History of nonbinary gender: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 01:55, 10 November 2019

This article on the history of nonbinary gender should focus on events directly or indirectly concerning people with nonbinary gender identities. It should not be about LGBT history in general. However, this history will likely need to give dates for a few events about things other than nonbinary gender, such as major events that made more visibility of transgender people in general, gender variant people from early history who may or may not have been what we think of as nonbinary, and laws that concern intersex people that can also have an effect on the legal rights of nonbinary people.

Content warnings: This history may need to talk about some troubling events that could have been traumatic for some readers. Some historical quotes use language that is now seen as offensive.

Tips

Here are some tips for writing respectfully about historical gender variant people whose actual preferred names, pronouns, and gender identities might not be known.

Dead names. It is disrespectful to call a transgender person by their former name ("dead name") rather than the name that they chose for themself. Some consider their dead name a secret that shouldn't be put in public at all. For living transgender people in particular, this history should show only their chosen names, not their dead names. In this history, some deceased historical transgender persons may have their birth names shown in addition to their chosen names, in cases where it is not known which name they preferred, or where it is otherwise impossible to find information about that person, if one wants to research their history. This should be written in the form of "Chosen Name (née Birth Name)." If history isn't sure which name that person earnestly preferred, write it in the form of "Name, or Other Name."
Pronouns. It is disrespectful to call a person by pronouns other than those that they ask for. Some historical persons whose preferred pronouns aren't known should be called here by no pronouns. If this isn't possible, they pronouns.
Words for a person's gender, assigned and otherwise. It is disrespectful to label a person's gender otherwise than they ask for, but it's not always possible to do so. In the case of some historical people, history has recorded how they lived, and what gender they were assigned at birth, but not how they preferred to label their gender identity. For example, it's not known whether certain historical people who were assigned female at birth (AFAB) lived as men because they identified as men (were transgender men), or because it was the only way to have a career in that time and place (and were gender non-conforming cisgender women). This should be mentioned in the more respectful form of, for example, "assigned male at birth (

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 ==Eleventh century==
-* ''Wæpen-wifestre'', or ''wæpned-wifestre'' (Anglo-Saxon, ''wæpen'' "sword," "penis," "male" (or ''wæpned'' "weaponed," "with a penis," "male") + ''wif'' woman, + ''estre'' feminine suffix, thus "woman with a weapon," "woman with a penis," or "man woman") was defined in an eleventh-century glossary (Antwerp Plantin-Moretus 32) as meaning "hermaphrodite." The counterpart of this word, ''wæpned-mann,'' simply meant "a person armed with a sword" or "male person."<ref>Dana Oswald, ''Monsters, Gender and Sexuality in Medieval English Literature.'' Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2010. p. 93.</ref><ref name="ClarkMedieval">David Clark. ''Between medieval men: Male friendship and desire in early medieval English literature.'' Oxford University Press, 2009. P. 63-65.</ref> ''Wæpen-wifestre'' is known to be a synonym for "scrat" (intersex).<ref>''Catholicon Anglicum: An English-Latin Word-book, dated 1483, volume 30.'' Accessed via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=I7wKAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&pg=PA325#v=onepage&q=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&f=false</ref> Another synonym given for ''wæpen-wifestre'' is ''bæddel,'' an which also means intersex, but also feminine men, from which the word "bad" is thought to be derived, due to its use as a slur.<ref>"bad (adj.)" ''Online Etymology Dictionary.'' https://www.etymonline.com/word/bad</ref> The related word ''bæddling'' was used in eleventh-century laws for men who had sex with men in a receptive role.<ref name="ClarkMedieval" /> Additional meanings of ''wæpen-wifestre'' are possible. When ''wæpen-wifestre'' is read as "woman with a penis," it could describe a feminine man, a man who has sex with men, or a transgender woman. When read as "woman with a sword," it could refer to a warrior woman. When read as "man woman," it could mean not only an intersex person, but also people who transgressed the gender binary that seems to have been the rule in Anglo-Saxon England, as far as is known from limited literature from that era. From this range of meanings that the word potentially covers, it's possible that ''wæpen-wifestre'' may have been a general category for intersex, queer, and gender-variant people in Britain contemporary to Beowulf.
+* The Anglo-Saxon word ''wæpen-wifestre'', or ''wæpned-wifestre'' (Anglo-Saxon, ''wæpen'' "sword," "penis," "male" (or ''wæpned'' "weaponed," "with a penis," "male") + ''wif'' woman, + ''estre'' feminine suffix, thus "woman with a weapon," "woman with a penis," or "man woman") was defined in an eleventh-century glossary (Antwerp Plantin-Moretus 32) as meaning "hermaphrodite." The counterpart of this word, ''wæpned-mann,'' simply meant "a person armed with a sword" or "male person."<ref>Dana Oswald, ''Monsters, Gender and Sexuality in Medieval English Literature.'' Rochester, NY: D.S. Brewer, 2010. p. 93.</ref><ref name="ClarkMedieval">David Clark. ''Between medieval men: Male friendship and desire in early medieval English literature.'' Oxford University Press, 2009. P. 63-65.</ref> ''Wæpen-wifestre'' is known to be a synonym for "scrat" (intersex).<ref>''Catholicon Anglicum: An English-Latin Word-book, dated 1483, volume 30.'' Accessed via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=I7wKAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&pg=PA325#v=onepage&q=%22W%C3%A6pen-wifestre%22&f=false</ref> Another synonym given for ''wæpen-wifestre'' is ''bæddel,'' an which also means intersex, but also feminine men, from which the word "bad" is thought to be derived, due to its use as a slur.<ref>"bad (adj.)" ''Online Etymology Dictionary.'' https://www.etymonline.com/word/bad</ref> The related word ''bæddling'' was used in eleventh-century laws for men who had sex with men in a receptive role.<ref name="ClarkMedieval" /> Additional meanings of ''wæpen-wifestre'' are possible. When ''wæpen-wifestre'' is read as "woman with a penis," it could describe a feminine man, a man who has sex with men, or a transgender woman. When read as "woman with a sword," it could refer to a warrior woman. When read as "man woman," it could mean not only an intersex person, but also people who transgressed the gender binary that seems to have been the rule in Anglo-Saxon England, as far as is known from limited literature from that era. From this range of meanings that the word potentially covers, it's possible that ''wæpen-wifestre'' may have been a general category for intersex, queer, and gender-variant people in Britain contemporary to Beowulf.
 ==Seventeenth century==