Christine and the Bitches… The women’s quarrel in the 15th century

“The “Querelle des femmes” is not, as one might think, a dispute between women. It is a debate of ideas on the status and condition of women that took place, mainly through texts, between the 15th and 18th centuries. The debate on these questions is not new. Generations of clerics have distilled misogynistic discourses, which were then conveyed in numerous texts, from the most inoffensive to the most doctrinal.

The famous Roman de la Rose (13th century) is a perfect example of this literature against women. A monument of medieval literature, it is the starting point of a lively debate between the writer Christine de Pizan and some Parisian humanist scholars. Thus began the first “Querelle des femmes”.

In this lecture, Tania Van Hemelryck will review the stakes and the course of this women’s quarrel. She will focus particularly on the work and career of Christine de Pizan, copyist, entrepreneur, committed author and the first woman to have taken up the pen to defend her sex. The talk will be enamelled with examples and illustrations related to the documents exhibited at the KBR museum or shown in the exhibition “Witches”.