The Male Body and Social Masculinity in Premodern Europe

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In the premodern world, the male body and masculinity were inextricably entwined and imbued with ambiguity, mutability, and contradiction. Prevailing beliefs about the body rendered it unstable just as masculinity itself was ambivalent, in flux, and in a perpetual process of becoming. Masculinity existed only if it were recognized, acknowledged, and affirmed by other men who recognized it, acknowledged it, and affirmed it. The eleven essays in this volume provide an overview of the intersections between physical embodiment and social masculinity and demonstrate their mutability and mutual dependence. While physical prowess reinforced masculinity, social status could overcome bodily defects. Removing a physical sign of masculinity, such as cutting a king’s hair, could also deprive the man of social and political status. Possession of a socially-valued quality, such as the strong heavenly voices of the castrati singers, allowed men to transcend their physical emasculation and enjoy social masculinity. Crossing premodern Europe, these essays examine how masculinity was constructed by external presentation, such as hair, musculature, sexual prowess, clothing, and honourable behaviour, or deconstructed through bodily defects such as virginity, impotence, castration, non-normative sexuality, or shameful behaviour. Together, they reveal the fluctuations that men experienced and explore how social and embodied masculinity intersected and could reconstruct or redefine masculinity as social and cultural values modified. Jacqueline Murray is Professor of History at the University of Guelph where she also served as Dean of Arts. She has published widely on masculinity and male sexuality in the premodern world.