Legal regulation of women on the English Renaissance stage, 1558-1642

The question of why women did not perform on the English Renaissance stage is an enduring one, which is yet to be properly answered. This article examines contemporary legislation and case law to illustrate the regulation of women’s performance throughout the Renaissance. The article engages in a reading of legislation, provides a textual analysis of court records - both the official narrative represented in the court transcripts and the social and political attitudes that underpinned the rulings - and links the law to the position of women and performers in the Renaissance social structure. The author contends that the laws adopted by judges and legislators were not arbitrary, but reinforced dominant concepts of gender, class and status in Renaissance society. It is argued that regulations operated to cast women performers as outsiders who were subject to male controls. The author offers an alternative reading of Renaissance women performers that expounds the diegetic and political possibilities of their performances, and significantly challenges the notion that the Renaissance theatre was an all- male stage