Single Life and the City 1200-1900

Today, singleness is often represented as a new and increasingly popular lifestyle, particularly in the city. However, single people crowded European towns from the late middle ages onward. This book discusses the living conditions of women and men living without a spouse in cities in western Europe, and reflects on differences and similarities in the past. Throughout the volume, singles' lives are examined via a continuum of lenses ranging from labour and social activities to living arrangements and material culture. The collection provides some of the first comparisons of single men and women and sheds light on new groups of single women, such as beguines, prostitutes and heads of households. Not only do the singles portrayed in this book emphasize the diversity of their experiences, they also call stereotypes into question. By providing fresh approaches and evidence to the study of singles in the urban past, the authors assembled here move the field forward and profitably expand the lens of marital status.

Julie De Groot is Member of the Centre for Urban History at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, and Fellow of the Fund for Scientific Research Flanders (FWO). She is working on a doctoral project on the meaning, use and decoration of domestic spaces in cities of the Southern Low Countries and France during the long sixteenth century.

Isabelle Devos is Associate Professor at the History Department of Ghent University, Belgium, and specializes in social and economic history. She is a historian and demographer.

Ariadne Schmidt is Assistant Professor at Leiden University, Netherlands. Her research interests include the early modern history of work, labour markets, gender and crime. She is a social and economic historian.