Queen Christina of Sweden – Defying gender roles in the 17th Century

We often think of the breakdown of gender stereotypes as being a modern concept, something very 21st century as the world becomes, little by little, more accepting of differences to gender. There’s still a long way to go before the prejudices are truly a thing of the past but is the breakdown of these prejudices really a modern thing?

When studying a small girl’s waistcote and looking at just how much it resembled the restrictive nature of the adult equivalent, member of the regiment Beth Parker decided to look into the life of the little girl who this waistcote belonged to and found a very interesting character indeed.

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Elite Discourse and Witchcraft: Nationalism, Anti-Catholicism and Puritanism.

Firstly, let me apologise for the lack of content here in the past few weeks, as the Newcastle’s Blog Fairy it’s been a bit on the hectic side so some things had to be put on the back burner! Things are calming down now though so normal, weekly service should be resuming!

A little while ago there was a post on here put together by one of our members, Anne, all about Medical Knowledge and Medicinal Herbs in the 17th Century. Anne, who has a lot of knowledge on the subject wrote a fantastic piece for us to put on here and it was really well received. As time goes on and especially over the winter when there are less battles to tell you about, other members of the regiment have agreed to write posts for the blog sharing their areas of knowledge.

For some it’s something they already have a lot of knowledge about, for others it’s a chance to sit down and do some research and reading about a topic they want to know more about as they put together their article. Today’s article is from Beth who was our ‘Meet the Member’ this month. Beth is a History student at the University of Sheffield and for one of her assignments looked into Witchcraft in the 17th Century and agreed to write a shortened version of what she found for the blog, so without further ado, here is a piece all about Witchcraft. Beth has provided a list of sources and book for further reading at the end of this piece for those who wish to find out more.

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Medical Knowledge and Medicinal Herbs in the 17th Century

The Newcastle’s Blog Fairy decided it was about time that some of our wonderful members were able to share their knowledge of the period with our delightful blog readers.

Last month we introduced you to one of our members, Anne who has spent her time in the society either being a medic or sharing her medical knowledge of the period on the Living History camps. Anne kindly agreed to be the first to share her knowledge so in our first piece of a more historical nature, as opposed to what we get up to, here is an insight into Medicine and Medical knowledge of the period.

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