Bodin justified absolute monarchy by invoking women’s natural unfitness to rule

Evidence

Jean Bodin (1530–1596), French political theorist, and King James I of England (1566–1625; acc. 1603) both modified Salisbury’s model in justifying the new authority of the head in the emerging nations. Bodin enlarged the absolute and perpetual power of the sovereign over citizens and subjects. Nobles and merchants qualified for citizenship; artisans and retailers did not. But equality, even among the citizens, was absurd. Women were subject to the authority of the father and were unfit for public affairs. Female rulers like Mary, Queen of Scots, and Elizabeth I of England had overturned the natural order. Succession to the throne should descend through the male line, since nature had deprived women of “strength, foresight, pugnacity, [and] authority.” — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 349

Categorization

• XREF: Directly builds the ecofeminist link between naturalizing hierarchy and women’s exclusion that threads through the whole course — parallels the Omelas/stratification thread and the complaints-about-immodesty sumptuary literature on how order claims police gender. — connects to: Women use divine authority to justify power they cannot claim as persons — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1766
• CANDY: Bodin ranking citizenship to exclude artisans and retailers while calling gender equality ‘absurd’ is a striking, quotable example for conversation.

Broader Connections

• Women use divine authority to justify power they cannot claim as persons #expands (0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1766