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E-book
Author Romeo, Emily C. K., author.

Title The virtuous and violent women of seventeenth-century Massachusetts / Emily C.K. Romeo
Published Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, [2020]
©2020

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Description 1 online resource (xi, 220 pages)
Contents Cover -- Series -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- Chapter 1. The Limits of Household Violence -- Order and Disorder -- Chapter 2. From "That Wicked House" -- Women and Infanticide -- Chapter 3. Almost Inconceivable Foes -- Anglo-American Women and Indian War -- Chapter 4. "The Devil will Bless Himself, to Find Such a Convenient Lodging" -- Women and the Witchcraft Threat -- Chapter 5. Female Violence -- From Potential Threat to Cultural Weapon -- Notes -- Index -- Back Cover
Summary "Dismantling the image of the peaceful and serene colonial goodwife and countering the assumption that New England was inherently less violent than other regions of colonial America, Emily C.K. Romeo offers a revealing look at acts of violence by Anglo-American women in colonial Massachusetts, from the everyday to the extraordinary. Using Essex County as a case study, Romeo deftly utilizes seventeenth- and eighteenth-century sources to demonstrate that Puritan women, both "virtuous" and otherwise, learned to negotiate the shifting boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable violence in their daily lives and communities. The Virtuous and Violent Women of Seventeenth-Century Massachusetts shows that more dramatic violence by women-including infanticide, the scalping of captors during the Indian Wars, and even witchcraft accusations-was not necessarily intended to challenge the structures of authority but often sprung from women's desire to protect property, safety, and standing for themselves and their families. The situations in which women chose to flout powerful social conventions and resort to overt violence expose the underlying, often unspoken, priorities and gendered expectations that shaped this society."-- Provided by publisher
Subject Puritan women -- Massachusetts -- Social conditions -- 17th century
Puritans -- Massachusetts -- History -- 17th century
Puritans -- Rhode Island -- Providence -- History -- 17th century
Violence -- Massachusetts -- History -- 17th century
Family violence -- Law and legislation -- Massachusetts -- History -- 17th century
Married women -- Legal status, laws, etc. -- Massachusetts -- History -- 17th century
Sex role -- Religious aspects -- Puritans
HISTORY -- General.
Family violence -- Law and legislation
Married women -- Legal status, laws, etc.
Puritans
Violence
Massachusetts
Rhode Island -- Providence
Genre/Form History
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781613767627
1613767625