Legendary effects: Women saints of the “Legenda aurea” in England, 1260–1532

This dissertation offers a literary and material history of the vernacular Legenda aurea translations that circulated in England from the thirteenth through sixteenth centuries, focusing on women saints from a feminist perspective. Chapter One of this dissertation examines the Legenda aurea in its original Italian Dominican context alongside lay legendaries, namely the South English Legendary, Légende dorée, and the Gilte Legende. In Chapter Two, I discuss my survey of thirty-seven manuscripts and thirty-nine incunables, as well as English Legenda aurea ownership records (summarized in the appendix). This information contextualizes the reception and the paratextual elements of Caxton\u27s Golden Legend and Mirk\u27s Festial, both first printed in 1483. The texts in the first half of the dissertation seek to define how a mixed-gendered lay audience should respond to women saints, whether through imitation, supplication, or other means. Chapters Three and Four examine the portrayal of feminine gender and sexuality in verse adaptations of women saints\u27 lives with predominantly female readers. Bozon\u27s vies, Chaucer\u27s Second Nun\u27s Tale, Lydgate\u27s lives of virgin martyrs, the Scottish Legendary, the Vernon Golden Legend and Bokenham\u27s Legendys of Hooly Wummen versify select material from the Legenda aurea to explore the relationships between love, violence, sexuality, and speech. I close with an epilogue discussing my discovery of the sole extant translation of the Legenda aurea prologue into Middle English within an allegorical poem