Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of Ladies (1405) is an allegorical dream-vision narrative that functions as a biographical catalogue of exemplary women from myth and history. The stated motivation of its author/narrator is a dream-visitation by three allegorical ladies—Reason, Rectitude, and Justice—who commission her to build a symbolic city to serve as a fortress defending all virtuous women from slander. This is a response to the despair Christine feels after studying the texts of respected male authors, which she finds to be misogynistic. Drawing on the evidence of accomplished women from history, mythology, and scripture, Christine constructs an alternative, pro-feminine history. The book explores themes such as Misogyny and Proto-Feminism as Alternative Narratives, Virtue as the Natural Feminine State, and Education as the Key to Female Liberation.

The text is a landmark of proto-feminist literature, written by Europe’s first professional woman of letters. After being widowed in 1390, Christine wrote to support her family, gaining influential patronage at the French court. Written in medieval French, Le Livre de la cité des dames or The Book of the City of Ladies was a direct response to the pervasive literary misogyny of the late Middle Ages, a tradition Christine had publicly challenged during the famous “Debate of the Rose” in which she criticized Jean de Meun’s presentation of women in the famous Roman de la Rose. In The Book of the City of Ladies Christine draws on—and critiques—other authoritative sources of her day like Giovanni Boccaccio’s Concerning Famous Women to promote her argument of female virtue and achievement. Christine continued to write on politics, morality, and women’s roles until 1405, at which time she left court life for the convent at Poissy. Christine’s public writing largely ceased at this time, except for her last known work, a famous 1429 poem Ditié de Jehanne d’Arc (The Tale of Joan of Arc) celebrating Joan of Arc as an embodiment of female strength and divine will.

This guide refers to the 1999 Penguin Classics edition.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature descriptions of rape, sexual violence and harassment, graphic violence, illness and death, death by suicide, racism, and gender discrimination.

Language Note: The source text debates ideas of sexual consent and uses the term “rape” in ways that reflect fraught attitudes toward women’s personal agency in the Middle Ages. The term “rape” often meant an individual act of forced sexual violence, as today, but could also mean a man having sex with a woman without the legal right to do so—with or without that woman’s agreement. Its use in the source text reflects contemporaneous limitations on women’s rights and ability to consent or dissent to sex within certain sociolegal contexts, for instance within or outside marriage, and the fact that women legally belonged to their fathers or husbands.

Plot Summary

The narrator, Christine, is distressed by reading the works of many respected male philosophers and poets that paint such a negative picture of women that she begins to despise her own sex. She laments to God for having created such a “vile thing” (6) as woman. A brilliant beam of light illuminates the room, and three crowned, majestic ladies appear before her. The first lady, who identifies herself as Lady Reason, comforts Christine. She advises her to disregard the lies of these authors and to trust her own experience and judgment.

Reason explains that she and her two sisters have come on a divine mission. God has chosen Christine to build an allegorical city, the City of Ladies, which will serve as a fortress to protect all virtuous women from slander. Reason, holding a shining mirror that reveals the truth of all things, will help Christine build the city’s foundations and walls. The second lady, Lady Rectitude, carries a ruler to measure right from wrong: She will guide the construction of the houses and buildings inside the city. The third lady, Lady Justice, holds a golden measuring cup that measures each person’s just deserts: She will complete the high towers and bring the city its queen and noble inhabitants. Overwhelmed but encouraged, Christine accepts the task.

Lady Reason instructs Christine to take the “spade of her intelligence” (16) and begin digging in the “Field of Letters” to create the city’s foundations. This allegorical process takes the form of a dialogue where Christine raises common misogynistic arguments, and Reason refutes them, clearing away the “earth” of false opinions. Reason explains that men attack women for various reasons, including misguided intentions, personal sinfulness, envy, or a simple desire to slander. She dismantles claims that women inherently flawed, using logic and scriptural examples to prove her points. Reason then provides the “stones” for the city’s walls: stories of exemplary women from history and mythology. She recounts the deeds of powerful female rulers and warriors like Queen Semiramis, the Amazons, and Queen Zenobia to demonstrate women’s capacity for leadership. To prove women’s intellectual abilities, she tells of learned women and inventors, including Nicostrata, who invented the Latin alphabet, Minerva, who invented armor, and Ceres, who invented agriculture. At the end of Part 1, Reason declares the foundations and walls complete and gives way to her sister.

Lady Rectitude instructs Christine to build the houses, palaces, and temples within the city walls: The building materials for this phase are stories of prophetesses and women of great virtue. Rectitude begins with accounts of the 10 Sibyls, who foresaw the life of Christ, and other prophetic women like the Queen of Sheba and Cassandra of Troy. To counter accusations that women are inconstant, Rectitude gives examples of women who were faithful in love. To counter the claim that women cannot keep secrets, she cites Portia, who knew of the plot against Caesar. She argues for the value of women’s counsel by giving examples of men who met disaster by ignoring female warnings. Rectitude refutes the charge that women are unchaste with examples from scripture and history. She vehemently denies the contention made in some male sources that women wish to be sexually overpowered by a man when they reject his advances. To counter the accusation of changeability, Rectitude first points out famously inconstant male emperors like Nero before offering the powerful example of Griselda, a marchioness whose steadfastness was proven. While warning against love’s dangers, Rectitude defends women’s constancy in love with the tragic stories of Dido, Thisbe, and Ghismonda. She concludes by dismissing claims of avarice. With the city’s buildings constructed and filled with inhabitants, Rectitude announces her task is done.

Lady Justice completes the city by building its high towers and bringing its queen. The queen is revealed to be the Virgin Mary, the apogee of female virtue. Her first companions are Mary Magdalene and the other women who remained with Christ during the crucifixion when the male apostles fled. The final inhabitants are the holy female saints and martyrs, whose stories serve as the ultimate proof of women’s strength and faith. Justice recounts the lives of numerous virgin-martyrs who endured torture and death for their faith and performed miracles

With the stories of the saints fortifying the city’s gates and towers, Lady Justice declares the construction finished and hands the completed city over to Christine. In a final address, Christine invites all women, past, present, and future, to take refuge in their new city. She exhorts them to live virtuously, to be worthy of its protection, and to prove their slanderers wrong. She warns them to be on guard against deceitful men and the dangers of passionate love. The book ends with Christine’s prayer that she and all her female readers may serve God and be granted everlasting joy.