Oils and Waters: Chemical Science in Early Modern Women’s Recipes -- presentation at ACMRS

Here's a link to the full conference paper.

Abstract

Oils and Waters: Chemical Science in Early Modern Women’s Recipes

The traditional history of science usually considers alchemy to be the medieval and early modern antecedent to the modern sciences of physical transformation.  But alchemy, whose practitioners were few and whose language is deliberately obscure may not be the best place to look for an emerging natural philosophy of substances. Less well recognized but potentially as influential were the thousands of early modern women who, even more than physicians and apothecaries, were expected to oversee the health and nourishment of family members. Combined, their household kitchens contained far more tools of distillation than alchemists’ workshops, and together they produced far more medicine than apothecary shops. The evidence for this large scale and ongoing creative work lies in the many unedited and often still un-transcribed manuscript collections of recipes at the Folger, the Wellcome, and other major archives. Drawing on a variety of these manuscripts in English, I argue that the circulation of pharmacological and culinary knowledge among women demonstrates a complex understanding of both the content and the methods of existing natural philosophy. Further, I show that these women were producing creative and original knowledge using old methods on newly available materials. Finally, I use a variety of sources, including poems, plays, and letters as evidence that women’s authority in these areas was often tacitly recognized and therefore influential.