The Evolution of Women's Asylums Since 1500: From Refuges for Ex-Prostitutes to Shelters for Battered Women

by Sherrill Cohen

Book Overview

The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Catholic Europe witnessed the growth of new institutions designed to house repentant prostitutes and girls and women at risk of becoming prostitutes. This little-known surge in institution building arose out of the Catholic reform movement and the Counter-Reformation. Cohen presents a portrait of life in three such institutions for women in the Italian cities of Florence and Pistoia. These institutions represented...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195051645
• ISBN13: 9780195051643
• Release Date: September 1992
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.5" x 9.6"