ABSTRACT
Many-headed melodies look to address early modern women's musical activities across a broad spectrum of cultural events and settings. Countless writers have concurred that the most important virtù an early modern woman could embrace was that of silence. Silence protected her chastity, and the latter was a requisite commodity for her and her family. Recent scholarship has offered a veritable landslide of studies about early modern women, illuminating them as writers, thinkers, midwives, mothers, in convents, at home, as rulers. Spanish music theorists and educational treatises alike strongly prohibited musical learning for women. Janet Pollack's essay recognizes how a woman's musical tastes and talents fashioned an important musical collection. Pollack examines Elizabeth's personal letters, official documents concerning her musical education, newly uncovered contemporary descriptions of her musical abilities, and the technical demands of Parthenia.
