Burgermeister’s DaughterWhat was the predominant image of women and women’s place in medieval society? Actual historical events, such as the scandal and subsequent litigation revolving around Anna Buschler which Steven Ozment detail’s in the Burgermeisters Daughter, suggests something off a compromise between these two literary extremes. It is easy to say that life in the sixteenth century was surely no utopia for women but at least they had some rights.Anna was the daughter of Hermann Buschler, a prominent citizen who had even been the burgermeister of the German town of Schwabisch Hall, within the Holy Roman Empire. When she was young, Anna had simultaneous affairs with a young local nobleman, Erasmus Schenk of Limpurg, and a cavalryman named Daniel Treutwein. Anna’s father was so upset when he discovered these affairs; he deprived her of mostly all her inheritance. Anna a scandalized woman, fought in the Hall legal system for decades, and she eventually won back some of her inheritance.Anna’s story suggests a rather empowered woman, largely thanks to a Germanic legal tradition, which made women’s basic rights, and kept men from treating them like they were their own property. Anna had faced many difficulties, particularly the fact that as an unprofessional single woman, she needed a male to represent her in court (Burgermeisters Daughter, 111). Had she been a professional woman with marketable skills, Anna would have received “proper legal status”, evidence of some amount of equal rights between male and female.Furthermore, the story of Anna’s battle for her inheritance shows a great deal about popular opinion. Anna, known for the affairs that she had, initially lost her case. Instead of calmly accepting t…
… lost she might as well just take what she was being given. This was definitely not the way sixteenth century families were run, and because of this she fought her father, her siblings and the council of Hall for her inheritance, and in the end she had come out satisfied.Anna Buschler led a very challenging life, and a very dramatic one at that. Anna was a dishonorable woman that was an embarrassment not only to her family but also of her home city, Hall. She fought her way through long, drawn out lawsuits and through the abandonment of her family, but she made the citizens of Hall believe in her, and that’s all it took. Women’s life in the sixteenth century was built around men and didn’t have the majority of rights in Germany, but Anna Buschler showed the cities around her and Germany that it could be done, that you can show the world the power of a woman.
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