ABSTRACT
In the sixteenth century an unidentified party intervened in the so-called ‘Medieval Housebook’ (begun c. 1475) by portraying a female figure observing a military encampment illustrated in the volume. This figure is one of agency in the cultural construction of elite masculinity, and operates in contrast to another figure that inspired it, in which female agency is elided. The point-counterpoint strategy of these two figures corresponds with ways in which the Housebook invites its consumers to shape meaning across the illustrated folios through its representation of positive behavior to emulate and negative behavior to avoid for both men and women. For some viewers, the drawing of the female observer could have resisted the largely negative characterization of women throughout the volume.
