Drawing on legal and literary sources, this work revises and expands understandings of female honesty, worth and credit by exploring how women from the middling and lower ranks of society fashioned positive identities as mothers, housewives, domestic managers, retailers and neighbours between 1550 and 1700.

Tim Reinke-Williams is Lecturer in History at the University of Northampton, UK. His research focuses on how ideas and practices of gender shaped the mentalities and experiences of women and men in early modern England. His publications include articles in the journals Gender and History and Continuity and Change.

Introduction 1. Motherhood 2. Housewifery 3. Domestic Management 4. Retailing 5. Sociability Conclusion