<P> After the Norman invasion, the position of women in society changed . The rights and roles of women became more sharply defined, in part as a result of the development of the feudal system and the expansion of the English legal system; some women benefited from this, while others lost out . The rights of widows were formally laid down in law by the end of the 12th century, clarifying the right of free women to own property, but this did not necessarily prevent women from being forcibly remarried against their wishes . The growth of governmental institutions under a succession of bishops reduced the role of queens and their households in formal government . Married or widowed noblewomen remained significant cultural and religious patrons and played an important part in political and military events, even if chroniclers were uncertain if this was appropriate behaviour . As in earlier centuries, most women worked in agriculture, but here roles became more clearly gendered, with ploughing and managing the fields defined as men's work, for example, and dairy production becoming dominated by women . </P> <P> The years after the Black Death left many women widows; in the wider economy labour was in short supply and land was suddenly readily available . In rural areas peasant women could enjoy a better standard of living than ever before, but the amount of work being done by women may have increased . Many other women travelled to the towns and cities, to the point where they outnumbered men in some settlements . There they worked with their husbands, or in a limited number of occupations, including spinning, making clothes, victualling and as servants . Some women became full - time ale brewers, until they were pushed out of business by the male - dominated beer industry in the 15th century . Higher status jobs and apprenticeships, however, remained closed to women . As in earlier times, noblewomen exercised power on their estates in their husbands' absence and again, if necessary, defended them in sieges and skirmishes . Wealthy widows who could successfully claim their rightful share of their late husband's property could live as powerful members of the community in their own right . </P> <P> An English cultural identity first emerged from the interaction of the Germanic immigrants of the 5th and 6th centuries and the indigenous Romano - British inhabitants . Although early medieval chroniclers described the immigrants as Angles and Saxons, they came from a much wider area across Northern Europe, and represented a range of different ethnic groups . Over the 6th century, however, these different groups began to coalesce into stratified societies across England, roughly corresponding to the later Angle and Saxon kingdoms recorded by Bede in the 8th century . By the 9th century, the term the Angelcynn was being officially used to refer to a single English people, and promoted for propaganda purposes by chroniclers and kings to inspire resistance to the Danish invasions . </P> <P> The Normans and French who arrived after the conquest saw themselves as different from the English . They had close family and economic links to the Duchy of Normandy, spoke Norman French and had their own distinctive culture . For many years, to be English was to be associated with military failure and serfdom . During the 12th century, the divisions between the English and Normans began to dissolve as a result of intermarriage and cohabitation . By the end of the 12th century, and possibly as early as the 1150, contemporary commentators believed the two peoples to be blending, and the loss of the Duchy in 1204 reinforced this trend . The resulting society still prized wider French cultural values, however, and French remained the language of the court, business and international affairs, even if Parisians mocked the English for their poor pronunciation . By the 14th century, however, French was increasingly having to be formally taught, rather than being learnt naturally in the home, although the aristocracy would typically spend many years of their lives in France and remained entirely comfortable working in French . </P>

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