The Mediation of Power Along Gendered and Religious Lines in Aristocratic Women’s Typika

Abstract

The typika of aristocratic women in late Byzantine Constantinople encode the motivations guiding their patronage. Although these women employ gendered language of humility and piety, they also grant themselves, their children, and members of their social strata significant privilege within their monastic orders. Consequently, the typika reveal a tension in which women’s attempts to secure personal power are shaped by the cenobitic, male-dominated religious framework. Through a textual analysis of the typika in translation, I argue that these documents demonstrate a negotiation between self-preservation and an obligation to fulfill traditional gender expectations by appealing to established male authorities. I conclude with a biographical discussion indicating that concessions to male administration were a strategy for these women to insulate their privilege after the deaths of their husbands.