Médicos de su honra: Violence against women in medieval Castile

Abstract

El médico de su honra (The surgeon of his honor) and other plays of the traditional Spanish Baroque drama helped to spread the conception that husbands, lovers, brothers, or men of the family in general have the right to punish a woman who had broken the social rules about family, love or sex. This article studies domestic violence in late medieval Castile looking at the case of a woman, Catalina Fernández, accused of living with a married man and put in prison for thirteen months. It stresses the support of legal authorities in the punishment of women who broke the mentioned social rules.