Christine de Pisan

Christine de Pisan was a Kinfolk of the Children of Gaia.

Biography

"Alas, and if it has to be that wars and battles are begun for many reasons and quarrels, then they should also be avoided and shunned by better and more valid reasons, and peace should be sought." - Christine de Pisan

Gaian ideals were not popular in the Middle Ages of the World of Darkness, when the most zealous and intolerant leaders of the Christian faith shouted down their more moderate brethren and led the crusade against heresies, real and perceived. It was, among other things, a poor time to be a woman. Women mostly kept to their assigned place as wives and mothers, aiding husbands in daily work but getting little or no thanks or praise in return.

Christine de Pisan, a Kinfolk woman associated with the Coeur d'Or (Golden Heart) sept of central France, was different. Widowed young, she turned to writing and produced some volumes of love poetry for a noble patron, writing under her own name. The good reception that her tales of virtue and desire received led her to go further. Inspired by her acquaintance with the Black Furies, but wishing that their savagery could be softened by Gaia's love, she wrote of a City of Ladies, in which women could accomplish all things for themselves without the need of male "supervision." On an Umbral journal with a Child of Gaia ally, which she recounted in a tale, she confronted the spirits of wealth, philosophy, beauty and wisdom to find out which spirit was the most powerful in the Tellurian. Her books on peace praised as bravest of all he who seeks an end to war and slaughter, reproving the knights for their bloodlust and cruelty. She reprimanded even the Queen of France for failing to take her husband to task for his war-making, urging all noble ladies to use their high position for good ends. When her influential books won her audiences with the rich and powerful, she used the powers of Gaia to seek peace and justice.

Christine de Pisan was the first woman in all history to support herself by writing, and is honored to this day by the Children for her ideals of peace and equal rights for women. Many Gaians as well as Black Furies claim her as a spiritual and even physical ancestor. Far ahead of her time, her books inspired many modern Children of Gaia to work, write and speak for peace and justice. Some lament that no one listened to her words, while others remain in awe of her boldness in speaking at all.

References

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