Teaser Tuesday - May 10

Teaser Tuesday
The rules are:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) 'teaser' sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title and author of the book that you’re getting your 'teaser' from .. that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given!

While a dowry was an accepted part of a young woman's admission to holy orders, advance payment may have bordered on irregular practice. Gradually as the women started to show their worth, local support grew and the carping decreased.

from Fiona Maddocks Hildegard of Bingen The Woman of her Age lots of interesting historical detail but I'm not sure it quite gets to the person of the woman, though as a lot of the documentation is rather sketchy maybe that's not surprising? From the Observer review:

The 12th century anchorite Hildegard of Bingen possessed a clutch of talents which would make even the most eclectic of media-donnas curdle with envy. Writer, visionary, prophet, composer, artist, herbalist, politician, preacher, property owner, upbraider of emperors and favourite of Popes, she could even exorcise demons and heal the sick. She invented her own language, wrote one of the earliest surviving morality plays, established her own convent, terrorised her detractors, and, when she died, was mourned by nuns and reverently biographised by monks.

Maddocks reluctant view - in so far as she passes it on - is that Hildegard is more likely to have encouraged the music rather than written it herself.