Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T01:35:58.128Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Deviant Insiders: Legalized Prostitutes and a Consciousness of Women in Early Modern Seville

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Mary Elizabeth Perry
Mary Elizabeth Perry
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.
Image of the first page of this content. For PDF version, please use the ‘Save PDF’ preceeding this image.'
Type
Deviance and Social Control
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 27 , Issue 1 , January 1985 , pp. 138 - 158
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1985

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Archivo Municipal de Sevilla (hereafter cited as A.M.S.), Colección del Conde de Águila, Tomo 7, Letra A, Número 73. This document has been published by Órtiz, Antonio Domínguez in Documentos relativos a la mancebía, Archivo Hispalense, Series 1, III (1887), 16–18. Although male prostitutes and clandestine prostitution existed in Seville, this article will focus on legalized prostitution and female prostitutes, who were much more widely described in this and all other historical records.Google Scholar

2 Several sociologists have propounded a dramaturgical theory that views social behavior as theater. See, e.g., Douglas, Jack B. and Waksler, Frances C., The Sociology of Deviance: An Introduction (Boston and Toronto, 1982);Google ScholarGoffman, Erving, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Woodstock, N.Y., 1973).Google Scholar

3 Trexler, Richard, “La prostitution Florentine au xvc siécle: patronages et clientéles,” Annalel, 36:6(1981), 983–1015.Google Scholar

4 Rossiaud, Jacques, “Prostitution, jeunesse et société dans les villes du sud-est au xve siécle,” Annales, 31:2(1976), 300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Also note idem, “Fraternités de jeunesse et niveaux de culture dans les vittes du sud-est a la fin du Moyen Age,” Cahiers d'Histoire, 21:1–2 (1976), 67–102.Google Scholar

5 Walkowitz, Judith, Prostitution and Victorian Society: Women, Class, and the State (New York and London, 1980);CrossRefGoogle ScholarEvans, Richard, “Prostitution, State, and Society in Impe?al Germany,” Past and Present, no. 70 (1976), 106–29;CrossRefGoogle ScholarConnelly, Mark Thomas, The Response to Prostitution in the Progressive Era (Chapel Hill, 1980).Google Scholar

6 For examples, see Finnegan, Frances, Poverty and Prostitution: A Study of Victorian Prostitutes in York (New York, 1979);Google ScholarRosen, Ruth, The Lost Sisterhood: Prostitution in America, 1900–1918 (Baltimore, 1982).Google Scholar Note, however, that Goldman, Marion, Gold Diggers and Silver Miners; Prostitution and Social Life on the Comstock Lode (Ann Arbor, 1981), esp. 156CrossRefGoogle Scholar, points out that women chose to become prostitutes, even though their choices were limited by social and economic considerations.

7 Davis, Natalie Zemon, “Women on Top,” in her Society and Culture in Early Modern France (Stanford, 1975), 124.Google Scholar

8 Kelly-Gadol, Joan, “Did Women Have a Renaissance?” in Becoming Visible: Women in European History, Renate Bridenthal and Claudia Koonz, eds. (Boston, 1977), esp. 157–61.Google Scholar

9 Foucault, Michel, The History of Sexuality, Hurley, Robert, trans. (New York, 1978), 1Google Scholar, develops the theme of sexuality as an expression of power.

10 Las Siete Partidas, Scott, Samuel Parsons, trans. (Chicago, New York, and Washington, 1931), Partida IV, Title XV, Law I.Google Scholar

11 Ibid., Partida V, Title XIV, Law LIII; and Partida VII, Title VI.

12 Ibid., Partida I, Title IV, Law XXXVII.

13 Ibid., Law XXVI, citing the prophet Habbakuk.

14 Ibid., Partida IV, Title II.

15 Douglas, Mary, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (New York and Washington, 1966).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 A.M.S., Ordenanzas de Sevilla, Título: De las mugeres banangas, y dehonestas.

17 Parody, Joaquin Guichot y, Historia del Excmo. Ayuntamiento de la muy noble, muy leal, muy herdica e invicta ciudad de Sevilla (Sevilla, 1896), I, 101.Google Scholar See the discussion of stigmatization in Lemert, Edwin M., Human Deviance, Social Problems, and Social Control (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1967), esp. 42;Google ScholarGoffman, Erving, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity (New York, 1974).Google Scholar

18 Parody, Guichot y, Historia del Excmo, I, 375.Google Scholar

19 SÁnchez, Jose VelÁzquez y, Anales epidémicos; Reseña históríca de las enfermedades contagiosas en Sevilla desde la reconquista cristiana hasta de presente (Sevilla, 1866), 54.Google Scholar This work (pp. 50–61) contains a brief history of the regulation of prostitution in Seville.

20 Parody, Guichot y, Historia del Exceto, I, 376.Google Scholar

21 A.M.S., , Ordenanzas de SevillaGoogle Scholar, Título: De las mugeres barrangas, y deshonestas, 63r–64. See the royal letter to Seville in 1500, quoted in Parody, Guichot y, Historia del Excmo, I, 375.Google Scholar Rossiaud, “Prostitution,” 290, also found that people in southeastern France referred to brothel keepers as “abbesses.”

22 León, Pedro de, Compendio de algunas experiencias en los ministerios de que vsa la Compa de IESVS con q practicamente se muestra con algunos acaecimientos y documentos el buen acierto en ellos (Granada, 1619), Appendix 1 to Part II, cases 7, 8, 180, 181.Google Scholar

23 Farfan, Francisco, Tres libros contra de peccado de la simple fornicación: donde se averigua, que la torpeza entre solteros es peccado mortal, segun ley divina, natural, y humana; y se responde a los engaños de los que dizen que no es peccado (Salamanca, 1585), 730. I am grateful to William Christian, who brought this passage to my attention.Google Scholar

24 Sociologists presenting theories of labelling include Erikson, Kai T., Wayward Puritans: A Study of the Sociology of Deviance (New York, 1966);Google Scholaridem, “Notes on the Sociology of Deviance,” Social Problems, 9 (Spring 1962), 303–14;Google ScholarBecker, Howard S., Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance (New York and London, 1963);Google ScholarGarfinkel, Harold, Studies in Ethnomethodology (Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1967);Google Scholaridem, “Conditions of Successful Degradation Ceremonies,” American Journal of Sociology, 61 (03 1956), 420–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar In addition, Douglas and Waksler, Sociology of Deviance; Gove, Walter R., ed., The Labelling of Deviance: Evaluating a Perspective (Beverly Hills, 1980);Google ScholarKitsuse, J. I., “Societal Reaction to Deviant Behavior: Problems of Theory and Method,” Social Problems, 9 (Winter 1962), 247–57;CrossRefGoogle ScholarLemert, , Human Deviance;Google ScholarOrcutt, James, “Societal Reaction and the Response to Deviation in Small Groups,” Social Forces, 52 (12 1973), 259–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Orcutt's theory appears particularly appropriate for legalized prostitution in Seville because he has proposed that social response to rule-breakers does not always exclude them and may, in fact, hold them within society.

25 See Thobar, Ramón Carande, Carlos V y sus banqueros; La vida económíca en Castilla, 1516–1556 (Madrid, 1943), 38–39;Google ScholarÓrtiz, Antonio Domínguez, The Golden Age of Spain, 1516–1659 (London, 1971), 134–36;Google ScholarAlmansa, Javier Ruiz, “La población de España en el siglo XVI; Estudio sobre los recuentos de vecindario de 1594, llamados comómente ‘Censo de TomÁs GonzÁlez,’“ Revista Internacional de Sociologia, 1 (1943), 136.Google Scholar Note the careful attention that Trexler, “La prostitution Florentine,” 995, gives to the clients of prostitutes in fifteenth-century Florence.

26 Navagero, Andres, Viaje a España, translated by Gamo, José Maria Alonso (Valencia, 1951), 57.Google Scholar Reliable population figures for men and for women are not available for comparison in this period.

27 See the discourse of the contemporary economist, Mata, Francisco Martínez de, in Memoriales y discursos de Francisco Martinez de Mata, Álvarez, Gonzalo Ánes, ed. (Madrid, 1971), esp. 129.Google Scholar A broader discussion of economic problems related to prostitution is in Perry, Mary Elizabeth, Crime and Society in Early Modern Seville (Hanover and London, 1980), 213–21, 230–33.Google Scholar The necessity of ritual for social relations is discussed in Douglas, , Purity and Danger, esp. 62.Google ScholarGoffman, Erving, Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behavior (Garden City, N.Y., 1967), esp. 19Google Scholar, discusses the necessity of a ritual state for the individual.

28 Valdes, Juan de, Diálogo de doctrina cristiana: Nuevamente compuesto por un religioso (1529; Madrid, 1929), 38–39.Google Scholar See also Vives, Juan, Institución de la mujer cristiana (Madrid, 1529);Google Scholar and Luxan, Pedro de, Colloquios matrimoniales del Licenciado Pedro de Luxan (Sevilla, 1550).Google Scholar

29 The oral tradition of street people and vagabonds has been printed in Hill, John, ed., Poesias Germanescas, Humanities Series No. 15 (Bloomington, 1945); the reference to prostitutes as bags of money is at page 119.Google Scholar

30 Rua, Joaquin Hazañas y la, Los Rufianes de Cervantes: “El Rufián Dichoso” y “El Rufián Viudo” con un estudio preliminar y notas (Sevilla, 1906), 26 n. 1.Google Scholar See Perry, Mary Elizabeth, “‘Lost Women’ in Early Modern Seville: The Politics of Prostitution,” Feminist Studies,4:1(02 1978), 209CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and n. 58. A real was a coin worth approximately 34 maravedis or 68 blancas.

31 Archivo del Diputación de la Provincia de Sevilla, Libros de Protocolos del Amor de Dios, Legajo 49, Expediente 2, shows tributes from 1549 through 1674.

32 A.M.S., Archivo de Privilegios, 127, Ordenanzas de Sevilla, recopiladas, (Sevilla, 1632), Título: De las mugeres barrangas, y deshonestas; Título: Del Alcalde de la justicia. The decree is also quoted in Parody, Guichot y, Historia de Excmo, I, 375.Google Scholar

33 A.M.S., , Ordenanzas de SevillaGoogle Scholar, Título: De los cabernos y mesoneros. Goffman, , Interaction Ritual, 62–70, discusses avoidance rituals and fear of pollution.Google Scholar

34 SÁnchez, VelÁzquez y, Anales epidémicos, 50–61;Google Scholar A.M.S., Colección del Conde de Águila, Tomo 7, Letra A, Número 73. See also Garfinkel, “Conditions of Successful Degradation Ceremonies.” Note that nonlicensed prostitutes could be natives of the city and undoubtedly were.

35 For example, see Lemert, , Human Deviance, v;Google Scholar and Gove, Walter R., “The Labelling Perspective: An Overview,” in Labelling of Deviance, Gove, , ed., 9–22.Google Scholar

36 Goffman, , Interaction Ritual, 19–22, discusses ways a disgraced person can uphold rules of conduct.Google Scholar

37 See Goffman, , Stigma, 17.Google Scholar

38 For the names, see A.M.S., Colección del Conde de Águila, Letra A, Número 73.

39 Trexler, , “La prostitution Florentine,” 989, found evidences of genuine piety among the prostitutes of fifteenth-century Florence.Google Scholar

40 See notes 7 and 9, above.

41 The phrase is from Cerda, Juan de la, Vida polftica de todos los estados de mugeres (AlcalÁ de Henares, 1599), 14.Google Scholar

42 Valdivia, Diego Pérez de, Aviso de gente recogida (1585; Madrid, 1977), 666.Google Scholar

43 Goffman, , Interaction Ritual, 89.Google Scholar

44 Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, the Schroeder, Reverend H. J., O.P., trans. (St. Louis and London, 1941), 220–21.Google Scholar Note, however, that cloistering did not originate with the Council of Trent. Boniface VIII had commanded perpetual enclosure for female religious in 1298, a move which one scholar believes was intended to keep invaders out, rather than to keep nuns in their convents. See Bernstein, Marcelle, Nuns (London, 1976), 19, 55.Google ScholarÓrtiz, Antonio Domínguez, El estamento eclesiástico, Vol. IIGoogle Scholar of La sociedad española en el siglo XVII (Madrid, 1970), 121–25, discusses the stricter enforcement of enclosure on nuns in Spanish convents.Google Scholar

45 Valdivia, Pérez de, Aviso de gente recogida, 759–60.Google Scholar For more discussion of beatas, see Mary Elizabeth Perry, “Beatas and the Problem of Power in Early Modern Seville,” a paper presented to the Society for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies, University of California at Berkeley, April 1982.

46 Cerda, , Vida politica, 244.Google Scholar

47 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 11, Números 58–60.

48 Ritual meetings of non-equals are discussed in Goffman, , Interaction Ritual, esp. 47–95.Google Scholar

49 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Seccíón 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 11, Número 63.

50 Perry, , Crime, 227–28.Google Scholar See also A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribaniás de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Número 8, for testimony that some prostitutes-from the brothel could not attend Mass because they lacked cloaks. I have found no indication that prostitutes in the public brothel made much money. The association of deviance and disease is the subject of Chevalier, Louis, Laboring Classes and Dangerous Classes in Paris during the First Half of the Nineteenth Century, Jellinek, Frank, trans. (Princeton, 1981).Google Scholar

51 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Número 69. Dr. Luis Suárez complained to the city council that the lechuga and lengua cervina, commonly sold in the brothel, were in very poor condition. Both were evidently plants used as remedies for venereal disease.

52 The 1570 regulations are in the British Museum, Egerton 1873, “Tractatus yarn et collectanea,” folios 155–156.

53 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo II, Número 62.

54 Ibid. This is a memorial from Pedro García Arroyal.

55 See the description of treatment for syphilis in Morgado, Alonso, Historia de Sevilla (Sevilla, 1587), 365;Google Scholar and García, Juan Ignacio Carmona, El sistema del hospitalidad pública en Sevilla del Antiguo Régimen (Sevilla, 1979), 53; A.M.S., Seccíón Especial, Papeles del Conde de Águila, Tomo 32 en folio, Número I. Perry, Crime, 228–29, discusses hospitals and treatments.Google Scholar

56 Órtiz, Antonio Domínguez, Vida y obras del Padre Pedro de León, Archivo liispalense, Series 2, XXVI-XXVII, 1957, 167. The account of his ministry to people of Seville's brothel is in Pedro de León, Compendio, Part I, Chapters 4–6.Google Scholar

57 Douglas, , Purity and Danger, esp. 95–102Google Scholar, discusses the danger of anomalous people and the necessity for giving them definable boundaries. See also discussion, Goffman's of deference and demeanor in Interaction Ritual, 47–49.Google Scholar

58 Parody, Guichot y, Historia del Excmo, II, 68–69.Google Scholar

59 Cerda, , Vida politica, 18.Google Scholar

60 Morgado, , Historia de Sevilla, 320–21, 355–57.Google Scholar

61 A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanias de Cabildo, Tomo 24, Número 1.

62 Morgado, , Historia de Sevilla, 373.Google Scholar

63 See, for example, the warning of Alonso Ruiz, administrator of the girls' orphanage, in A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 24, Número 28; and Pedro de León, Compendio, Part I, Chapter 5, folios 14–15, and Part II, Chapter 25, folios 191–92.

64 Perry, , Crime, 5–6, 192–93;Google Scholar also see Ortiz, Antonio Domínguez, Orto v ocaso de Sevilla (Sevilla, 1946).Google Scholar

65 Money was called in to be restamped or revalued in 1604, 1609, 1628, 1636, 1641, 1642, and 1643; see Biblioteca Capitular, 84–7–21, Otros sucesos acontecidos en Sevilla en diferentes tiempos. For the decline of trade, see Chaunu, Pierra and Chaunu, Huguette, Seville et l'Atlantique, 1504–1650 (Paris, 1955–1959), esp. VI.Google Scholar

66 Mariana, Padre Juan de, “Tratado contra los Juegos públicos,” in his Obras, published in Biblioteca de Autores Españoles, XXX, 446.Google Scholar

67 Ibid., 447.

6 s Ibid.

69 Vives, Juan Luis, Del socorro de los pobres, ode las necesidades humanes (1526; Madrid, 1922), 280.Google Scholar

70 See, for example, the complaint of Juan Vazquez, A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escibanías de Cabildo, Tomo 12, Número 44.

71 Ibid. Also, Tomo 11, Número 63; also A.M.S., Sección Especial, Papeles del Sr. Conde de Águila, Tomo 7 en folio, Número 20.

72 Pedro de León, Compendio, Part I, Chapter 4, folios 10–14, and Chapter 6, folio 16.

73 Ibid.

74 Ibid., Part II, Chapter 25, folios 191–92.

75 Mata, Martínez de, Memoriales v discursos, Alvarez, Anes, ed., Third Discourse, 129. See also A.M.S., Papeles Importantes, Siglo XVI, Tomo 9, Número 1.Google Scholar

76 Archivo del Hospital de la Santa Caridad, Memoria de todas las parroquias de Sevilla y de las necesidades y pobres que había en ellas; que pedía el Ver D. Miguel Mañara para tener cuidado de socorrer las como 10 hijo, y mientras ?cibíó los remedios como por estas memorias parece (1667), Estante 4, Legajo 18. For a more detailed discussion of women and charity, see Perry, , Crime, 163–89.Google Scholar

77 Pacheco, Francisco, Libro de descripción de verdaderos retratos, de illustres v memorables varones (Sevilla, 1599).Google Scholar See Goffman, , Interaction Ritual, 21–22Google Scholar, for a broader discussion of rituals of penitence.

78 Pacheco, , Libro.Google Scholar

79 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 11, Número 33.

80 A.M.S., Siglo XVI, Sección 3, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 14, Número 7. Morgado, , Historia de Sevilla, 465–66Google Scholar, described the convent.

81 Hepworth, Mike and Turner, Bryan S., Confession: Studies of Deviance and Religion (London, Boston, Melbourne, and Henley, 1982), esp. 37.Google Scholar

82 For a discussion of religion in early modem Spain, see Martín, Melquiades Andres, Los Recogidos: Nueva visión de la mística española (1500–1700) (Madrid, 1975);Google Scholar and Flors, Juan, ed., Corrientes espirituales en la España del siglo XVI (Barcelona, 1963).Google Scholar

83 Juan de Arguijo provided an eyewitness description of these festivities, quoted in Parody, Guichot y, Historia de Excmo, II, 172–73.Google Scholar Earlier popular enthusiasm for the Immaculate Concep tion is in Biblioteca Capitular, 84–7–19, Memorias eclesiÁsticas y seculares de la muy noble y muy leal ciudad de Sevilla (Sevilla, 1698), folios 195–97.Google Scholar The major resistance to the increased veneration of the mother of Jesus appeared to come from the Dominican Order. See Órtiz, Domínguez, El estamento eclesiástico, 98.Google Scholar

84 Pedro de León, Compendio, Part I, Chapter 6, folio 16; Part II, Chapter 12, folio 142x. The two Magdalen institutions at this time were the Recogidas and the Casa Pía.

85 Pedro de León, Compendio, Part I, Chapter 5, folios 14–15.

86 Ibid., Part I, Chapter 4, folios 10–14; Chapter 5, folios 14–15.

87 Montes, Raimundo González de, Aries de la Inquisición española, Vol. V.Google Scholar of Reformistas antiguos españoles (1567; n.p., 1851), 201–4;Google ScholarPelayo, Marcelino Menéndez y, Historia de los heterodoxos españoles (Madrid, 1928), II, 234–35.Google Scholar

88 Pelayo, Menéndez y, Historía, II, 243; A.M.S., Sección Especial, Efemérides, “Noticias y casos,” Part I.Google Scholar

89 Douglas, , Purity and Danger, 34, 94;Google ScholarErikson, , Wayward Puritans, 195.Google Scholar

90 A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Números 9, I I, 17. Note that his complaint came in the same year as the official visit described above. The officials' report did not say how many women were converted that day, nor did it explain whether the officials' harsh measures against the prostitutes were intended to intimidate them into conversion or to answer the administrator's complaints.

91 See Becker, , Outsiders, 147–55Google Scholar, for a discussion of moral entrepreneurs.

92 Rule 16 in the 1621 regulations, A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Número 14.

93 The new regulations of 1621 are in A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Número 14.

94 For discussions of deviance as disease, see Becker, , Outsiders, 5–7;Google ScholarChevalier, , Laboring Classes; Thomas Szasz, The Myth of Mental Illness (New York, 1961), 44–45.Google Scholar

95 A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 22, Número 9; Tomo 16, Número 20.

96 Goldman, Gold Diggers, esp. 159–61, discusses the dirty work of prostitution in the mining towns of the nineteenth-century American West.Google Scholar

97 Gaspar Navarro, quoted in Piñuela, José Deleito y, La Vida religiosa española bajo el quarto Felipe: Santos y pecadores (Madrid, 1952), 204–5.Google Scholar

98 Pedro de León, “Industrias con que uno de la comps de Jhe mejor conseguiran sus fines,” a section following Appendix 2 of his Compendio, folio 456.

99 A.M.S., Siglo XVII, Sección 4, Escribanías de Cabildo, Tomo 29, Número 18.