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The Very Secret Sex Lives of Medieval Women
- An Inside Look at Women & Sex in Medieval Times
- Narrated by: Cat Gould
- Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins
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Summary
An inside look at sexual practices in medieval England.
Were medieval women slaves to their husband's desires, jealously secured in a chastity belt in his absence? Was sex a duty, or could it be a pleasure? Did a woman have a say about her own female sexuality, body, and who did or didn't get up close and personal with it? No. And yes. It's complicated.
Romance, courtship, and behind closed doors.
The intimate lives of medieval women were as complex as for modern woman. They loved and lost, hoped and schemed, were lifted up and cast down. They were hopeful and lovelorn. Some had it forced upon them, others made aphrodisiacs and dressed for success. Some were chaste and some were lusty. Having sex was complicated. Not having sex was even more so.
Inside The Very Secret Sex Lives of Medieval Women, a fascinating book about life during medieval times, you will discover tantalizing true stories about medieval women and a myriad of historical facts.
What listeners say about The Very Secret Sex Lives of Medieval Women
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- Anonymous User
- 19-05-24
interesting but badly narrated
it felt like it's being read by an AI and not a very good one too
very interesting subject, unlistenable delivery
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- Amazon Customer
- 26-01-24
loved this!
This was a hugely entertaining and equally informative book. I really loved it and finished it in two sittings!
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- Nicky Armstrong
- 18-03-23
I couldn't listen to the droning narration
I was really interested in the content but gave it up really quickly because I couldn't listen to the monotinous, tedious reading for more than 10 minutes. Good it you want to go to sleep.
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- Anonymous User
- 08-03-24
A "page turner"
It's definitely a must-read. Incredibly interesting and witty. I strongly recommend it even to those who are not usually into history.
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- pika
- 22-01-24
Entertaining and interesting.
Raised quite a few belly laughs and even more smiles, entertaining and interesting. Perfect way to pass time on a journey, also a great way to shock a man to silence!
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- bumf
- 07-02-23
Good book
Enjoyable book with good narration. I learnt some new things and around as entertained. Would recommend
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- Dawn
- 20-05-23
Robotic
The content was interesting and at times very humorous. It deserved a better narrator than this who sounded like an AI reboot.
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- K. J. Kelly
- 07-05-24
Good combination of history / contemporary context
Loved this. Good combination of history and contemporary context.
I love social history. And books about sex. That sounds wrong. But I do love the 'behind the scenes' and lesser known stories from times past about those subjects we don't always talk about.
So this audiobook, covering women in medieval times - contraception, getting pregnant, birthing, wanting babies or not wanting them, how to avoid sex, prostitution, divorce, same sex relationships - what an eye-opener into hidden history.
And lots of it taken from court records! This was the best part for me, insight into real women, cases, outcomes - and often dubious (and unfair) legal practices.
The asides, the conversations with examples put in modern texts and chats, these were funny and brought home the reality of the situations. It also kept this from being too academic and kept the tone very readable and light.
I saw sample pages of this on Amazon and do feel I missed out on a well-produced and rather beautiful book. I was looking for a bibliography as I really wanted to read a list of the author's sources which sadly weren't available on an audio version. Definitely something missing, as I wanted to check the validity of some of the women's histories and read the cases for myself.
Still, fantastic read. Plenty to open the eyes - and remind us that 21st century women are standing on many shoulders of those who've gone before us. And sex has always held such an important place within our species - we didn't invent it. Worth remembering.
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- Lizalou
- 11-06-23
Great content, poor narration
I was very frustrated listening to this book. It’s a fascinating and well researched subject and there was plenty of humour and liveliness in the text - but the narration! Punctuation is there to indicate how to read in an interesting and meaningful way to get across the meaning of the text. Sadly this was a perfunctory relaying of words with sentences running one into another in a monotone fashion. Very difficult to pick out and appreciate the content of the book. Such a shame.
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- Bradfordiansteph
- 27-07-23
Just don't bother
The narrator must have found the text boring as she read it with the monotony of an 8 year old.
The text has interesting bits but nothing that can't be found elsewhere in better detail.
The author actually makes a joke about imagining a man getting away with rape in modern times because the woman got pregnant. This is in the context of that in medieval times it was thought pregnancy only occurred when both parties climaxed and climax could only occur in consenting people. This has literally happened and this comment has been made by members of the current political class in the USA. It's also still a widely held incorrect belief.
There's a narration or text error too (obviously it's spoken so I don't know who is at fault). York is a county not a country.
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