14C - 16C Sheep & Women in the Cultural Landscape

 England (Lincoln), c. 1325-35 British Library, Additional MS 42130, Folio 87v

England (Lincoln), c. 1325-35 British Library, Additional MS 42130, Folio 163v The man is shearing, the woman is milking.

 Sheep Shearing, Duke du Berry, Books of Hours (c. 1410)

A sheep-shearing feast is the setting for Act IV of William Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale. 
"Wife make us a dinner, spare flesh neither corne,
Make wafers and cakes, for our sheepe must be shorne,
At sheep shearing neighbors none other thing craue,
but good cheer and welcome, like neighbors to haue"

 Petites Heures de la reine Anne de Bretagne. Date d'édition  1401-1500

Simon Bening (1483-1561) April Farmyard with woman milking cow and shepherds driving sheep from byre. From the Da Costa Book of Hours, Bruges, c. 1515. MS. M.399, fol. 5v.

Book of Hours (Jehan de Luc, 1524)

Jean Fouquet c 1415-1481 Saint Margaret herding sheep From Hours of Etienne Chevalier.

A farmer watches his wife shearing sheep. Book of Hours, Italo-Flemish, early 16C