Passionate Encounters, Public Healing Medieval Urban Bathhouses in Northern France
Abstract
This article focuses on the resurgence of urban bathhouses (called estuves in French after the stoves that heated them) between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries in Paris and other northern French-speaking cities. Popular and widespread institutions, bath-houses contributed to both individual well-being and civic health in cities across the king-dom. Using medical treatises, trial records, literary sources, and archival documentation, the article argues that bathhouses encouraged sociability, brought disparate groups together, and were in fact essential to the circulation and well-being of people in medieval cities as places of emotional community.
Repository Citation
Wurtzel, Ellen. 2023. "Passionate Encounters, Public Healing Medieval Urban Bathhouses in Northern France." French Historical Studies 46(3): 331-360.
Publisher
Duke University Press
Publication Date
8-1-2023
Publication Title
French Historical Studies
Department
History
Document Type
Article
DOI
https://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00161071-10454811
Keywords
Middle Ages, Emotions, History, Prostitution, Cleanliness, Stews, City
Language
English
Format
text
