Keeping women silent and obedient--the Scold's Bridle

The scolding wife Date: 1670-1696 Tract Supplement / A2:4[78]

I won't say HOW exactly, but a scold's bridle features prominently in my third novel, Masque of a Murderer. (Well, okay, maybe one is found on the corpse of a young woman. Or not.)  But the bridle does play an important role, and I thought I would give a little more background.

Since at least the Middle Ages,  women had been expected to heed Paul's admonition to be "chaste, silent and obedient," an expectation that became even more pronounced for women in early modern Europe. Women were branded "scolds" if they harangued their husbands or neighbors, or as we may say today, spoke their minds.

"The Scolding Wife," shown here, is one of many tales of a merry young man who made the mistake of marrying a rich widow who very quickly made his life miserable.

Indeed, the couple couldn't even sit down to eat without her scolding him:

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"They was not all at supper set, or at the board sat down,
E’er she began to brawl and scold,
and call’d him a peaking clown.
That nothing he could do that was pleasing in her light;
But still she scolded day and night,
Which made this merry man’s heart full of woe."

Such accounts explain how the men's good will and cheer are sapped by the woman's speech. It should be noted, however, that the tale is to be 'set to a pleasant tune.' The ballad is meant to be lighthearted--an everyday tale of a man who cannot control his wife. As such, it is as much a comment about his nature as it is about hers.  Nevertheless, there is a gendered warning here about the respective roles that men and women should play in a marriage.

My favorite of these little discourses is one by Anonymous (1684): "The tongue combatants, or A sharp dispute between a comical courageous country grasier, and a London bull-feather'd butchers twitling, twatling, turbulent, thundering, tempestuous, terrifying, taunting, troublesome, talkative tongu'd wife."  

Hmmmm.....

Sometimes, however, the warning against women's scolding was more explicit--and more terrifying.

Devices known as scold's bridles, or scold's masks, first emerged in the Middle Ages, and continued to be used (in England at least) throughout the early modern era. 

The scold's mask was a painful contraption of iron and leather that fit over a woman's face that effectively prohibited her from speaking. Sometimes, the woman might be paraded about, as a humiliating reminder to keep her opinions to herself, and as a lesson to other women who might be inclined to do the same. 

So how does this play out in my novel?   Find out in April 2015, when Masque of a Murderer is released!

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