The Medieval Studies Seminar (SEM) – 2026 edition, dedicated in its first semester to the theme “Women in a Monastic Context in the Middle Ages”, continues on May 15 (Friday), at 4:00 pm, with its fourth session, in webinar format.
The session will feature João Luís Fontes (IEM – NOVA FCSH), who will present a paper entitled “Women and Poverty: Revisiting a Theme”. This presentation will address different ways in which women experienced religion in the Middle Ages, exploring practices, trajectories, and expressions of spirituality in diverse contexts.
Abstract
In recent decades, there has also been, in our context, a growing number of studies on women’s religious experiences and their connections to the movements of renewal that, in this field, marked the final centuries of the Middle Ages. The poor life, embraced by an increasing number of hermits scattered across the Alentejo region, also emerged as a path for many women who, in small communities within urban centres, adopted a way of life grounded in poverty, prayer, penance, work, and charity. Examining these communities allows us to understand their religious choices, the strategies they employed to safeguard their autonomy and way of life, as well as the dynamics that gradually led to their institutionalisation, most often under the auspices of prestigious mendicant observances.
Biographical note
PhD in Medieval History (2012) from the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities of NOVA University Lisbon, with a dissertation entitled “From the Poor Life to the Congregation of Serra de Ossa: Genesis and Institutionalisation of an Eremitic Experience (1366–1510)”. Member of the Institute for Medieval Studies at the same Faculty and of the Centre for the Study of Religious History at the Portuguese Catholic University. Assistant Professor of Medieval History at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, NOVA University Lisbon.
Between 2013 and 2019, he was a postdoctoral fellow funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, with the project “The Desert in the City: Female Religious Experiences in Portugal in the Late Middle Ages (1350–1525)”. He is currently involved in the projects “Franciscan Landscapes: the Observance between Italy, Portugal and Spain (F-ATLAS)”, an international project funded by the JPI Cultural Heritage under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme; “Monastic Landscapes. Representations and Virtualisations of Medieval Spiritual and Material Realities in the Western Mediterranean (6th–16th centuries)”, coordinated by Marta Sancho Planas and Núria Jornet Benito (since January 2019); and “Castile and Portugal in the Late Middle Ages: Social, Cultual and Spiritual Contacts between Two Rival Monarchies (13th–15th centuries) (LUSO)”, led by César Olivera Serrano (IH-CSIC) and Pablo Martín Prieto (UCM).
Current research interests: eremitism, lay spirituality, hagiographic literature, courtly and noble culture and piety, social elites, geography and heritage of religious institutions, rituals and liturgical worship, history of spirituality, and women’s history.
