ABSTRACT
The aim of this chapter is to explore the literary environments and writing of the women whose education empowered them to be intellectually productive during the long European Renaissance from quattrocento Italy onwards. Almost all early-modern female scholars were of the social elite. However, this did change between 1450 and 1750, as educated women from the middling classes became literate in larger numbers and began writing works for publication. The chapter analyses the meanings of the Renaissance concept of the ‘learned lady’, arguing that this was a social construct connected to gender expectations. It was a cultural trope shaped by two things: the reality of some scholarly women in society and the differing national contexts in which learned women were able to flourish. The ‘learned lady’, as will be shown, was frequently represented as the symbol of the muse. She, therefore, offers a glimpse into the world of gender relations amongst the highly educated, while at the same time allowing us assessment of the secular genres and subjects across which women wrote.
