Jewish women in early modern period

Some Italian Jewish women became published writers. One notable author was Sarra Copia Sullam (1592-1641). She was accused of plagiarism by men that wanted to undermine her written accomplishments.[2] Jewish women also acted as ritual slaughterers. Ritual slaughter can be defined as killing animals for meat, typically in a religious ritual. Although women could act as ritual slaughterers, they had limited circumstances in which they were able to slaughter animals. Only qualified women were allowed to, and usually only in cases in which they needed to provide food for their families.[2] Women also served in the business sphere of Italian society. They acted as financial agents for their husbands, moneylenders, manufacturers of buttons and silk, cosmetic developers, etc. Their business was conducted both privately and publicly. This practice of women in business was disputed by men in society, as they thought women had no place in business.[3]

Jewish women were not allowed to worship communally in Jewish Italy. However, they did have a separate women's section in synagogue where they could worship and take part in their faith. Those women that could read Hebrew prayed daily. Translations from Hebrew to a more common language later appeared for those that did not know Hebrew—men also benefitted from these translations, as not all could men could read Hebrew. Women played a big role during worship by disrupting it. They would yell curses on their male counterparts and aired grievances they had. Because Jewish Italian women could not access the Torah during worship, they made the mappot, which was a binder with Torah scrolls. Some women even participated in daily fasting, prayer, and even abstaining from all pleasures.[4]

Some Jewish girls were lucky enough to receive a complete Jewish education in Italy. However, many in society feared educated girls, but realized that illiterate women would not make for good homemakers or mothers. Because of this realization, daughters were taught how to write in Italian and some even learned Hebrew. This education was mainly taken care of at home, but some girls attended school. Occasionally women became teachers of Hebrew—they were called rabbit or rabbinate. These teachers would also get involved with healing, midwifery, and other domestic practices, not just Hebrew teaching.[5]

Almost as soon as a young woman would reach puberty, she would become engaged. The usual age of marriage for Italian Jewish women was between fourteen and eighteen, while the typical age of marriage for males was twenty-four to twenty-eight. Marriage typically occurred after an engagement period called the shiddukhin which could last about a year or more. The engagement process was determined by parents; fathers typically made the matches between young men and women. These engagements were considered to be binding legal contracts. Financial considerations were extremely important in determining enagagments, as women brought a dowry to the marriage, and grooms supplied monetary sums if the marriage ended in divorce, he went to jail, or he died. As such, the sums were determined in the engagement contracts.

After the marriage occurred, young women left her family to join her husband's. She then became homemaker and was expected to have children. Jewish women in Italy were unable to initiate divorce, so in order to divorce her husband, a woman would have to either involve her rabbi, violate marital laws, or try to convert either herself or her husband to Christianity, as the marriage would then become null.[6]

Even though Jewish women in Poland-Lithuania were mainly secluded in their homes, they did have access to becoming economically independent and were able to hold jobs of their own in society. They performed as bankers, money-lenders, arendas, inn or tavern managers, peddlers, store owners, and craft-makers, where they would sell at markets under tight restrictions. Families were often dependent on the financial contribution Jewish women made by working in these areas of trade.[7]

Women were not allowed to hold public office positions, due to male contempt for women. This did not mean, however, that they were unable to participate publicly. They could serve as court witnesses, petition signers, and bond guarantors.[7]

In several communities in Poland-Lithuania, women were able to serve their communities and husbands as charity donation collectors. They participated in facilitating donations, monetary collecting, and giving money as well. As well as charity donations, older women in the community served as gynecologists for the town women. They would give exams, advice, and generally be consulted about many feminine problems women in town were experiencing. Women also acted charitably by advising other women about religious matters. These matters could include menstruation, adultery, and women's body preparation for burial.

Women were excluded from almost all religious and intellectual parts of life in Poland-Lithuania.

Jewish women in Poland-Lithuania tended to be secluded. They mainly stayed in their homes, and they were not allowed to have much contact with males (be they relatives or acquaintances) at all. Due to this seclusion, they had very limited access to traveling outside their home, and were told to go outside their homes only as "little as necessary".[7] Of course, this then meant that their professions were limited, as seen in the section above. Women were supposed to be second to their husbands in their own homes, and as subordinates, their husbands would be in control of all types of situations.[9] This led to the seclusion of women in their homes, applying to married and unmarried women.

The education of Jewish girls was primarily done through privately hired tutors or a member of their family who had studied enough to pass on the knowledge. Girls would study religious readings instead of the more common Yiddish literature that were translated into Hebrew. Sometimes, girls studied in heder, which was why they were able to read Hebrew at all. However, most females in the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth were illiterate, as female education was seen as much less important than male education.[7]

Women's worship was generally a private affair. They had synagogue access mainly on holidays and each Sabbath, however they had to sit separately from males during religious activity.[10] The synagogue was one of the acceptable public places for women to appear.[11] Worship for women consisted of prayer, including the Yiddish ttkines, or petitionary prayers. They're prayers depended on the time of year and even day, and could be modified for each individual reciting the prayers. This was due to each woman having own personal motivations and significance of religion, so the prayers needed to be unique to each and every one.[7] Some male rabbi even stated that women "were exempted from most of the commandments"[12] due to their status as women, so it is obvious that some were secluded from religious activity, however they had their own three "women's comandmants".[13]

The majority of the population of Jewish women in the Ottoman Empire came from Medieval Spain; thus the language they used traveled with them. Ladino was the primary language of Jewish women, while men spoke Hebrew. Women were educated mostly at home by their husbands in Jewish law, but men often lacked the motivation as most women were illiterate or learning took away time from children and household chores.[15] The majority of the education women had was in household tasks.[16] Since women were illiterate and weren't taught about the Jewish calendar, they had their own sense of time and place.[17]

Jewish women were conservatively dressed much like Moslems. When women went out in public, they covered themselves in a very large shawl that covered their whole body and wore a scarf on their heads.[18] All women wore the same type of clothing but the quality of their clothing implied whether or not they were wed. Married women had higher quality clothing.[17]

Peasant Jewish women tended to peddle at the marketplaces, selling chicken along with eggs and wine, among other goods. These urban middle-class women were limited to jobs similar to peddling and farming. Wealthier women living in the Ottoman Empire had greater options towards their occupations. Sometimes these women acted as merchants or moneylenders. Other, much less common, professions Jewish women held were midwives and medical caregivers. While women in the Ottoman Empire had means to succeed on their own, their options were a bit limited.[19]

Some women worked as healers. If a woman was ill (and common treatments were unsuccessful), a healer was hired to perform a ritual called indulco that involved the use of several substances including water, rosewater, honey, salt, and eggs. These women were popular in the Jewish community until they were banned by rabbis and public healthcare was established. Women also participated in a lot of philanthropy for the community. Their individuality came from their baked goods which they shared. Soup kitchens were stocked by more affluent women while breast milk was supplied by poorer women to infants who were orphaned or in need. They offered bread to people poorer than themselves as well as animals.[17]

Women who worked were often not the breadwinners of their families but working out of necessity due to being widowed or simply needing the extra money.[18]

The public place is one where women would go to either do chores, such as using the oven for cooking, using the looms for spinning and weaving, or fetching water for laundry and cooking. These were often social encounters as well as ones where Jewish women would get their responsibilities done.[14]

Especially in the Spanish Sephardic society, bath houses were attended regularly by Jewish women and were regarded as social places. In the Jewish community the bath house is known as the mikveh.Women would socialize with each other. These women bathed with women of other religions too such as Christians and Moslems. Occasionally this practice was looked down upon by men, as they did not believe people of different religions should associate with each other.[14]

Similarly to the Household confinement section, Moslem influence reached to how Jewish women participated in worship. Unlike Moslem women, Jewish women were allowed to attend worships in their synagogues. However, in the Spanish synagogues, women were separated from men during the services, which is a common Moslem practice.[20]

Marriage

It was common practice to be married off young so parents could see their children succeed. During this time, the expectancy was to live a shorter life than today.[21] The father of the bride took on the job of finding a good provider for her future. The father only cared about finding a groom that was financially fit in order to take care of his daughter. It was taught that after the daughter were to marry she would take on her new journey as a married woman and learn. Sometimes this transition wasn't smooth sailing and could cause abuse within the marriage.[22] Within the first year of marriage, both the mother and child could die due to the young age of these women giving birth and poor practices with cleanliness and nutrition. This was the downside of sending a daughter to get married at a younger age. Usually, daughters were married from oldest to youngest. They had to be well-rounded, respectable, virgin women that had a dowry to offer.[21]

The families took charge of deciding who was getting married to who. This usually happened between other family members. The rich married with other rich whether part of their own family or another rich family.[21]

Weddings were made of special components. The bride was led throughout the wedding by being dressed and being taken by the man with a ring. She was not actually participating in the wedding although its considered the most important thing in her life because she had been taught about it since a young age. She does get to participate in a ritual bath. This signifies her purity. The women of her family get to attend the bath and assist the bride getting dressed. Throughout the ritual bath, songs are played which praise the bride.[21]

After the couple was wedded, they were to move in with the groom's family which could cause a lot of tension. The women in the family would fight and could ultimately lead to a divorce.[21]

In the Sephardic Ottoman Empire, different cultures lived amongst each other. This led to the Moslem culture influencing Jewish women in their daily activities. As the Early Modern period Moslem culture restricted women's movement outside the home and regulated their dress if they did venture outside, the Jews of the Ottoman Empire also began adopting these practices. Portuguese Jewish men during this time period were especially protective of their female counterparts, and would seclude them from other aspects of society.[20]

Growing up, girls had to learn how to cook and take care of the home. If she did not know, she would embarrass her family and reflect badly upon her mother who was supposed to teach her all of these things. Women were judged by how they kept up the household. If they did everything that was expected of them with no complaints. did not ask for anything, and the home appeared clean and tidy, they would be known as a nikuchira, or a "good housewife who runs her home properly".[17] Many chores were done in a public. These women had to share ovens, courtyards and other amenities. Women were expected to treat their husbands like royalty. She had to live up to this or she would be left behind and her husband would be on to the next wife.[23]

Pregnancy

In the middle of a woman's pregnancy, a cortar fashdura, or diaper-preparation ceremony occurred. Only women attended. The birth of a daughter would be sad because the family would now have to provide a dowry. The birth of a daughter also came with a fadamiento ceremony where the daughter would be named. A son being born would go through a circumcision ceremony. The people that attended the daughter's ceremony would light candles to signify the daughters success in life.[21]

Women's status were the weaker sex and they had to be protect by men. They were also seen as objects who tempt men and had to be toned down.[24] If women owned property their husbands would take care of it.[25] Jewish women became heads of households if their husbands passed away. This new status was one of extreme independence, and it was regularly accepted in Ottoman society. Widows controlled their own dowry and inheritances—she was also completely responsible for herself and any children she had with her husband. This gave widows immense power and freedom of movement in society.[26]