[See also: SALIC LAW]
Fischer, Katherine, trans. The Burgundian Code. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
1949.
Rivers, Theodore John, trans. The Laws of the Salian and Ripuarian Franks. New York: AMS,
1986.
Murray, Alexander Callander. Germanic Kinship Structure: Studies in Law and Society in Antiquity
and the Early Middle Ages. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1983, pp. 135–
55.
Wallace-Hadrill, J.M. The Long-Haired Kings and Other Studies in Frankish History. London:
Methuen, 1962.
WIDOWS AND WIDOWHOOD
. When a medieval woman was widowed, she was able to act independently for one of the
few times in her life, rather than being under the tutelage of a father, brother, or husband.
Since women normally married men much older than themselves, widows were more
common than widowers.
A widow could live singly, remarry, or enter a nun-nery. A dowry that she had
brought to the marriage was usually hers for her lifetime, and she could also support
herself from any dower her husband had fixed on her at the time of their marriage. A
woman with young children, it was assumed, would take over her husband’s property at
least until her sons had grown up. In practice, especially in the early Middle Ages, this
meant that the widow of a powerful lord was treated almost like an heiress, and a man
might marry her seeking her late husband’s property.
A well-placed woman could marry and be widowed several times during her life.
Older widows and those who had already had several husbands usually retired eventually
to the cloister; medieval French nunneries recruited at least as many widows as young
girls.
Constance B.Bouchard
WILLAME DE WADINGTON
(fl. mid-13th c.) The Manuel des péchés, written in Anglo-Norman verse ca. 1250–70, is
commonly ascribed to Willame de Wadding-ton, though he may have been simply its
scribe. The work is a confession manual addressed to the laity and deals first with the
most common breaches of the Ten Commandments, then with the Seven Deadly Sins;
there follow a series of exempla on the sin of sacrilege, a discussion of the sacraments,
and instructions for making a good confession. The whole work is interlarded with saints’
legends, accounts of visions, and exempla, which constitute nearly half its bulk. The
Manuel was translated into En-glish verse ca. 1300 with the title Handlying Synne, then
Medieval france: an encyclopedia 1844