Masculinity and husbandry in Joseph Hall's Virgidemiarum

Verse satire from Roman times and onward draws extensively on gender stereotypes in its depictions of urban and decadent men. While clearly drawing on such literary traditions, Joseph Hall's Virgidemiarum (1597–98) spans over a wider register in emphasising both rural and urban contexts, and in focusing specifically on aspects of husbandry, pedigree and provision. Rather than being simply classical imitation, the failed men of Hall's satires should be understood from the economic context of early modern masculinity, which constituted manhood in terms of pedigree and providing for one's household. Unlike other Elizabethan satire, which predominantly attacks sexual vice as an urban phenomenon, Virgidemiarum depicts flawed manhood in broader terms of failed husbandry. In doing so, the essay contends, Hall's satires re‐enact changes in social structure and in the conceptions of masculinity at the time.