Rape In 18th Century England

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Society in early modern England seen rape, if proven, to be a gross and extremely indecent crime, specifically if the victim is a child or a virgin. Toulalan mentions the misguided belief that sex with a virgin was thought to cure venereal disease, yet society still views the rape of a virgin through a harsh lens due to the impact a sexual assault has on the victim, as well as the victims family. The marriage of a women depended on their virginity, chastity, and reputation, and therefore raping a virgin or a child was seen as especially heinous, due to the importance society placed on ones virginity and reputation. On June. 22nd, 1677 an unnamed man is accused of raping a married women. The victim is said to have not cried out, and also dined …show more content…

In Laura Gowing’s article Women’s Bodies and the Making of Sex in Seventeenth Century England, she argues that the “hierarchical nature” and “early modern patriarchal household” play a factor in the number of rapes and sexual assaults that are brought to the authorities, and make these crimes a frequent risk to women in early modern England. During the seventeenth and eighteenth century, the paternalistic structure of society plays a large role in the way society perceives cases of rape. Throughout Europe, women were still assumed to be desirous, temptable, and “satiable”, as Manon Van Der Heidjen points out in her article “Women as Victims of Sexual and Domestic Violence in Seventeenth Century Holland.” An unnamed man living in Chancery-Lane was indicted for the rape of a woman around fifteen years of age on an unknown date. He has witnesses testify in confidence of his character, and further testimonials are made condemning the woman, stating she is “lewd, lascivious, and disorderly,” and that she is only after “a piece of his money,” and thus he is found to be not guilty of rape. It is clear from the trial of this unnamed man that women remain at a disadvantage when convicting a man of rape, due to society perceiving the female gender as possessing an “excess of desire”. Another case from the Old Bailey which shows the disadvantage a women is at when convicting a

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