On Wednes-day evening, we attended a lecture at the ELCA Wittenberg Center by Dr. Martin Treu on the life of Katharina von Bora. His presentation focused on the question of just how much we can know with certainty about the wife of Martin Luther, given that in the 16th century women were seen but not heard—there are no written sources from women, only about them—and that what was written down about her gives us only the barest of facts.
From the outline of her life we can "paint in" a picture, but our pictures of her typically reflect the time and culture in which we live. In the 19th century, portraits of Katharina von Bora emphasized that she was a good wife; in the 20th century, we have tended to put a feminist interpretation on what facts we have.
We do know that Frau von Bora came from a family of minor nobility (and in the 16th century, no one other than Martin Luther, especially given her noble descent, would have called her Katharina or Katie). She was married to Luther from 1525 to 1546, and these are the years best documented (though by Luther and his friends and colleagues).
Scholars are not sure whether she could write, given that nothing she might have written has survived and that an inscription attributed to her, in a Bible she gave someone as a gift, has been shown to have been written not by her but by Luther. Because she had been a nun, though, she was able to read. In fact, Luther asked Katharina to read his translation of the Bible. She wasn't particularly interested, so Luther offered her 50 guilders to read it in the winter when there would be little to do in the fields. (Luther's annual salary as a professor would have been 250 guilders).
Typical of minor nobility—proud yet poor—it was easier for von Bora's father to send her off to the convent than to provide a suitable dowry. This gave women two advantages, however: First, they received an education. Second, they lived healthier, longer lives because death during childbirth was so common (the average 16th-century woman lived only to about 33 or 35). So at age 6, Katharina von Bora entered the convent as a student.
We don't know exactly how she became acquainted with Luther's thought, but at Easter 1523, 12 nuns left the convent in a wagon. Three went back to their families; 9 could not (they were essentially out of the family at that point—entering the convent was considered a permanent decision, and, in fact, no one of the von Bora's attended Katharina and Luther's wedding).
In the 16th century, marriage was a business arrangement between families and couples and families hoped that love would come later. With no one to support them and virtually no opportunities available to them, 7 of the nuns were married within a few months (the oldest of them who came to Wittenberg became a schoolteacher in Grimma and was later married). Luther offered Katharina a husband but she declined him—nearly unheard of at the time.
By 1525, most all Protestant pastors were married; those who were not were looked at as possible "crypto-Catholics." So Luther (and for other reasons as well) decided to be married.
In 1527, Katharina established a household in a former monastery. With that much space, she ran a student hostel that became quite a business. She had 20 students living there, farmed land they had acquired, raised cows and pigs, and brewed her own beer (which was important for health reasons—the brewing process killed whatever bacteria was usually in the water supply). She earned almost as much from all of this as Luther earned as a professor.
Luther acknowledged her success in his will in 1542 by appointing her sole heir and guardian of their children—unthinkable at the time and ultimately unenforceable because his will was, essentially, illegal. She needed to have a guardian appointed to her, so she selected a faraway relative. The authorities were not amused, so she appointed Philip Melanchthon, who agreed but also said that she would do as she pleased.
After Luther's death in 1552, Katharina von Bora falls back into the anonymity of women of that time. There are no written sources documenting her death, only a brief obituary by Melanchthon that notes her "special life."
From the outline of her life we can "paint in" a picture, but our pictures of her typically reflect the time and culture in which we live. In the 19th century, portraits of Katharina von Bora emphasized that she was a good wife; in the 20th century, we have tended to put a feminist interpretation on what facts we have.
We do know that Frau von Bora came from a family of minor nobility (and in the 16th century, no one other than Martin Luther, especially given her noble descent, would have called her Katharina or Katie). She was married to Luther from 1525 to 1546, and these are the years best documented (though by Luther and his friends and colleagues).
Scholars are not sure whether she could write, given that nothing she might have written has survived and that an inscription attributed to her, in a Bible she gave someone as a gift, has been shown to have been written not by her but by Luther. Because she had been a nun, though, she was able to read. In fact, Luther asked Katharina to read his translation of the Bible. She wasn't particularly interested, so Luther offered her 50 guilders to read it in the winter when there would be little to do in the fields. (Luther's annual salary as a professor would have been 250 guilders).
Typical of minor nobility—proud yet poor—it was easier for von Bora's father to send her off to the convent than to provide a suitable dowry. This gave women two advantages, however: First, they received an education. Second, they lived healthier, longer lives because death during childbirth was so common (the average 16th-century woman lived only to about 33 or 35). So at age 6, Katharina von Bora entered the convent as a student.
We don't know exactly how she became acquainted with Luther's thought, but at Easter 1523, 12 nuns left the convent in a wagon. Three went back to their families; 9 could not (they were essentially out of the family at that point—entering the convent was considered a permanent decision, and, in fact, no one of the von Bora's attended Katharina and Luther's wedding).
In the 16th century, marriage was a business arrangement between families and couples and families hoped that love would come later. With no one to support them and virtually no opportunities available to them, 7 of the nuns were married within a few months (the oldest of them who came to Wittenberg became a schoolteacher in Grimma and was later married). Luther offered Katharina a husband but she declined him—nearly unheard of at the time.
By 1525, most all Protestant pastors were married; those who were not were looked at as possible "crypto-Catholics." So Luther (and for other reasons as well) decided to be married.
In 1527, Katharina established a household in a former monastery. With that much space, she ran a student hostel that became quite a business. She had 20 students living there, farmed land they had acquired, raised cows and pigs, and brewed her own beer (which was important for health reasons—the brewing process killed whatever bacteria was usually in the water supply). She earned almost as much from all of this as Luther earned as a professor.
Luther acknowledged her success in his will in 1542 by appointing her sole heir and guardian of their children—unthinkable at the time and ultimately unenforceable because his will was, essentially, illegal. She needed to have a guardian appointed to her, so she selected a faraway relative. The authorities were not amused, so she appointed Philip Melanchthon, who agreed but also said that she would do as she pleased.
After Luther's death in 1552, Katharina von Bora falls back into the anonymity of women of that time. There are no written sources documenting her death, only a brief obituary by Melanchthon that notes her "special life."
1 comment:
Thanks for this summary. I feel as though I was in the room.
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