Home truths

HETTA HOWES finds both vivid human stories and echoes of modern inequalities in a book on women in the Middle Ages

- Catherine Hanley

Women’s work was “underpaid, underappreciated, and often invisible to those who benefited from it” laments Catherine Hanley. Her new book explores the medieval family unit from the perspective of its women, but she could just as easily be discussing the present day. The gender pay gap may be closing but it’s not closed yet, and the invisible labour that disproportionately falls to women continues to be a hot topic.