Application deadline

Applicants from Nordic countries: 1 December

Applicants from outside the Nordic countries: 1 October

Type of course

Admission requirements

Course content

In Western and Eastern Europe, female regency was commonplace in medieval and pre-modern times. Recent research shows that between 1350 and 1450, there were 12 female candidates emerging among 100 royal successions in 18 autonomous kingdoms, a ratio of one-to-eight. In this period, queen Margaret ruled Denmark, Sweden and Norway. Between 1600 and 1800, the rate in Europe¿s hereditary kingdoms was about one-to-seven. In the 16th century, almost every European kingdom was ruled by a woman: Catherine de Medici and Maria de Medici in France, Mary de Guise and Mary Stuart in Scotland, Jeanne d¿Albret in Navarre, Mary I. Tudor and Elisabeth I. Tudor in England. In the 18th century, Catherine the Great of Russia and Maria Theresa of Austria were powerful regents.

Organized chronologically as well as thematically, the course focuses on 1) females whose regencies were based on hereditary dynastic claims (e.g. Navarre, Spain, England, Scotland, Sweden, Austria), 2) females whose regencies were based on some kind of coup d¿etat, 3) female regents for minor relatives, for instance in Scotland, Spain and France, or for absent male relatives (e.g. the network of female regency in the name of Emperor Charles V), 4) elected female rulers (in the Holy Roman Empire) and 5) females who, as mistresses, `ruled¿ informally (France).

Objectives of the course

Knowledge and understanding:

• 
  knowledge about the importance and significance of female regency embedded in Medieval and Pre-modern

European history

• 
  insight into aspects of gender theories as well as recent research

Skills:

• 
  a broad access to aspects of European history
•  a gender-based access to the history of female regency
• access to political debates concerning authority and regency
• practice in close-reading of source material

Language of instruction and examination

Teaching methods

Assessment

Work requirement: Each student is required to produce a ten-minute video presenting a topic related to the course in a scientific way. Students wishing to work in pairs may do so, but are required to produce a twenty-minute video. This is a compulsory requirement that will be evaluated as accepted or not accepted. It must be accepted before students are allowed to take the final exam.

Exam: An essay (of approximately 3500 words) on a given topic. Allotted time: 7 days. Grades are awarded on an A to F scale. 

The course is open for re-examination early in the following semester.

Recommended reading/syllabus

Reading List HIS-2060 Spring 2015

Books

Layheer, William, Queenship and Voice in Medieval Northern Europe (Palgrave Macmillan: New York, 2010). ISBN: 978-0-230-10465-5.

Monter, William, The Rise of Female Kings in Europe, 1300-1800 (Yale University Press: new Haven, 2012). ISBN 978-0-300-17327-7

Kompendium

Contents

Arnstein, Walter L., `The Warrior Queen: reflections on Victoria and Her World¿, Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies, Volume 30, Number 1, Spring (1998), pp. 1¿28. Published by The North American Conference on British Studies. URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4052381. ISSN 0095-1390. OCLC:610371154

Attreed, Lorraine, `Gender, Patronage and Diplomacy in the Early Career of Margaret of Austria (1480¿1530), Mediterranean Studies, Volume 20, Number 1 (2012), pp. 3¿27. ISSN 1074-164x. E-ISSN 2161-4741

Nivre, Elisabeth Wåghäll, `Writing life ¿ writing news: representations of Queen Christina of Sweden in early modern literature, Renaissance Studies, Volume 23, Number 2 (2009), pp. 221¿239. ISSN 026-1213. Online ISSN 1477-4658

Richard, Judith, `Gender Difference and Tudor Monarchy: The Significance of Queen Mary I, Parergon, Volume 21, Number 2, July 2004, pp. 27-46. ISSN 0313-6221. E-ISSN 1832-8334. DOI: 10.1353/pgn.2004.0037

Wiesner, Merry E., `Gender and power in Early Modern Europe: The Empire Strikes Back¿, in Lynne Tatlock (ed.) The Graph of Sex and the German Text: Gendered Culture in Early Modern Germany 1500¿1700 (Amsterdam/Allante GA, 1994), pp. 201¿223. CHLOE: Beihefte zum Daphnis, b. 19. ISBN 90-5183-470-5

Woodacre, Elena, Medieval / Early Modern Queenship. An Annotated Bibliography,

http://www.royalstudiesnetwork.org/bib.php