Technological capacity of women in the High Middle Ages

Abstract

The High Middle Ages was a period of wide-ranging economic expansion. Historical evidence attests that textile production and dairying represent a long-established female know-how in gendered work domains, culturally coded as feminine, but what authors want to highlight here are the changes within these work domains. Their assertion of an underestimation of women's role and work in the High Middle Ages springs forward and is constructed around the concepts of gender-related tasks and technological change on a detailed level in the whole chain of production. The expanding mass production of various cloths starting in the High Middle Ages was an integral part of local and regional economies and local, regional, and long-distance trade. The mounting mass production of various cloth starting in the High Middle Ages involved specialisation only in one or a few of the steps of working operations, especially spinning and weaving, and in different settings, including workshops for special commodities.