeat, but he is, intriguingly, not a real loser. He had tested his limits, and she showed him how far he could go, and not one step further. We do not know whether they both simply played a rhetorical game, but their exchange constitutes a strong rhetorical strategy. Notably, the wife does not come up with any serious defenses, and she only extends the time limit until they would get divorced until their date of death.

Thus, in essence, both employ empty arguments without real substance; instead, they both play a role and finally reach an agreement, maybe as premeditated, but we cannot be certain about that. Altogether, however, the narrator allows us to participate in a typical debate although the scholastic elements are missing. Instead, they both only talk time sequences, with her simply turning those around, thus nullifying his efforts altogether. While he seems to ventilate strong anger about if not even hatred for her, she threatens him with violence if he would try to realize his plan to get divorced from her. He is good-humored enough to accept her authority, she is kind enough to welcome him back to their marital love, and their sexual union concludes this rhetorical game.

When we turn to Der Stricker’s verse narrative “Die dreiWünsche” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 2, 1974, no. 26, pp. 194–206), we come across a simple but meaningful story about a married couple that is granted three wishes from God after they have prayed to Him for a long time to lift them up out of their poverty. This is a motif we find in world literature until today (Gobrecht 2014; Clute and Grant 1999, 944–45), so the comments about the married couple carry somewhat timeless value and meaning.

The relevant point for our discussion consists of the shared efforts by husband wife to pray to God to grant them His grace and to liberate them from their poverty. Neither one blames the other, and the husband above all emphasizes that he has never done anything wrong against his wife and against God (vv. 12–13). If she might be the culprit for their misery, he himself would help her to do penance and thus to regain the divine grace (vv. 16–18). She in turn underscores that she has always operated side by side with him, so there would be no guilt on her part (vv. 19–20). Hence, both then collaborate to appeal to God together, which puts them on a completely equal footing.

Once the miracle has happened, with the angel granting him these three wishes, the man goes home and relates it to his wife, asking for her advice how to approach this unique opportunity. She humbly requests one of those three wishes, pointing out that she had prayed just as much as he had done, so that she would be entitled to this grace (vv. 115–21). Of course, both people are foolish individuals, as we always encounter them in stories based on the same motif. Once she has been granted the privilege to one of the three wishes, she immediately requests a most elegant dress, which comes true without fail. But this irritates him so much that he wishes that this dress goes into her stomach, which also happens and which nearly kills her. When all the neighbors have arrived in response to her horrible screaming because of the pain, they force him to use his third wish to rescue his wife.

This is the end of their good fortune, and everyone begins to mock him above all so much more than his wife because he had been responsible for the good use of the three wishes and yet pathetically failed in that (vv. 179–96). His grief over this public shaming affects him so badly that he eventually dies. For the narrator, there is nothing left but to ridicule foolish people like this peasant who disregard Christ and their own soul and think only of material goods: “swer die selenihternert, / der istein tore, swie er vert” (vv. 225–26; he who does not take care of his soul is a fool in whatever he does). Curiously, however, we then do not hear anything about the wife or her dress, which she still would have owned through the third wish.

Of course, as in many other cases, Der Stricker regularly uses his accounts about people’s silly or stupid, if not violent and aggressive behavior for didactic and religious purposes. Nevertheless, here we encounter a simple example of a well-functioning marriage in which both people try their best to convince God to grant them wealth and closely collaborate in that regard. The couple communicates well with each other, and when he has received the three free wishes, she only requests one of those for herself. Hilariously, she reveals her foolishness when she asks for that dress, and he flies into a rage over this wasteful use of this wish, but he then has to pay for his anger and frustration by being forced to use the third wish to liberate her from the dress in her body.

In “Das heiße Eisen” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 2, 1974, no. 27, pp. 218–29), we hear of yet another marital conflict, but this one turns into a very harmful outcome for the woman although she herself had initiated the cruel testing of marital loyalty. At first, she wants him to prove by means of an ordeal, that is, carrying a hot iron for six steps to find out whether God might protect him because of his innocence. Even though he agrees to this horrible test, he cheats by way of secretly placing a piece of wood on his palm. Then, however, he turns this around and forces her to submit to this ordeal. At first, she tries many different excuses, and even admits her several adulterous relationships, but he remains adamant and finally cuts her short; since she does not know of his trick, she burns herself terribly, and so he basically rejects her from then on, although the story does not conclude with divorce (vv. 188–92).

Finally, in “Ehemanns Rat” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 3.2, 1975, pp. 295–303), the poet reflects once again upon good and bad marriage partners, surveying both options on either side and evaluating ethical and moral ideals and values, acknowledging that some women are good and some are bad. In fact, the narrator explicitly highlights the danger for a women being married to a “bosen man” (v. 12; bad man) who would act out his evilness especially against his wife. Only if she could get away from him (divorce? highly unlikely in the Middle Ages) and join with a “biderben” (v. 20; a decent man), would she have a chance to lead a good marital life.

However, subsequently, we also hear of evil women whom good husbands simply cannot change into good wives (vv. 40–41). Yet, when a man always follows his wife’s advice, he would lose all respect within society and would be disregarded by everyone (vv. 45–50). Good women would, on the other hand, tend to be somewhat childish (v. 56), meaning that they might easily lose their virtues (v. 60). Hence, and here the poet reveals, once again his patriarchal worldview, even the wisest woman would be inferior to a wise man (vv. 71–73). Since women pay much attention to elegant clothing, they would not be equal partners, but if they turned more toward virtues, they could easily earn men’s respect (vv. 85–90). Indeed, the poet goes so far as to project that women would be equal to angels if they embraced more solidly the path toward virtue (vv. 91–94). What matters here is not so much the poet’s contemptuous opinion but the potentiality which women possess to rise tremendously in men’s respect and admiration.

At the same time, Der Stricker reveals a considerable degree of fear of women’s control over men, which leads him to malign them in general terms as oppressors (vv. 130–35). They would not tolerate half as much of what they would expect men to do in response to their demands (vv. 139–42). It would be better, as the poet avers, if women respected men as their authority figures (vv. 143–48), which fully confirms the patriarchal worldview. The reversal of the ‘natural’ order of husbands and wives, with the latter taking over the command post, constitutes a profound problem for the poet: “swelchwipbehaltetdazreht, / da muz der herrewesenchneht, / und wirt der chnehtherre” (vv. 157–59; when a woman takes charge, the lord becomes the servant and the servant becomes the lord).

However, admitting that this traditional hierarchy is in serious trouble, at least as Der Stricker perceived it, also indicated the considerable fear men felt within their society where their own gender role was no longer any guarantee. The narrator even suggests that the proverbial servants should all be slain to reconstitute the lord’s absolute authority (vv. 162–63). Ironically, however, he openly admits that men lose their honor if they let women take over the rein in their marriage. Relying on several animal metaphors – lambs and horses – the poet emphasizes unmistakably that women need to be controlled by their husbands and to be submitted under their “hu(o)te” (v. 171; control; supervision; authority). Oddly, he even fears that there would not be any woman in the world who, having the opportunity to assume the control in the marriage, would not ultimately begin to detest her husband and detest him: “er wurdeir so unmære, / dazsi sin gerne enbære” (185–86; he would become so disliked by her that she would be pleased to get rid of him).

Consequently, Der Stricker warns husbands at large not to be too excessively enamored with their wives so that they would allow them to dominate them. In such a case, he would turn into a “gouch” (v. 193; evil fellow, or fool). Revealing his deep inferiority complex, the poet finally comments that “swadazwipzemeisterwirterchorn, / da hantsiir ere verlorn / beidedazwip und der man” (203–05; where the wife becomes the mistress, then both have lost their honor, the wife and the husband) (for global perspectives, see Classen 2015, 901–36; McCarthy 2022).        

Conclusions

Throughout the entire Middle Ages, the topics of love, sex, and marriage mattered centrally, both for secular poets at the aristocratic courts and for theologians and legal scholars. Undoubtedly, marriage itself was a highly contested field, and so was the social relationship between both genders in a variety of circumstances. By focusing on a selection of mære by Der Stricker, this study has identified a remarkable narrative source where rather contrastive perspectivescome to the fore. The issue of dominance within marriage mattered significantly within the literary discourse, and hence perhaps also in the realm of social reality. As we could observe, in some cases, the husband brutally asserts his rule; in others, the wife knows how to achieve her goal to fool and then to eliminate her husband. In some tales, the hefty argument between both marriage partners is resolved because he admits his foolishness, asks her for forgiveness, which she grants him, and both then engage in their sexual intercourse, which leaves both fully satisfied.

Der Stricker pursued various perspectives, once singing an extraordinary song of praise of all women as the most glorious human beings here on earth, and once condemning them harshly for their lack of virtues, shame, humility, and a sense of their place within patriarchal society. But Der Stricker also included narratives determined by men’s deep fear of female superiority, which the narrative account can barely conceal. Even though these mæren constitute fictional material, they are predicated on apparently rather quotidian situations and experiences, allowing us to listen into conversations, bickering, argumentation, or mutual challenges characterizing the gender discourse in many different frameworks, most likely a mirror of the ordinary situation in many contemporary marriages. Der Stricker’s patriarchal viewpoint is clearly noticeable at times, but as a poet, he was certainly willing to spread his thematic repertoire widely and to include, as we have observed, very contrastive and yet also quite common conditions within married life during the early thirteenth century.In the story “The Aunt’s Advice” (Moelleken, ed., vol. 5, 1978, no. 145, pp. 54–82; in some of the manuscript, it is called “Das Bloch,” or ‘The Large Block of Stone’), for instance, at first we hear of a husband’s senseless, ruthless, and truly brutal beating of his wife, almost killing her in that process. In the last moment, the poor woman’s aunt arrives on the scene, helps her niece to disappear from public view because the aunt pretends that she had died. The husband is completely fooled because a large stone takes the place of the badly abused woman. Soon after, the ‘widower’ admits that he cannot live without a woman, and the aunt promises him a perfect match. In the meantime, she has taken so good care of her niece that she transforms into a most beautiful and attractive woman who then seemingly agrees to marry that man. When both finally lie in bed, she reveals her identity, and the news quickly spread of how he had been deceived. From that time on, he becomes so badly the butt of the joke in the community that he never dares to raise even a finger against her and is thus badly berated by the public and the narrator at the same time. Without any question, in this case Der Stricker vehemently condemned domestic violence and gave full credit to the aunt and the poor young woman.

His forerunner, Marie de France, was equally not shy to discuss both idealized (“Eliduc”) and evil (“Equitan) female marriage partners in her twelve lais, and Der Stricker’s near contemporaries in France who created a large body of fabliaux, were brutally at task to bring all marital secrets to light and to trigger laughter about male fools and smart women, or the opposite, apart from openly admitting the existence of horrible male domestic violence in cases when a wife dared to stand up to her husband. In this sense, his mæren do not necessarily reflect social reality as such, but certainly the common discourse prevalent within the literary sphere, presenting both the good and the bad in people’s lives.Violence erupted many times, as was to be expected, unfortunately, especially when the wife was not willing to submit herself under her husband’s control. But Der Stricker also indicated that some wives knew very well how to assume their own authority and to make a fool of their husband, if they did not even get him killed in that process. At times, we even hear of laughter that joins the marital couple in a harmonious way, and of poor folks who suffer from hunger and insufficient funds in their lives and then endeavor together to ameliorate their existence through prayers. Viewed in light of the European discourse on gender, Der Stricker thus deserves our particular attention because he shed remarkable light on the highly complex nature of this phenomenon, signaling his great respect and even complete admiration of women, and also his contempt of wives, all depending on the specific circumstances.

But we also observe the extent to which there was a considerable degree of fear among husbands who were weak in their character and entirely in need of their wives’ love. The best we can do here is to recognize the discursive nature of this topic, and this mostly likely both within the fictional framework and in social reality because Der Stricker’s short verse narratives were so diverse in their outlook and appealed to many audiences far into the fifteenth century. We hear of bad wife beating and vicious attacks by a wife against her husband. Of course, we clearly notice that the poet pursued the ideal of women’s obedience and submission, but he was certainly also ready to condemn in harsh terms men’s physical violence and to glorify strong, smart, and intelligent women who knew how to stand up for themselves and other women.

Acknowledgement

I wish to express my gratitude to the University of Arizona where I research and teach for making all the research and library tools necessary for this project available to me.

Funding Sources

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Conflict of Interest

The authors do not have any conflict of interest.

Data Availability Statement

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Ethics Statement

This research did not involve human participants, animal subjects, or any material that requires ethical approval.

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Author Contributions

The sole author was responsible for the conceptualization, methodology, data collection, analysis, writing, and final approval of the manuscript.

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