Castles and Palaces

Medieval castles and palaces have not traditionally been studied in terms of women and gender. Castle studies have produced analyses confined, on the whole, to defence and warfare, and palaces have acted as the backdrop to constitutional/political histories peopled almost exclusively by 'great men', or for studies of developments in court bureaucracy that show little concern for gender. Yet since the 1990s studies have emerged which have made women more visible. European coverage remains patchy, however. For example women's quarters in French palaces have receive little detailed attention; there and elsewhere problems of textual survival complicate the possibility of equating spaces unequivocally with the domains of women. Nevertheless, the complexity of interior patterns of access in high-status domestic architecture is now recognised as having gendered significance.