The above image is a sixteenth-century depiction of a dinner scene in an English brothel. Married men who frequented brothels often had strained marriages; however, this picture reveals that they enjoyed a household setting in the brothel as well as their own home. The women in the image are prostitutes of the brothel, bearing their breasts. [32]

The household during early modern England was expected to maintain very strict accordance to society’s standards. Thus, England’s strong patriarchal posture reinforced male dominance within the family as well as a husband’s control over his wife [16]. However, cases of adultery and female authority did occur and were considered to be not only disruptive to the household itself but these behaviors aroused public disapproval as well. In his article, “Love, Sex and Marriage”, Martin Ingram comments on the social construct of the household as a model of societal morality. However, he points out how sexuality can upset the household mold in explaining how, “…the counterpart of the stress on the sanctity of family and household—was a society in which sexual morality was of immense social importance and sexual transgressions were subject to legal penalty” [36]. Nevertheless, sexual deviance through prostitution and through adultery was common in both men and women. Yet, due to the double standard that existed during the Renaissance, women, defamed as “whores” were particularly susceptible to sexual slander [36]. Male supremacy in Renaissance society allowed men to experience sexual deviance without being condemned by society; rather it was the women who endured denunciations for a man’s indulgences.

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