Medieval Misogyny? Aristotle and Phyllis in Medieval German Culture

Medieval woman riding on top of medieval man

Aristotle, esteemed as a great philosopher in the medieval world, also eked out a second existence there as a figure of fun and mockery. Beginning in the thirteenth century, Aristotle appears everywhere in texts and in visual representations as a slave of love, a reincarnation of the ancient folkloric motif of the wise man tricked and humiliated by a beautiful woman. Focusing on the medieval German versions of this story, this talk argues that the popularity of the mounted Aristotle material is not adequately explained by the putative orthodoxy of its misogynist claims alone. Rather, its popularity derives from its ability to capture and refract in multiple ways the fundamental tensions of high and late medieval masculine identity formations.

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Location Information

Location Address: HH - J.G. Hagey Hall of the Humanities
200 University Avenue West
1102
Waterloo, ON, CA N2L 3G1

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Link to map: https://uwaterloo.ca/map/

Additional Information

Host: Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies Event website: Medieval Misogyny? Aristotle and Phyllis in Medieval German Culture Cost: Free admission