Carter, for example, concludes that, “…when a community was willing to kill or mutilate a man for rape, the crime was considered a felony when the community was not willing to kill or mutilate a man for rape, the crime was considered less than a felony (possibly a trespass).” Additionally, poor women without means to appeal could be charged with a false accusation and further victimized through prison sentences. Punishment of rape, however, may have been impacted by social class as well as who comprised the legal authority. Ecclesiastical courts tended to treat an allegation of rape with less severity than evolving secular courts.
Carter, in his study of rape in Medieval England, writes that, “Clerics, or those claiming to be clerics, formed the largest percentage of rapists.” Carter’s study is confined to the 13 th and 14 th Century at a time English Common Law was still competing with separate Church courts. Research demonstrates rape was not always reported and perpetrators represented all social classes. Even among the Medieval nobility, rape – as defined under modern law, was punished mildly and seen as a “prelude” to marriage, impacting a woman’s honor more than her rights as a person, especially if forced sex was not accompanied by violence. Women were viewed as weaker creatures, the progeny of Eve, and therefore more prone to sin than the male. Christianity did little to improve the status of women, often reinforcing notions that males were intrinsically superior to females. Women in the Early Middle AgesĪmong the Germanic cultures encountered first by Romans and beyond the fourth century by Christian missionaries, rape was treated as theft within the parameters of the wergild system. During the Middle Ages, however, neither intent nor a sense of personal responsibility was attached to rape: women had few if any advocates, living in a society that marginalized them and preferring to see rape as the product of carnal intentions or “diabolical desire.” Historians researching available records and literature demonstrate that punishments were comparatively mild and in many instances women, unable to press their accusations, were arrested on charges of false appeal. Rape is also a sexual crime resulting in the victimization of women and children. Rape is a crime of violence that modern, enlightened society has chosen to punish strenuously.
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