This book is the latest, most comprehensive study of the Beguines, written in accessible language, well footnoted and meticulously referenced, thorough and factually reliable. This is the rock on which I want to build my novel, and it documents a women's movement of the 13th century that was nervy, adventurous, centered in spirituality but not servile, and grounded in social activism. The Beguines broke all the old rules. They lived together in small groups and large; they made it possible for women to pursue careers as artists and managers as well as teachers and healers; they served the poor and the weary; they put their lives where their values were; and none of them had to marry or join a convent in order to live the way they wanted to. Some married but chose to live separately from their husbands (and some of their husbands then became Beghards, the male equivalent); some had children and brought them up in community; some stayed single; some lived intimately with other women, and some had very close relationships with Augustinians, Dominicans, Benedictines, and Cistercians. This movement included several hundred thousand women and a few thousand men. As the movement became more threatening to the status quo in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, it came under great pressure and persecution, but for a couple of shining generations, it was a great way to live.

This is a really excellent work which pulls together the most recent scholarship on the beguines and dispels several long held historiographical myths about them. The beguines were members of lay religious communities which emerged in what is now Belgium in the early 13th century and flourished through the fourteenth century, characterised by their semi-monasticism, lack of formal vows, and desire to support themselves by their labours. Simons doesn't focus on the writings of the mystics which the movement produced, but rather looks at the beguines as a lay, female, urban movement. Readable and well-organised, Cities of Ladies manages to be both an introduction to the topic and a scholarly reference work (no easy feat to manage). Really, really interesting if you want to learn more about the only medieval religious movement created by and for women.

A decent intro to béguin life.