Abstract

This study is an exploration of the unlicensed and semi-official medical activities of women in England from 1348 to 1500. The emphasis is placed on the diversity of women's medical practice in both urban and rural areas. Some of the issues to be addressed are: the importance of herbalists and wet nurses as unacknowledged health care practitioners, the social and medical significance of hospital sisters, the variety of services offered by midwives and female surgeons, and the images of women healers in literature and science. The conclusions of this study are based on a critical analysis of traditional notions of professionalization and constructs of health and sickness.