Bathsua Makin
Encyclopedia
Bathsua Reginald Makin (c. 1600-c. 1675) was a proto-feminist
, middle-class Englishwoman who contributed to the emerging criticism of woman’s position in domestic and public sphere
s in 17th-century England
. Herself a highly educated woman, Makin was referred to as “England’s most learned lady,” skilled in Greek
, Latin
, Hebrew
, German language
, Spanish, French and Italian
. Makin argued primarily for the equal right of women and girls to obtain an education
in an environment or culture
that viewed woman as the weaker vessel, subordinated to man and uneducable. She is most famously known for her polemic
al treatise
entitled An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen, in Religion, Manners, Arts & Tongues, With An Answer to the Objections against this Way of Education (1673).
and Thomas Pell
. The evidence from the writings of Sir Simonds D'Ewes, a pupil of Reginald (Reynolds), was also lost to sight.
Makin's connection with John Pell, known as mathematician, is documented in correspondence between the two. The John Pell manuscripts in the British Library
reveal letters from Bathsua signed “your loving sister,” along with letters written by John Pell in which he refers to Bathsua as “sister.” The identification of Bathsua as “sister” to Pell was in fact an anachronistic reading; Bathsua was sister-in-law to Pell, Pell having married Ithamaria Reginald, Bathsua’s sister, in 1632. This realization led to the tracing of a book of poetry attributed to Bathsua Makin. Musa Virginea, published in 1616, bears a title page which, in its translation, states: “The Virgin Muse {in} Greek-Latin-French, by Bathsua R{eginald}, (daughter of Henry Reginald, school master and language lover, near London), published in her sixteenth year of age.” This piece of writing is important in distinguishing Bathsua’s parentage and the year she was born. While Makin’s book of poetry names Henry Reginald as her father, scholars have difficulty pinpointing exactly who he was since there were several men by the name of Henry Reginald, or variants of Reginald, living around London in the early 17th-century. He was a school-master though, as Bathsua points out on the title page of Musa Virginea, and likely taught at a school outside of London
. Bathsua's training in classical and modern languages is then easily attributable to her father, the learned man and “language lover.”
While she was highly educated, Bathsua was of the middle-class and was plagued by financial difficulties throughout her life. The name Bathsua derives from Batshua
(an alternative name of Bathsheba appearing in 1 Chronicles
3:5) and, as James L. Helm points out, the name Batshua means “daughter of abundance,” yet “abundance” was not Makin’s experience (1993:46). Makin married Richard Makin in the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft on 6 March 1621 (Teague 1993:5). It is likely that Bathsua and Richard Makin lived in Westminster
, as there is record of several children christened in parishes there. Frances Teague points out that “documents that Bathsua Makin’s biographers have overlooked suggest that Richard Makin was a minor court
servant in the 1620s or 1630s who lost his place, while Bathsua Makin entered court service around 1640” (1993:6). Evidence of Richard Makin’s petition to court in 1640, and his failure to resume a place in the court of Charles I implies that the Makin’s likely endured financial strain which may have led to Bathsua’s seeking employment.
There is little definitive information pointing to how Makin assumed her position in court as the tutor to the daughter of Charles I, Princess Elizabeth. Frances Teague’s research on Bathsua reveals that Bathsua was in correspondence with Anna Maria van Schurman
, the Dutch scholar, and in a letter from van Schurman dated 1640 there is reference to Bathsua as teacher to “the royal girl Elizabeth” (1986). Bathsua’s position as educator to Princess Elizabeth was underway then in 1640 and continued until at least 1644, possibly as late as 1650; Makin therefore entered into Parliamentary
custody with Elizabeth in 1642, continuing to tutor the princess in mathematics, reading, writing and languages. Princess Elizabeth died in 1650 and it is evident that financial difficulties ensued for Bathsua as she issued a petition for the payment of her service to the court that was dismissed in 1655. Her husband Richard Makin died in 1659 and likely by this time, or soon thereafter, Bathsua had obtained employment in the household of Lucy Hastings, Dowager Countess of Huntingdon
. Makin alludes in her pamphlet, An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen (1673), to having taught the Countess in languages, Arts
and Divinity
and, as Teague points out, letters found in the Huntington Library dated 1664 and 1668 reveal Makin’s close connection to the Hastings family.
Documentation in the Hastings’ papers reveals Makin was employed in the Hastings household until 1662. After this she likely continued teaching, setting up her own school soon thereafter, a school at Tottenham High Cross, just outside of London, which she advertised in the postscript of An Essay, published in 1673. As Frances Teague points out, “it is not known whether the school was a success, how long Makin taught there, or even when Makin died” (1998:104). Evidently, though, she was still alive in 1675, as a letter from Makin to a noted London physician, Baldwin Hamey (1600–1676), dated 1675, is preserved at the Royal College of Physicians
.
While struggling financially throughout her lifetime, Bathsua nonetheless was acquainted with well-known scholars and court members. It is not know whether Bathsua was in direct personal contact with Anna Maria van Schurman, yet the evidence of correspondence between the two and the mention of Bathsua in van Schurman’s other correspondences alludes to the fact that the two scholars, both Royalists
, respected each other and were on fairly intimate terms. In fact, Bathsua mentions van Schurman in her catalogue of learned women in An Essay. Bathsua was likely inspired by van Schurman’s The Learned Maid; or, Whether a Maid may be a Scholar (translated in 1659), using van Schurman’s treatise on women and girls’ right to education as a model for her pro-educational tract
, An Essay. Bathsua was also influenced by the work of John Amos Comenius
, a prominent 17th-century scholar and educator, whom she would have been exposed to, either directly or indirectly, through her brother-in-law John Pell. Pell and his friends, Samuel Hartlib
and John Dury
, were “England’s leading Comenians, believing that implementing Comenian ideas would strengthen education and the common good” (Teague 1993:7). While there was little call for abolishing set gender and class hierarchies within the Comenian model, in An Essay, according to Patricia L. Hamilton, “Makin champions pedagogical
methods developed by Moravia
n educator John Amos Comenius and recommends that women be educated according to a broad curriculum—a mixture of classical and modern languages, history, mathematics and science, and issues related to domestic economy” (2001:147).
structures governing her society. Family
, education and religion
were all male dominated institution
s. 17th-century women were increasingly relegated to the home, to the domestic or private sphere and even in the home women, as mothers, wives, or daughters, were governed by men. While within upper-class and aristocratic families there had been an increase in female education and women’s autonomy during the late Tudor period
due to the leadership of Elizabeth I
, into the 17th-century Stuart period, with the reign of James I
, a return to a more paternalistic hierarchical social model took hold and there was a decline in the encouraging of female erudition
(Gim 1999:186).
Nonetheless, as Hilda L. Smith points out, various cultural changes going on in the 17th century did create a milieu in which cultural norms could be challenged. Breakthroughs in rationalism
and scientific thought along with demographic and economic issues “provided a climate of change and a significant common experience for those critical of women’s lives during the late seventeenth century” (Smith 1982:xi). There was a growing sense of instability in the 17th century related to religious strife, civil wars
, growing diversification among classes and the undercutting of socially established cultural hierarchies. Protestantism
called for the individual reading and interpretation of the bible
, which not only led to the need for increased literacy among all women and men but also allowed previously held customs
to be challenged.
While women writers began to take advantage of the changing attitudes in the 17th century, their writing is all the more valuable due to the risk of scorn they faced in attempting to participate in the public sphere. Frances Teague points out that “A seventeenth-century man might write because he sought a public identity; seventeenth-century women who wrote were scorned because such a public identity was deemed inappropriate for them” (1993:9-10). Teague goes on to stress that Makin wrote because of her financial difficulties; however, while she is advertising a school in which she will earn a living teaching, Makin’s An Essay, peppered with emotional appeals, vituperative attacks on the custom of “breeding women low,” along with a logical, effective and systematic undercutting of the arguments against women’s learning, reveals her purpose for writing went beyond simple economic advancement. From female writers such as Christine de Pizan
in the 14th century to Mary Wollstonecraft
at the end of the 18th century to Virginia Woolf
in the 20th century, “women’s didactic and defensive writings reveal a submerged tradition of female intellectual resistance to oppressive and repressive cultural givens” (Myers 1985:176-77). Bathsua Makin’s An Essay adds to the rich body of pro-female writing, a “genre
” that was well underway in the 17th century.
While Makin’s publications are few, two poems written to the Hastings are preserved in the Hastings Collection at the Henry E. Huntington Library. On 24 June 1649, Makin wrote a Latin elegy addressed to Lucy Hastings, the Dowager Countess of Huntingdon on the occasion of the death of Henry, Lord Hastings. Makin also wrote an elegy in honor of Lady Elizabeth (Hastings) Langham, who died in 1664. The poem is entitled “Upon the Much Lamented Death of the Right Honorable, the Lady Elizabeth Langham.” In addition, the collected works of Anna Maria van Schurman
(Leyden, 1648) include an exchange of letters in Hebrew between van Schurman and Makin.
An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen, Makin’s most important piece of writing, was published in 1673, and is in the vein of other 17th-century tracts on education. The motivation behind Makin’s didactic and polemical essay
lies in the fact that Makin argues for “learning as an aid to the moral life, to women’s usefulness and moral agency” (Myers 1985:177). An Essay is grounded in religious thought, for Makin points out that an education lends to the polishing of one’s soul so “that you may glorify God.” (Makin 1673). Such an education would, according to Makin, cultivate a woman’s soul so that women may be better able “to know God
, Jesus Christ, themselves, and the things of nature, arts and tongues” (Makin 1673). Makin takes the stance that education will not only benefit the soul of woman, leading her to greater communion with God, but female learning will benefit the nation
. She states that “Were women thus educated now, I am confident that advantage would be very great: the women would have honor and pleasure, their relations profit, and the whole nation advantage” (Makin 1673).
An Essay begins with a series of letters in which Makin establishes her audience with her original appeal to “all Ingenious and Virtuous Ladies, more especially to her Highness the Lady Mary
, eldest Daughter to his Royal Highness the Duke of York” (Makin 1673). In the introductory epistle
, Makin admits that to challenge customs, to imply that women are reasonable creatures who will benefit from learning, is a bold attempt and she expects to meet opposition while at the same time claiming that the patronage
of the Royal Highness will be a form of protection. Here, in Makin’s exordium
, through the use of kairos
, she appeals to her audience’s interest and sympathy. While her audience is both male and female, her emotional appeal, the pathos
of her treatise, is directed at women, for she writes: “I expect to meet with many scoffs and taunts from inconsiderate and illiterate men, that prize their own lusts and pleasure more than your profit and content” (Makin 1673). She goes on to state: “I shall be the less concerned at these, so long as I am in your favor; and this discourse
may be a weapon in your hands to defend yourselves, whilst you endeavor to polish your souls, that you may glorify God” (Makin 1673). She further emphasizes “ladies” as her target audience: “I hope I shall not need to beg the patience of ladies to peruse this pamphlet: I have bespoken and do expect your patronage, because it is your cause I plead against an ill custom, prejudicial to you, which men will not willingly suffer to be broken” (Makin 1673).
Makin’s introductory address to her audience is followed by two letters in which she takes on a male persona
. While her first male persona is pro-learning, the following letter’s masculine voice sets up Makin’s argument as he, an objector to women’s learning, claims that “Women do not much desire Knowledge; they are of low parts, soft fickle natures . . . [and] they will abuse their Education” (Makin 1673). Such objections to female erudition are taken up and refuted throughout the essay. Makin’s strongest argument comes in the following long section of the essay in which she catalogues mythological, legend
ary, biblical, historical and contemporary women, women who were writers, artists, moral heroines and mothers (Myers 1985:181). In her listing of female worthies Makin establishes her credibility, her ethos
, her right and ability to promote education for women, but more importantly, she, in turning to external proofs, reveals how “Women were formerly Educated in the knowledge of Arts and Tongues, and by their Education, many did rise to a great height in Learning” (Makin 1673). Makin goes on to claim that, “Were Women thus Educated now I am confident the advantage would be very great” (Makin 1673).
Makin, having established quite firmly through her catalogue of other learned ladies that educated women were not a new phenomenon nor a threat to society, goes on to relate a series of staged proofs and refutations. She takes on a syllogistic
form, logically deconstructing over twelve different objections to women’s learning. Within the logos
of her argument, some of her chief refutations involve responses to the claims that women will abuse their educations and not obey their husbands. She responds that “tis not knowing too much but too little that causes the irregularity” (Makin 1673), i.e., “More education, not less, is the way to prevent pride,” (Hamilton 2001:150), and educated women will be better companions to their husbands and more efficient members of their families. She also logically counters the objection that women are of low parts, weak and soft and therefore uneducable. Makin's syllogistic response is that such “deficiencies” demand all the more for the education of women and women will, in their softness, be all the more easy to educate.
Importantly, what scholars have found conventional about Makin’s argument is her hesitancy to demand equality for women, at times appearing to reinforce women’s role as the “weaker vessel” whose place is in the home, where “God has made the man head,” and women the “helps” to their husbands (Makin 1673). Nonetheless, she was writing from within the patriarchal context of 17th-century England, and as J. L. Helm points out, “Makin carefully placed women within the bounds of her society’s restrictions” (1993:48). As she states in the introductory epistle, she does not “plead for female preeminence, [for] to ask too much is the way to be denied all” (Makin 1673). Such a disclaimer lends persuasion to Makin’s rhetoric
al treatise for she reveals her sensitivity to her audience, an audience in which “The Barbarous custom to breed women low is grown amongst us, and hath prevailed so far” (Makin 1673). Her claim to not ask too much serves as a “conciliatory strategy to diffuse opposition” (Hamilton 2001:149).
Other criticisms of Makin’s An Essay point to her use of a masculine persona and her call for the education of “rich” women and girls. While her use of a masculine persona gives credence to masculine-centered ideologies
and confirms that only men are capable of participating in the intellectual debate of the public sphere, taking on a male voice does give Makin more freedom. Also, as Mitzi Myers points out, “the male voice is always there in pro-women writing, whether formally personified or not” (1985:180). Universal educational models for all levels of society are not Makin’s aim. Makin’s pro-education treatise is directed towards women and girls of means. She alludes to the fact that the women and girls who should be educated are those “persons that God has blessed with the things of this world, that have competent natural parts” (Makin 1673). In other words, those that are rich and have spare time may make better use of their time “in gaining arts, and tongues” (Makin 1673), rather than “to trifle away so many precious minutes merely to polish their hands and feet, to curl their locks, to dress and trim their bodies” (Makin 1673).
Thus, Makin’s argument for educating women reveals ambiguity as to whether women deserve a place in the public sphere, for her proposal of an educational model for women argues for women to be better wives, mothers or daughters, not to prepare women for the public sphere. Makin, though, in writing such a tract, deliberately participates in the public domain of 17th-century intellectual debate. Her postscript, advertising a school “where, by the blessing of God, gentlewomen may be instructed in the principles of religion; and in all manner of sober and virtuous education” (Makin 1673), reveals not only that she was still teaching at the age of seventy-three, but that she was dedicated to the betterment of woman’s position in society.
For up to date studies of Bathsua’s life and work see Frances Teague and Jean R. Brink. Teague and Brink’s research has provided important findings, clarifying Makin’s true identity as a Reginald and also clarifying work that is attributed to Makin (it was previously held that Makin was responsible for The Malady . . . and Remedy of Vexations and Unjust Arrests and Actions (1646)).
Many scholars have provided excellent commentaries on Makin’s An Essay. While some of the criticism on Makin considers her work too conventional to be wholly classified as feminist, Nancy Weitz (Miller), Mitzi Myers, James L. Helm, and Frances Teague provide analyses of Makin’s rhetorical methods and point to the effectiveness of Makin’s pro-education argument.
Several scholars work to tie Makin’s work to other important writing of the period. Both Patricia Hamilton and James L. Helm see Makin’s An Essay as directly influential and influenced by other educational reform tracts written by 17th-century men.
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
, middle-class Englishwoman who contributed to the emerging criticism of woman’s position in domestic and public sphere
Public sphere
The public sphere is an area in social life where individuals can come together to freely discuss and identify societal problems, and through that discussion influence political action...
s in 17th-century England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. Herself a highly educated woman, Makin was referred to as “England’s most learned lady,” skilled in Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
, Hebrew
Hebrew language
Hebrew is a Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, is it considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, though other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language is also used by non-Jewish groups, such...
, German language
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, Spanish, French and Italian
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
. Makin argued primarily for the equal right of women and girls to obtain an education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
in an environment or culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
that viewed woman as the weaker vessel, subordinated to man and uneducable. She is most famously known for her polemic
Polemic
A polemic is a variety of arguments or controversies made against one opinion, doctrine, or person. Other variations of argument are debate and discussion...
al treatise
Treatise
A treatise is a formal and systematic written discourse on some subject, generally longer and treating it in greater depth than an essay, and more concerned with investigating or exposing the principles of the subject.-Noteworthy treatises:...
entitled An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen, in Religion, Manners, Arts & Tongues, With An Answer to the Objections against this Way of Education (1673).
Life
Makin's identity as the daughter of Henry Reginald has been confirmed by recent scholarship. Up until the 1980s mistakes and oversights identified Makin wrongly as sister to John PellJohn Pell
-Early life:He was born at Southwick in Sussex. He was educated at Steyning Grammar School, and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, at the age of thirteen. During his university career he became an accomplished linguist, and even before he took his B.A. degree corresponded with Henry Briggs and...
and Thomas Pell
Thomas Pell
Dates may not be entirely accurate in this article due to disagreements between sources.Thomas Pell was a physician who was famous for buying the area known as Pelham, Westchester, New York, as well as land that now includes the eastern Bronx and southern Westchester County. He founded the town...
. The evidence from the writings of Sir Simonds D'Ewes, a pupil of Reginald (Reynolds), was also lost to sight.
Makin's connection with John Pell, known as mathematician, is documented in correspondence between the two. The John Pell manuscripts in the British Library
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom, and is the world's largest library in terms of total number of items. The library is a major research library, holding over 150 million items from every country in the world, in virtually all known languages and in many formats,...
reveal letters from Bathsua signed “your loving sister,” along with letters written by John Pell in which he refers to Bathsua as “sister.” The identification of Bathsua as “sister” to Pell was in fact an anachronistic reading; Bathsua was sister-in-law to Pell, Pell having married Ithamaria Reginald, Bathsua’s sister, in 1632. This realization led to the tracing of a book of poetry attributed to Bathsua Makin. Musa Virginea, published in 1616, bears a title page which, in its translation, states: “The Virgin Muse {in} Greek-Latin-French, by Bathsua R{eginald}, (daughter of Henry Reginald, school master and language lover, near London), published in her sixteenth year of age.” This piece of writing is important in distinguishing Bathsua’s parentage and the year she was born. While Makin’s book of poetry names Henry Reginald as her father, scholars have difficulty pinpointing exactly who he was since there were several men by the name of Henry Reginald, or variants of Reginald, living around London in the early 17th-century. He was a school-master though, as Bathsua points out on the title page of Musa Virginea, and likely taught at a school outside of London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. Bathsua's training in classical and modern languages is then easily attributable to her father, the learned man and “language lover.”
While she was highly educated, Bathsua was of the middle-class and was plagued by financial difficulties throughout her life. The name Bathsua derives from Batshua
Bathsheba
According to the Hebrew Bible, Bathsheba was the wife of Uriah the Hittite and later of David, king of the United Kingdom of Israel and Judah. She is most known for the Bible story in which King David seduced her....
(an alternative name of Bathsheba appearing in 1 Chronicles
Books of Chronicles
The Books of Chronicles are part of the Hebrew Bible. In the Masoretic Text, it appears as the first or last book of the Ketuvim . Chronicles largely parallels the Davidic narratives in the Books of Samuel and the Books of Kings...
3:5) and, as James L. Helm points out, the name Batshua means “daughter of abundance,” yet “abundance” was not Makin’s experience (1993:46). Makin married Richard Makin in the parish of St. Andrew Undershaft on 6 March 1621 (Teague 1993:5). It is likely that Bathsua and Richard Makin lived in Westminster
Westminster
Westminster is an area of central London, within the City of Westminster, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Thames, southwest of the City of London and southwest of Charing Cross...
, as there is record of several children christened in parishes there. Frances Teague points out that “documents that Bathsua Makin’s biographers have overlooked suggest that Richard Makin was a minor court
Noble court
The court of a monarch, or at some periods an important nobleman, is a term for the extended household and all those who regularly attended on the ruler or central figure...
servant in the 1620s or 1630s who lost his place, while Bathsua Makin entered court service around 1640” (1993:6). Evidence of Richard Makin’s petition to court in 1640, and his failure to resume a place in the court of Charles I implies that the Makin’s likely endured financial strain which may have led to Bathsua’s seeking employment.
There is little definitive information pointing to how Makin assumed her position in court as the tutor to the daughter of Charles I, Princess Elizabeth. Frances Teague’s research on Bathsua reveals that Bathsua was in correspondence with Anna Maria van Schurman
Anna Maria van Schurman
Anna Maria van Schurman was a German-Dutch painter, engraver, poet and scholar. She was a highly educated woman by seventeenth century standards...
, the Dutch scholar, and in a letter from van Schurman dated 1640 there is reference to Bathsua as teacher to “the royal girl Elizabeth” (1986). Bathsua’s position as educator to Princess Elizabeth was underway then in 1640 and continued until at least 1644, possibly as late as 1650; Makin therefore entered into Parliamentary
English Interregnum
The English Interregnum was the period of parliamentary and military rule by the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell under the Commonwealth of England after the English Civil War...
custody with Elizabeth in 1642, continuing to tutor the princess in mathematics, reading, writing and languages. Princess Elizabeth died in 1650 and it is evident that financial difficulties ensued for Bathsua as she issued a petition for the payment of her service to the court that was dismissed in 1655. Her husband Richard Makin died in 1659 and likely by this time, or soon thereafter, Bathsua had obtained employment in the household of Lucy Hastings, Dowager Countess of Huntingdon
Huntingdon
Huntingdon is a market town in Cambridgeshire, England. The town was chartered by King John in 1205. It is the traditional county town of Huntingdonshire, and is currently the seat of the Huntingdonshire district council. It is known as the birthplace in 1599 of Oliver Cromwell.-History:Huntingdon...
. Makin alludes in her pamphlet, An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen (1673), to having taught the Countess in languages, Arts
ARts
aRts, which stands for analog Real time synthesizer, is an audio framework that is no longer under development. It is best known for previously being used in KDE to simulate an analog synthesizer....
and Divinity
Divinity
Divinity and divine are broadly applied but loosely defined terms, used variously within different faiths and belief systems — and even by different individuals within a given faith — to refer to some transcendent or transcendental power or deity, or its attributes or manifestations in...
and, as Teague points out, letters found in the Huntington Library dated 1664 and 1668 reveal Makin’s close connection to the Hastings family.
Documentation in the Hastings’ papers reveals Makin was employed in the Hastings household until 1662. After this she likely continued teaching, setting up her own school soon thereafter, a school at Tottenham High Cross, just outside of London, which she advertised in the postscript of An Essay, published in 1673. As Frances Teague points out, “it is not known whether the school was a success, how long Makin taught there, or even when Makin died” (1998:104). Evidently, though, she was still alive in 1675, as a letter from Makin to a noted London physician, Baldwin Hamey (1600–1676), dated 1675, is preserved at the Royal College of Physicians
Royal College of Physicians
The Royal College of Physicians of London was founded in 1518 as the College of Physicians by royal charter of King Henry VIII in 1518 - the first medical institution in England to receive a royal charter...
.
While struggling financially throughout her lifetime, Bathsua nonetheless was acquainted with well-known scholars and court members. It is not know whether Bathsua was in direct personal contact with Anna Maria van Schurman, yet the evidence of correspondence between the two and the mention of Bathsua in van Schurman’s other correspondences alludes to the fact that the two scholars, both Royalists
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...
, respected each other and were on fairly intimate terms. In fact, Bathsua mentions van Schurman in her catalogue of learned women in An Essay. Bathsua was likely inspired by van Schurman’s The Learned Maid; or, Whether a Maid may be a Scholar (translated in 1659), using van Schurman’s treatise on women and girls’ right to education as a model for her pro-educational tract
Tract (literature)
A tract is a literary work, and in current usage, usually religious in nature. The notion of what constitutes a tract has changed over time. By the early part of the 21st century, these meant small pamphlets used for religious and political purposes, though far more often the former. They are...
, An Essay. Bathsua was also influenced by the work of John Amos Comenius
Comenius
John Amos Comenius ; ; Latinized: Iohannes Amos Comenius) was a Czech teacher, educator, and writer. He served as the last bishop of Unity of the Brethren, and became a religious refugee and one of the earliest champions of universal education, a concept eventually set forth in his book Didactica...
, a prominent 17th-century scholar and educator, whom she would have been exposed to, either directly or indirectly, through her brother-in-law John Pell. Pell and his friends, Samuel Hartlib
Samuel Hartlib
Samuel Hartlib was a German-British polymath. An active promoter and expert writer in many fields, he was interested in science, medicine, agriculture, politics, and education. He settled in England, where he married and died...
and John Dury
John Dury
John Dury was a Scottish Calvinist minister and a significant intellectual of the English Civil War period. He made efforts to re-unite the Calvinist and Lutheran wings of Protestantism, hoping to succeed when he moved to Kassel in 1661, but he did not accomplish this...
, were “England’s leading Comenians, believing that implementing Comenian ideas would strengthen education and the common good” (Teague 1993:7). While there was little call for abolishing set gender and class hierarchies within the Comenian model, in An Essay, according to Patricia L. Hamilton, “Makin champions pedagogical
Pedagogy
Pedagogy is the study of being a teacher or the process of teaching. The term generally refers to strategies of instruction, or a style of instruction....
methods developed by Moravia
Moravia
Moravia is a historical region in Central Europe in the east of the Czech Republic, and one of the former Czech lands, together with Bohemia and Silesia. It takes its name from the Morava River which rises in the northwest of the region...
n educator John Amos Comenius and recommends that women be educated according to a broad curriculum—a mixture of classical and modern languages, history, mathematics and science, and issues related to domestic economy” (2001:147).
Cultural context
Makin, writing within the confines of 17th-century British culture, was subject to the patriarchalPatriarchy
Patriarchy is a social system in which the role of the male as the primary authority figure is central to social organization, and where fathers hold authority over women, children, and property. It implies the institutions of male rule and privilege, and entails female subordination...
structures governing her society. Family
Family
In human context, a family is a group of people affiliated by consanguinity, affinity, or co-residence. In most societies it is the principal institution for the socialization of children...
, education and religion
Religion
Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...
were all male dominated institution
Institution
An institution is any structure or mechanism of social order and cooperation governing the behavior of a set of individuals within a given human community...
s. 17th-century women were increasingly relegated to the home, to the domestic or private sphere and even in the home women, as mothers, wives, or daughters, were governed by men. While within upper-class and aristocratic families there had been an increase in female education and women’s autonomy during the late Tudor period
Tudor period
The Tudor period usually refers to the period between 1485 and 1603, specifically in relation to the history of England. This coincides with the rule of the Tudor dynasty in England whose first monarch was Henry VII...
due to the leadership of Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
, into the 17th-century Stuart period, with the reign of James I
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
, a return to a more paternalistic hierarchical social model took hold and there was a decline in the encouraging of female erudition
Erudition
The word erudition came into Middle English from Latin. A scholar is erudite when instruction and reading followed by digestion and contemplation have effaced all rudeness , that is to say smoothed away all raw, untrained incivility...
(Gim 1999:186).
Nonetheless, as Hilda L. Smith points out, various cultural changes going on in the 17th century did create a milieu in which cultural norms could be challenged. Breakthroughs in rationalism
Rationalism
In epistemology and in its modern sense, rationalism is "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification" . In more technical terms, it is a method or a theory "in which the criterion of the truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive"...
and scientific thought along with demographic and economic issues “provided a climate of change and a significant common experience for those critical of women’s lives during the late seventeenth century” (Smith 1982:xi). There was a growing sense of instability in the 17th century related to religious strife, civil wars
English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...
, growing diversification among classes and the undercutting of socially established cultural hierarchies. Protestantism
Protestantism
Protestantism is one of the three major groupings within Christianity. It is a movement that began in Germany in the early 16th century as a reaction against medieval Roman Catholic doctrines and practices, especially in regards to salvation, justification, and ecclesiology.The doctrines of the...
called for the individual reading and interpretation of the bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
, which not only led to the need for increased literacy among all women and men but also allowed previously held customs
Convention (norm)
A convention is a set of agreed, stipulated or generally accepted standards, norms, social norms or criteria, often taking the form of a custom....
to be challenged.
While women writers began to take advantage of the changing attitudes in the 17th century, their writing is all the more valuable due to the risk of scorn they faced in attempting to participate in the public sphere. Frances Teague points out that “A seventeenth-century man might write because he sought a public identity; seventeenth-century women who wrote were scorned because such a public identity was deemed inappropriate for them” (1993:9-10). Teague goes on to stress that Makin wrote because of her financial difficulties; however, while she is advertising a school in which she will earn a living teaching, Makin’s An Essay, peppered with emotional appeals, vituperative attacks on the custom of “breeding women low,” along with a logical, effective and systematic undercutting of the arguments against women’s learning, reveals her purpose for writing went beyond simple economic advancement. From female writers such as Christine de Pizan
Christine de Pizan
Christine de Pizan was a Venetian-born late medieval author who challenged misogyny and stereotypes prevalent in the male-dominated medieval culture. As a poet, she was well known and highly regarded in her own day; she completed 41 works during her 30 year career , and can be regarded as...
in the 14th century to Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft was an eighteenth-century British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. During her brief career, she wrote novels, treatises, a travel narrative, a history of the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's book...
at the end of the 18th century to Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf
Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....
in the 20th century, “women’s didactic and defensive writings reveal a submerged tradition of female intellectual resistance to oppressive and repressive cultural givens” (Myers 1985:176-77). Bathsua Makin’s An Essay adds to the rich body of pro-female writing, a “genre
Genre
Genre , Greek: genos, γένος) is the term for any category of literature or other forms of art or culture, e.g. music, and in general, any type of discourse, whether written or spoken, audial or visual, based on some set of stylistic criteria. Genres are formed by conventions that change over time...
” that was well underway in the 17th century.
Writing
While Makin’s An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen was not published until 1673, her Musea Virginea, published in 1616, is now viewed as an important piece of writing because it reveals previously unknown biographical data while also implying she was a scholar and therefore important to the history of female writing. Musea Virginea, a book of verse written in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Spanish, German, French and Italian, was dedicated to James I. “But can she spin” was King James’ response to Makin and her demonstration of learning, revealing the negativity surrounding female erudition. Published at the age of sixteen and skilled or knowledgeable in up to seven different ancient and modern languages, Makin warranted the title of “learned lady,” a rare quality for a middle-class 17th-century woman.While Makin’s publications are few, two poems written to the Hastings are preserved in the Hastings Collection at the Henry E. Huntington Library. On 24 June 1649, Makin wrote a Latin elegy addressed to Lucy Hastings, the Dowager Countess of Huntingdon on the occasion of the death of Henry, Lord Hastings. Makin also wrote an elegy in honor of Lady Elizabeth (Hastings) Langham, who died in 1664. The poem is entitled “Upon the Much Lamented Death of the Right Honorable, the Lady Elizabeth Langham.” In addition, the collected works of Anna Maria van Schurman
Anna Maria van Schurman
Anna Maria van Schurman was a German-Dutch painter, engraver, poet and scholar. She was a highly educated woman by seventeenth century standards...
(Leyden, 1648) include an exchange of letters in Hebrew between van Schurman and Makin.
Essay
An essay is a piece of writing which is often written from an author's personal point of view. Essays can consist of a number of elements, including: literary criticism, political manifestos, learned arguments, observations of daily life, recollections, and reflections of the author. The definition...
lies in the fact that Makin argues for “learning as an aid to the moral life, to women’s usefulness and moral agency” (Myers 1985:177). An Essay is grounded in religious thought, for Makin points out that an education lends to the polishing of one’s soul so “that you may glorify God.” (Makin 1673). Such an education would, according to Makin, cultivate a woman’s soul so that women may be better able “to know God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
, Jesus Christ, themselves, and the things of nature, arts and tongues” (Makin 1673). Makin takes the stance that education will not only benefit the soul of woman, leading her to greater communion with God, but female learning will benefit the nation
Nation
A nation may refer to a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and/or history. In this definition, a nation has no physical borders. However, it can also refer to people who share a common territory and government irrespective of their ethnic make-up...
. She states that “Were women thus educated now, I am confident that advantage would be very great: the women would have honor and pleasure, their relations profit, and the whole nation advantage” (Makin 1673).
An Essay begins with a series of letters in which Makin establishes her audience with her original appeal to “all Ingenious and Virtuous Ladies, more especially to her Highness the Lady Mary
Mary II of England
Mary II was joint Sovereign of England, Scotland, and Ireland with her husband and first cousin, William III and II, from 1689 until her death. William and Mary, both Protestants, became king and queen regnant, respectively, following the Glorious Revolution, which resulted in the deposition of...
, eldest Daughter to his Royal Highness the Duke of York” (Makin 1673). In the introductory epistle
Epistle
An epistle is a writing directed or sent to a person or group of people, usually an elegant and formal didactic letter. The epistle genre of letter-writing was common in ancient Egypt as part of the scribal-school writing curriculum. The letters in the New Testament from Apostles to Christians...
, Makin admits that to challenge customs, to imply that women are reasonable creatures who will benefit from learning, is a bold attempt and she expects to meet opposition while at the same time claiming that the patronage
Patronage
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows to another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings or popes have provided to musicians, painters, and sculptors...
of the Royal Highness will be a form of protection. Here, in Makin’s exordium
Exordium
Exordium may refer to:* Exordium , the introductory section of a discourse in Western classical rhetoric; e.g., the 1st 4 verses of Hebrews in the Bible* Exordium , by Dutch symphonic metal band After Forever....
, through the use of kairos
Kairos
Kairos is an ancient Greek word meaning the right or opportune moment . The ancient Greeks had two words for time, chronos and kairos. While the former refers to chronological or sequential time, the latter signifies a time in between, a moment of indeterminate time in which something special...
, she appeals to her audience’s interest and sympathy. While her audience is both male and female, her emotional appeal, the pathos
Pathos
Pathos represents an appeal to the audience's emotions. Pathos is a communication technique used most often in rhetoric , and in literature, film and other narrative art....
of her treatise, is directed at women, for she writes: “I expect to meet with many scoffs and taunts from inconsiderate and illiterate men, that prize their own lusts and pleasure more than your profit and content” (Makin 1673). She goes on to state: “I shall be the less concerned at these, so long as I am in your favor; and this discourse
Discourse
Discourse generally refers to "written or spoken communication". The following are three more specific definitions:...
may be a weapon in your hands to defend yourselves, whilst you endeavor to polish your souls, that you may glorify God” (Makin 1673). She further emphasizes “ladies” as her target audience: “I hope I shall not need to beg the patience of ladies to peruse this pamphlet: I have bespoken and do expect your patronage, because it is your cause I plead against an ill custom, prejudicial to you, which men will not willingly suffer to be broken” (Makin 1673).
Makin’s introductory address to her audience is followed by two letters in which she takes on a male persona
Persona
A persona, in the word's everyday usage, is a social role or a character played by an actor. The word is derived from Latin, where it originally referred to a theatrical mask. The Latin word probably derived from the Etruscan word "phersu", with the same meaning, and that from the Greek πρόσωπον...
. While her first male persona is pro-learning, the following letter’s masculine voice sets up Makin’s argument as he, an objector to women’s learning, claims that “Women do not much desire Knowledge; they are of low parts, soft fickle natures . . . [and] they will abuse their Education” (Makin 1673). Such objections to female erudition are taken up and refuted throughout the essay. Makin’s strongest argument comes in the following long section of the essay in which she catalogues mythological, legend
Legend
A legend is a narrative of human actions that are perceived both by teller and listeners to take place within human history and to possess certain qualities that give the tale verisimilitude...
ary, biblical, historical and contemporary women, women who were writers, artists, moral heroines and mothers (Myers 1985:181). In her listing of female worthies Makin establishes her credibility, her ethos
Ethos
Ethos is a Greek word meaning "character" that is used to describe the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize a community, nation, or ideology. The Greeks also used this word to refer to the power of music to influence its hearer's emotions, behaviors, and even morals. Early Greek stories of...
, her right and ability to promote education for women, but more importantly, she, in turning to external proofs, reveals how “Women were formerly Educated in the knowledge of Arts and Tongues, and by their Education, many did rise to a great height in Learning” (Makin 1673). Makin goes on to claim that, “Were Women thus Educated now I am confident the advantage would be very great” (Makin 1673).
Makin, having established quite firmly through her catalogue of other learned ladies that educated women were not a new phenomenon nor a threat to society, goes on to relate a series of staged proofs and refutations. She takes on a syllogistic
Syllogism
A syllogism is a kind of logical argument in which one proposition is inferred from two or more others of a certain form...
form, logically deconstructing over twelve different objections to women’s learning. Within the logos
Logos
' is an important term in philosophy, psychology, rhetoric and religion. Originally a word meaning "a ground", "a plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word," "speech," "account," "reason," it became a technical term in philosophy, beginning with Heraclitus ' is an important term in...
of her argument, some of her chief refutations involve responses to the claims that women will abuse their educations and not obey their husbands. She responds that “tis not knowing too much but too little that causes the irregularity” (Makin 1673), i.e., “More education, not less, is the way to prevent pride,” (Hamilton 2001:150), and educated women will be better companions to their husbands and more efficient members of their families. She also logically counters the objection that women are of low parts, weak and soft and therefore uneducable. Makin's syllogistic response is that such “deficiencies” demand all the more for the education of women and women will, in their softness, be all the more easy to educate.
Importantly, what scholars have found conventional about Makin’s argument is her hesitancy to demand equality for women, at times appearing to reinforce women’s role as the “weaker vessel” whose place is in the home, where “God has made the man head,” and women the “helps” to their husbands (Makin 1673). Nonetheless, she was writing from within the patriarchal context of 17th-century England, and as J. L. Helm points out, “Makin carefully placed women within the bounds of her society’s restrictions” (1993:48). As she states in the introductory epistle, she does not “plead for female preeminence, [for] to ask too much is the way to be denied all” (Makin 1673). Such a disclaimer lends persuasion to Makin’s rhetoric
Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...
al treatise for she reveals her sensitivity to her audience, an audience in which “The Barbarous custom to breed women low is grown amongst us, and hath prevailed so far” (Makin 1673). Her claim to not ask too much serves as a “conciliatory strategy to diffuse opposition” (Hamilton 2001:149).
Other criticisms of Makin’s An Essay point to her use of a masculine persona and her call for the education of “rich” women and girls. While her use of a masculine persona gives credence to masculine-centered ideologies
Ideology
An ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions. An ideology can be thought of as a comprehensive vision, as a way of looking at things , as in common sense and several philosophical tendencies , or a set of ideas proposed by the dominant class of a society to...
and confirms that only men are capable of participating in the intellectual debate of the public sphere, taking on a male voice does give Makin more freedom. Also, as Mitzi Myers points out, “the male voice is always there in pro-women writing, whether formally personified or not” (1985:180). Universal educational models for all levels of society are not Makin’s aim. Makin’s pro-education treatise is directed towards women and girls of means. She alludes to the fact that the women and girls who should be educated are those “persons that God has blessed with the things of this world, that have competent natural parts” (Makin 1673). In other words, those that are rich and have spare time may make better use of their time “in gaining arts, and tongues” (Makin 1673), rather than “to trifle away so many precious minutes merely to polish their hands and feet, to curl their locks, to dress and trim their bodies” (Makin 1673).
Thus, Makin’s argument for educating women reveals ambiguity as to whether women deserve a place in the public sphere, for her proposal of an educational model for women argues for women to be better wives, mothers or daughters, not to prepare women for the public sphere. Makin, though, in writing such a tract, deliberately participates in the public domain of 17th-century intellectual debate. Her postscript, advertising a school “where, by the blessing of God, gentlewomen may be instructed in the principles of religion; and in all manner of sober and virtuous education” (Makin 1673), reveals not only that she was still teaching at the age of seventy-three, but that she was dedicated to the betterment of woman’s position in society.
Modern scholarship
Recently, scholarship dealing with 17th-century female writers has increased. Contemporary feminism’s aim to recover the words and history of our feminist foremothers can be seen in numerous texts. Authors such as Moira Ferguson, Hilda L. Smith, Mary Mahl and Helene Koon, and Antonia Fraser have worked to link historical female writers, many of which are now viewed as proto-feminists, with contemporary issues of femininity. They all situate Makin within a rich body of historical women, although these texts provide biographical data on Makin that is now viewed as incorrect.For up to date studies of Bathsua’s life and work see Frances Teague and Jean R. Brink. Teague and Brink’s research has provided important findings, clarifying Makin’s true identity as a Reginald and also clarifying work that is attributed to Makin (it was previously held that Makin was responsible for The Malady . . . and Remedy of Vexations and Unjust Arrests and Actions (1646)).
Many scholars have provided excellent commentaries on Makin’s An Essay. While some of the criticism on Makin considers her work too conventional to be wholly classified as feminist, Nancy Weitz (Miller), Mitzi Myers, James L. Helm, and Frances Teague provide analyses of Makin’s rhetorical methods and point to the effectiveness of Makin’s pro-education argument.
Several scholars work to tie Makin’s work to other important writing of the period. Both Patricia Hamilton and James L. Helm see Makin’s An Essay as directly influential and influenced by other educational reform tracts written by 17th-century men.
External links
- An online version of Bathsua Makin’s An Essay To Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen, in Religion, Manners, Arts & Tongues, With An Answer to the Objections against this Way of Education is available at A Celebration of Women Writers.