In Defense of Women

A Bilingual Edition

Pompeo Colonna author Margaret L King translator Franco Minonzio editor

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Iter Press

Published:17th Apr '24

£45.00

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In Defense of Women cover

An important contribution to early public debates on the nature of women written by a cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church.

Pompeo Colonna’s In Defense of Women (1530), presented in this volume in Latin and English translation, is one of several important defenses of women composed in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries by male advocates of women’s moral and intellectual worth. Known as a cardinal and a warrior, but also as an active participant in sixteenth-century Italian literary circles, Colonna addresses the work to his cousin Vittoria Colonna, the most renowned Italian woman poet of the era, who, he writes, had urged him to undertake it. His Defense not only refutes arguments of women’s inferiority and incapacity but, remarkably, asserts their ability to hold political office and govern. It contains original Latin text and a critical introduction by Franco Minonzio. It also features a foreword by Margaret L. King, as well as a postscript by King, tracing the separate male-authored and female-authored Renaissance defenses of women.
 

"The King-Minonzio edition of In Defense of Women by Pompeo Colonna presents a remarkable text by a fascinating author and locates it within the complexities of the Renaissance period. The Latin text and English translation are enhanced by excellent contributions, including a foreword on key issues, a meticulous introduction, an extensive glossary of names, and a substantial postscript on the querelle des femmes, all of which will be useful to scholars and students. Overall, this volume is an exemplary work of collaborative scholarship and offers an important male-authored defense of women." -- Eva Del Soldato, Associate Professor of Italian Studies, University of Pennsylvania

ISBN: 9781649591135

Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 18mm

Weight: 399g

250 pages