Christine de Pizan and Sacred History

Christine de Pizan was an author living in 15th century France whose writings highlighted the courageous actions of women that helped to strengthen their society. Living under the shadow of misogynist writers, she illuminated the female’s right to equality long before other French writers would broach the subject. Particularly enlightening in this respect is her book The City of Women, presenting the positive attributes of women. Globally speaking, Jeffrey Richards has interpreted the book as a treatise on religious doctrine. I will seek to demonstrate what I believe to be her true intent: to lay a foundation of equality of the sexes for future generations to debate. My goal is to refute, as an interpretive error, Richards’s vision of The City of Women as something entirely different: an attempt to “assign eschatological significance both to current events and to the history of women” (15), and as such to establish The City of Women as a metaphor for redemption. This metaphor cannot stand as accepted fact without diminishing the equitable nature that de Pizan applies to women from all time periods and all persuasions. I hope to restore a surer footing to a work that inspires men and women everywhere to embrace their inherent equality