ABSTRACT
In the “Seaventh Satyr” o f his Newes out ofPowles Churchyarde (1567), the E lizabethan lawyer and m oralist Edward Hake focuses a general com plaint abou t L o n d o n ’s com m ercial parasites on the mysterious, Fagan-like figure o f “olde m o th er B ” u n d e r whose guidance the city’s transien t and unruly popu lation o f prostitutes, brokers, and , signifi cantly, m aidservants is im agined to flourish. M other B and h e r disci ples are portrayed as particularly likely to prey upon “countrey m aides th a t com e from far, / as straungers to the towne ” recru iting them in to a life o f debauchery and theft:
As a symbol o f the difficult situation o f the early m odern wom an who, w hether by choice o r by force, stepped beyond the governm ent and confines o f the household, M other B’s unusual autonom y targets h e r for censure by m oralists such as H ake .2 H er freedom , however, could
also be defended. Thus, the anonymous A Letter sent by the Maydens of London, to the vertuous Matrones & Mistresses of the same, in the defense of their lawfull Libertie (1567), which replies to H ake’s now lost Mery Meet ing of May des in London, exonerates London’s maidservants from Hake’s charges in part by casting M other B as an indigent worker unwillingly dependen t upon the charity of householders for h e r m eager suste nance: “a candles ende is no t so costly,” the letter reasons, “that giving it to a poore woman to light h ir hom e in a dark night for breaking hir faces or shinnes, would undo you .”3
