e church played a large role in suppressing women. Interpretations of the story of Adam and Eve “tended towards an unfavorable view of woman” and these interpretations helped “the church men of the Middle Ages formulate their views” (Lucas 3). As the church developed, regulations regarding marriage under [...] under church law gave women a subservient place, overseen first by fathers or guardians and then by husbands” (Lucas 10). Women always had to be monitored for their behavior. But when women began taking the upper hand in their homes, they escaped the watchful eyes of their husbands and fathers, and realized how much they enjoyed sovereignty and freedom. According to the Wife of Bath, women “do love the best to be quite free to do [their] own behest” (Chaucer 429). Unfortunately for them, men did not have much say in this new domestic revolution. Regarding men, Alison simply states women “love no man that guards [them] or gives charge of where [they] go (Chaucer 321). In the Middle Ages, the church tried to campaign against marriage. The church leaders even devised stories of evil, abusive husbands, in hopes of driving young girls to become nuns. Chaucer had the Wife of Bath tell many of these horror stories, but the Wife of Bath told them quite fondly in regards to the relationship between herself and her husband, Jankyn (*http://www.virtual.park.uga.edu/cdesmet/wife.htm*). The church considered marriage “a righteous state and permissible, but less meritous than virginity” (Lucas 108). As a nun, women would have no opportunity for social mobility or sovereignty. This is what most church officials wanted for women, but it is not what women wanted for themselves. Alison, like most women of the time, enjoyed marriage, and considered herself lucky to “housbondes at chirche-dore she hadde fyve” (63). But what Alison enjoyed most in her marriage was ...
