Research Symposium

BIO

Nadia is a first year student pursuing a dual degree in History and Editing, Writing, and Media with minors in Museum Studies and British Studies. She loves anything old and is always trying to learn more about the past. Her favorite area of history is late medieval to early modern English history. In her free time, she enjoys reading, drawing, and creating a family tree of British monarchs. She looks forward to studying abroad in London in the Fall to visit places she’s only read about, such as the Tower of London and Hampton Court Palace. She is interested in continuing research related to history.

Hester Pulter and the Depiction of Vermin in Early Modern Culture

Abstract

This project began by taking a close look at seventeenth-century woman poet Hester Pulter’s emblematic poem, “The Bishop and the Rats” (Emblem 46), as part of the larger, ongoing Pulter Project. This poem included particular emphasis on rats and other vermin to serve as metaphor. Thus raising the question: how were rats and other vermin depicted in early modern culture? I will pay extra attention to fables and emblem books which would have served culturally significant roles and were recognized by many people throughout the period. In addition to primary emblems and fables, my research will draw from contemporary sources, such as Mary Fissell’s “Imagining Vermin in Early Modern England,” to distinguish between our modern notion of vermin as compared to how those of Pulter’s time would have understood vermin. The difference between how one in the early modern period would have thought of vermin and how we think of vermin today is an important distinction in framing our thinking about the culture connected to the depiction of such creatures.

Keywords: English, Poetry, Vermin, Rats, Emblems