Hello Dr. Jasperse! Thank you for joining us today.

I wonder if you would speak a little about the relationship between medieval ideas of charity and the way that power might be enacted through medieval women's wills. That is, were wills as political as I suspect they might have been with regards to the recipients defined and the objects or endowments passed down to specific individuals?

Hello Dr. Jitske Jasperse! Thanks for coming and answering questions! For the purpose of this AMA, how is it you would define power? Even better, how power is defined in that period?

Hello Dr Jasperse! I listened to a very interesting presentation during the recent vIMC about silver plate being inherited by - usually - the eldest male heir. Were there household or personal items that were traditionally or customarily inherited by women instead, and if so, what significance did they have?

Hello Dr Jasperse! Thank you for doing this AMA!

Sorry for a rather trivial question - which item (or items) of Matilda Plantagenet (and/or of her sisters) were you personally most fascinated with, especially in terms of its emotive meaning? Why did this particular item resonate with you? Was there a strict line between more 'private' items that hold personal meaning and more 'public' items that serve to demonstrate power, in context of 12th and 13th century England?

Hello! I'm curious about magical thinking in medieval times and material objects.

Nowadays it might be relatively common to have lucky "charms" or objects that are imbued with meaning in some magical way. Was that true in medieval times as well? Or was magical thinking less common with regards to material objects?

Hi! Thanks for coming on to do this AMA with us.

I'm interested in how the same objects might be perceived differently by different people. Were there instances or indeed broad categories of material items that might be understood in one way by men, but in a radically different way by women? Could such objects be used by women to perform power in such a way that 'flew under the radar', so to speak?

Hello! I've been wondering how much did the material life of royal women reflect that of lower orders? Like, I can't imagine Eleanor of Aquitaine doing a lot of spinning, but that was a major occupation for many English women. Did these princesses have distaffs? Did they learn spinning as part of their education?

Hi Dr. Jasperse,

Thank you for answering questions about your fascinating research. I am very interested in your focus on material culture and in the ways in which this type of evidence can be used by historians who depend on the written word to understand the past. Do you have any advice for historians who are trying to incorporate material evidence into their research?

Were there differences between individuals, groups, and nations in Europe over how objects were perceived, or were they fairly uniform in that regard (aside from how wealthy they were)?

Hi! Thanks for doing this AMA. I know that some rich women in the Middle Ages had Books of Hours - would these be seen as status symbols, or objects of personal devotion, or...what?

Hi, Dr. Jasperse. Thank you for answering questions. I am wondering about the importance of artifacts as an symbolic instrument, and if that is something you see in your research. It is a common High-Fantasy/medieval fantasy trope that a specific object (often a crown or some religious artifact) is of great importance for legitimization of a ruler or person. And while I know that real medieval rulers were basically hoarders when it came to artifacts, I have no idea about what purpose, if there was any at all, these artifacts had politically.

To sum it up, my question would be, have you seen any evidence for or indication that items were used to strengthen someones political position, simply by the virtue of possession of said object?

Hi Jitske. I recently wrote my thesis which explored misogyny in fiction such as The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. Almost every female character in Game of Thrones is threatened with rape at least once, many several times. George Martin’s response to this was basically ‘we’ll it’s a medieval setting, it wasn’t a nice world to live in’. After looking at Corinne Saunders’ work I still found it inconclusive as to whether rape was as common during these times as Martin likes to assume, and ended up concluding that his obsession with using rape is a result of toxic masculinity. What are your thoughts about rape culture during the medieval age, was it as common as some might think?

Jeanne De Clisson or Jeanne D'arc? (Thanks for the ama)

Hi Dr. Jasperse, did iconoclasm arising during the reformation in England reduce the power of late medieval/early modern women?

How were single mothers who take care of their family's seen by other peasants

This all sounds super fascinating! What are your must read books about medieval material cultural and medieval women? Bonus points if there are audio versions of them available.

Thank you for doing this! I'm obsessed with the Angevin empire.

My biggest question...

If there was one item you've found to symbolize the power and impact of the medieval woman on history, what would it be?

You remind me of Dr Sophie White. Professor of American Studies at the University of Notre Dame. She taught my senior capstone course about material culture. You two might enjoy each other’s work.