Women Of The Renaissance Dbq

Even to this very day, women are limited in opportunities compared to men. The Renaissance was a time of humanism which helped open up women’s options, but it was still insufficient. Select women were allowed to get a broad education, but they must never become a master of one topic. Even if they were lucky enough to have this knowledge, they were looked down on by men and even other women. However, few women broke past the gender barrier and were praised for their work. Women of the Renaissance simply could not please everyone when choosing to accept the few opportunities they were limited to. Education wise, women of the Renaissance had very little options compared to men. If they were a part of the nobility, they were expected to have knowledge
Men would ignorantly rant about women's incapability to attain knowledge of certain subjects and women wouldn’t be able to say anything back due to their perverted, hostile, and incompetent minds (Doc 5) As said in private letters to a possible fictitious character, men were so horrible that their tongues should have been cut off and hearts cut to pieces. Women were not much kinder to their own gender. Many would rather get drunk and criticize successful women out of envy. Thus, educated Renaissance women were not socially accepted by men or their own sex. Furthermore, men were supposedly afraid of strong women (Doc 7) It is stated in a Spanish handbook for nuns that a woman’s virginity makes her stronger than many men and, in turn, they’re frightened. When one evaluates this handbook, it can be said that men can find virgins unattractive due to their strength, However, during the Renaissance, widows were considered “tainted goods” and labeled unattractive. Before this was decided, the standards of beauty was reformed and taken more seriously because the people during the Renaissance’s main concern was beauty and luxury. Men’s concept of beauty was very hypocritical and unattainable for women, which caused further social
Queen Elizabeth I was loved by most of her English subjects, which is why they used her for the model of the ideal Renaissance woman and leader. Her intellect was much the same, if not better, than all of the princes of her time (Doc 1) She could speak Latin, French, and Italian and understand Greek. She loved reading about history and even translated a book. She was both feared and loved, and made decisions based on what was best for her country. Queen Elizabeth I was one of the few examples of Renaissance women being praised for their intellect and