Women as historians: The case of early modern German convents

While writing by nuns features extensively in the history of medieval women's literature, almost nothing is known about nuns, or their writings, in the early modern period. It is sometimes assumed that nuns stopped writing because of the changes which convents underwent in the sixteenth century as a result of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation. This article attempts to question the assumption that there is no writing by nuns in the early modern period, showing that there were nuns writing in considerable numbers, although their writings only circulated as manuscripts. I shall suggest that the lack of interest in nuns' writings results rather from a focus in the history of German literature on printed writing by Protestant males. The article shows that one of the genres in which nuns wrote was historical writing, an unusual genre for women at this time. It discusses the reasons why few women wrote history and why nuns were in an advantageous position to do so, while also trying to show the motivation that women in early modern convents may have had for such writing. A range of historical writings is analysed from different religious orders in an attempt to show the women's common concerns and the function that their writings had within their communities. © Blackwell Publisher Ltd. 1999.