In the afterword to this volume, Naama Cohen-Hanegbi describes this book as about “women’s health and women’s roles in healthcare” in the late Middle Ages and early modernity (316). Substantial recent research, including books and articles by editors Ritchey and Strocchia, has enhanced our understanding of both subjects. The chapters in this volume demonstrate how a wide historical gaze and careful contextual analysis of texts and images can better position the healing of women and women healers as central concerns in the history of medicine.
The volume presents a series of case studies with overlapping interests and distinct methodologies, styles, and presentations. The geography of the chapters spans much of continental Europe and even includes two essays focused on the medieval Islamic world and the early Ottoman Empire. The opening section engages with religious healing—calling our attention to how religious rituals performed by women were part of the apparatus of...