In Ester Hath Hang'd Haman Ester Sowernam (probably a pseudonym) is the second of three women to respond to Swetnam's The Arraignment of Women. After using secular as well as religious arguments to refute Swetnam's accusations, Sowernam (a pun on Swetnam) turns the tables on Swetnam and arraigns the male sex. Like Speght, Sowernam, who refers to herself as a gentlewoman, wants us to know that she is educated. She uses Latin phrases, references to events of antiquity, to the Bible, and to law to convince us that she, and by extension, all women are capable of mastering these subjects. Using wit and logic, she turns Swetnam's arguments against him.

      The only clue we have to Sowernam's identity is a description of herself that she provides on the title page "neither Maide, Wife, nor Widdowe, yet really all, and therefore experienced to defend all." Yet, she certainly was well educated, the numerous classic allusions, Latin phrases, legal jargon, biblical references testify to her through education.

      The book concludes with a poem entitled "A Defense of Women, against the Author of the Arraignment of Women" and is signed Joane Sharp. The poem summarizes Sowernam's arguments. As with Sowernam, we know nothing about Sharpe except that she was the author of this work.

      Here is an excerpt of Ester Hath Hang'd Haman

When men complain of beauty¹, and say, That women's dressings and attire are provocations to wantonness, and baits to allure men, It is a direct means to know of what disposition or they are, it is a shame for men in censuring of women to condemn themselves; but a common Inn cannot be without a common sign; it is a common sign to know a lecher, by complaining upon the cause and occasion of his surfeit; who had known his disease but by his own complaint? It is extreme folly to complain of another, when the root of all rests within himself; purge an infected heart, and turn away a lascivious eye, and then neither their dressings, nor their beauty can any ways hurt you. Do not men exceed in apparel, and therein set themselves out to the view? Shall women betray themselves and make it known that they are either so bad in their disposition, or so wanton in their thoughts, or so weak in their government as to complain that they are tempted and allured by men? Should women make themselves more vain than youngest children, to fall in love with babies. Women are so far off from being in any sort provoked to love upon the view of men's apparel², and setting themselves, that no one thing can more draw them from love, than their vanity in apparel. Women make difference between colors and conditions, between fair show, and a foul substance: It shows a levity in man to furnish himself more with trim colors, than manlike qualities: besides that, how can we love at whom we laugh? We see him gallant it at the Court one day, &c brave it in the Country the next day; we see him wear that on his back one week, which we hear is in the brokers shop the next: furthermore we see divers were apparel and colors made of a Lordship, lined with Farms and Granges, embroidered with all the plate, gold, and wealth, their friends and Fathers left them: Are these motives to love or to laughter? Will or dare a woman trust to their love for one Month, who will turn her of the next? This is the surfeit which women take by brave apparel. They rather suspect his worth, then with his love, who does most exceed in bravery. So Mr. Swetnam, do you and all yours forbare to censure of the dressings and attires of women for any such lewd intent, as you imagine: Bad minds are discovered by bad thoughts and hearts. Do not say and rail at women to be the cause of men's overthrow, when the original root and cause is in your selves. If you be so affected that you cannot look but you must forthwith be infected, I do marvel (Joseph Swetnam) you set down no remedies for that torment of Love, as you call it: You bid men shun and avoid it, but those be common and ordinary rules and instructions: yet not so ordinary, as able to restrain the extraordinary humors of your giddy company. I will do you and your friends a kindness if you be so scorched with the flames of love.

1. Woman's beauty is good, but the heart which does surest is naught.
Women do not fall in love with men for their apparel.

For more information, see

      * Used to prepare this work

      * Moria Ferguson, First Feminists: British Women Writers 1578 - 1799 [Bloomington, In: Indiana University Press, 1985] (includes excerpts)

      * Susan Gushee O'Malley (ed.), 1996, The Early Modern Englishwoman: A Facsimilie Library of Essential Works, Part 1: Printed Writings, 1500-1640, Volume 4, Defences of Women: Jane Anger, Rachel Speght, Ester Sowernam, and Constantia Munda, Scolar Press, 1996 (complete text of Protection)

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