Criminalizing Sex in Early Modern England

Apple  |  Android  |  Spotify  |  Stitcher  |  RSS  |  YouTube (captioned)
​​​

In the middle of the Reformation, Parliament passed a law criminalizing some forms of sexuality. This became known as the Buggery Law of 1533. Why would the government be interested in regulating sex? An investigation into official records reveals that it had less to do with the bedroom and everything to do with power, privilege, and piety.

Podcaster: Lesley

---

Further Reading

GW Bernard, The King’s Reformation: Henry VIII and the Remaking of the English Church. Yale University Press: 2007, especially pp. 249-257

Martin Ingram, Church Courts, Sex, and Marriage in England, 1570-1640, Cambridge University Press (1987)

R.B Outhwaite, The Rise and Fall of the English Ecclesiastical Courts, 1500-1860. Cambridge University Press (2006)

Randolph Trumbach, “Renaissance Sodomy 1500-1700” in Matt Cook, ed.,  A Gay History of Britain: Love and Sex between Men since the Middle Ages, Greenwood World Publisher (2007), pp. 45-76

​Music: "Evening Melodrama" by Kevin MacLeod (www.incompetech.com)