MOSAIC (ST. MARK'S, VENICE, 1220)
Each of the previous experiences in the matter of feminine education has been followed by a considerable period during which there was a distinct incuriousness on the part of women in educational matters. Of course that is only an analogy and though history is worth studying, only because the lessons of the past are the warnings of the future, yet this does not foretell a lessening of feminine interest in educational matters, after a few generations of experience of its vanity to make up to them for the precious special privileges of their nature, the proper enjoyment and exercise of which it is so likely to hamper. It would be interesting to know just why feminine education, after a period of efflorescence during the Thirteenth Century, retrograded during the next century. There have been some ungallant explanations offered, which we mention merely because of their historical interest but without any hint of their having any real significance in the matter.
A distinguished German educational authority has called attention to the fact that a well-known prepared food, for which Bologna is famous, is first heard of about the time that the higher education for women came into vogue at the Italian universities. Towards the end of the same century a special kind of pudding, since bearing the name of its native city, Bologna, which might very well have taken the place of an ordinary dessert, also began to come into prominence. This German writer suggests then, that possibly the serving of meals consisting of these forms of prepared food, which did not require much household drudgery and did not necessitate the bending over the kitchen range or whatever took its place in those days, may have led the men to grumble about the effects of the higher education. After all, he adds, though the women get whatever they want, when they ask for it seriously, if it proves after a time that the men do not want them to have it, then women lose interest and care for it no longer. This, of course, must be taken with the proverbial grain of salt, though it [{334}] illustrates certain phases of the domestic life of the time as well as affording a possible glimpse into the inner circle of the family life.
The real story of woman's intellectual position in the century is to be found in its literature. How deep was the general culture of the women of the Thirteenth Century, in Italy at least, can be judged from the Sonnets of Dante and his friends to their loved ones at the end of this century. Some of the most beautiful poetry that was ever written was inspired by these women and like the law of hydrostatics, it is one of the rules of the history of poetry, that inspiration never rises higher than its source and that poetry addressed to women is always the best index of the estimation in which they are held, the reflection of the highest qualities of the objects to which it is addressed. Anyone who reads certain of the sonnets of Dante, or of his friends Guido Cavalcanti or Gino da Pistoia or Dante da Maiano, will find ready assurance of the high state of culture and of intellectual refinement that must have existed among the women to whom they were dedicated. This same form of reasoning will apply also with regard to the women of the South of France to whom the Troubadours addressed their poetry; to those of the north of France who were greeted by the Trouvères; and those of the south of Germany for whom the Minnesingers tuned their lyres and invoked the Muses to enable them to sing their praises properly. It would seem sometimes to be forgotten that poetry generally is written much more for women than for men. Everyone realizes that for one man who has read Tennyson's "Idyls of the King" there are probably five women to whom they have been a source of delight. When we think of the Thirteenth Century as not affording opportunities of intellectual culture for its women, we should ask ourselves where then did the Meistersingers and the poets of England, Germany and France who told their romantic tales in verse find an audience, if it was not among the women. The stories selected by the Meistersingers are just those which proved so popular to feminine readers of Tennyson in the Nineteenth Century, and the chosen subjects of interest in the stories show that men and women have not changed much during the intervening centuries. The literature of any [{335}] period reflects the interest of the women in it and, as interest is itself an index of intellectual development, Thirteenth Century literature must be taken as the vivid reflection of the cultural character of the women of the time, and this is of itself the highest possible tribute to their intelligence and education.
On the other hand the best possible testimony to the estimation of women during the Thirteenth Century, is to be found in the attitude of the men of the generations towards them, as it is clearly to be seen in the literature of the time. In the Holy Graal, the Cid, the Minnesingers and the Meistersingers, woman occupies the higher place in life and it is recognized that she is the highest incentive to good, unfortunately also sometimes to evil, but always the best reward that men can have for their exertions in a great cause. The supreme tribute to woman comes at the end of the century in Dante's apotheosis of her in the Divine Comedy. In this it is a woman who inspires, a woman who leads, a woman who is the reward of man's aspirations, and though the symbolism may be traced to philosophy, the influence of an actual woman in it all is sure beyond all doubt. Nor must it be thought that it was merely in this highest flight of his imagination that this greatest of poets expressed such lofty sentiments with regard to women. Anyone who thinks this does not know Dante's minor poems, which contain to women in the flesh and above all to one of them, the most wonderful tributes that have ever been paid to woman. Take this one of his sonnets for instance.
So gentle and so fair she seems to be.
My Lady, when she others doth salute,
That every tongue becomes, all trembling, mute,
And every eye is half afraid to see;
She goes her way and hears men's praises free.
Clothed in a garb of kindness, meek and low.
And seems as if from heaven she came, to show
Upon the earth a wondrous mystery:
To one who looks on her she seems so kind,
That through the eye a sweetness fills the heart,
Which only he can know who doth it try.
[{336}] And through her face there breatheth from her mind
A spirit sweet and full of Love's true art,
Which to the soul saith, as it cometh, "Sigh."
It will be noted that though this contains the highest possible praise of the woman whom he loved, it has not a single reference to any of her physical perfections, or indeed to any of those charms that poets usually sing. We have already called attention to this, that it is not the beauty of her face or her figure that has attracted him, but the charm of her character, which all others must admire—which even women do not envy, it is so beautiful—that constitutes the supreme reason for Dante's admiration. Nor must it be thought that this is a unique example of Dante's attitude in this matter; on the contrary, it is the constant type of his expression of feeling. The succeeding sonnet in his collection is probably quite as beautiful as the first quoted, and yet is couched in similar terms. It will be found in the chapter on Dante the Poet. Need we say more to prove that the women of the century were worthy of the men and of the supreme time in which they lived; that they were the fit intellectual companions of perhaps the greatest generation of men that ever lived?
