ABSTRACT
In early modern England, poor young women were usually freer from patriarchal control and more independent in courtship than their more prosperous sisters. However, accounts of night-time merriment in church court records suggest that wealthy young women did sometimes enjoy their own semi-secret spaces for recreation and courtship. The late hours of the night could transform the enclosed, respectable space of the home into a space for youth culture when the house was large enough to accommodate several young people and a separate bedchamber for unmarried women. While nocturnal youth culture is often associated with young men carousing in public places, these incidents prompt us to consider how the meanings of domestic space changed after elders went to bed.
