ABSTRACT
Women’s control over capital, over borrowing, lending, and the conveyance and reinvestment of sums large and small were exercises in financial management frequently revealed by their wills. Significant work has been done on women lenders in the seventeenth century and later, analyzing their importance to the economic health of the country as well as their willingness to venture capital in commercial enterprises on the same terms as men. 1 Erickson remarks that:
The responsibility taken on by a widow as administratrix or executrix – including paying legacies and portions, collecting and discharging debts, any debt litigation, and accounting to the church courts for all her actions – requires that she must have shared financial responsibilities as a wife, too, in order to acquire the skills and assurance necessary to assume administration, and to hold the necessary respect in her own family and community to do so. 2
