In October 2012, Thérèse de Hemptinne retired after a successful academic career at the department of (medieval) History at Ghent University. Carrying on and strengthening the internationally recognized Ghent tradition of Auxiliary Sciences for the study of the Middle Ages, Thérèse de Hemptinne taught for many years the Bachelor’s and Master’s courses of Diplomatics and Palaeography. Following her research interests, which from the 1990s onward gradually expanded to focus on the position and role of women in a medieval man’s world, Thérèse de Hemptinne also integrated gender as a ethodological tool of analysis into the Master’s courses ‘Historical Criticism’ and the ‘Gender Research Seminar’, and acted as a supervisor of many Master’s theses produced in the field of women and gender studies.

The critical edition of the charters of the counts of Flanders Thierry and Philip of Alsace (1128-1191) can be considered one of the most important scholarly achievements of Thérèse de Hemptinne. Yet, her academic bibliography also testifies to her many other interests in medieval studies, among which political and institutional, social and cultural history of the Middle Ages, and particularly to her original gender-based approach to the discourse of medieval sources related to these areas.

This volume is offered to Thérèse de Hemptinne by two of her students as a token of respect and gratitude for her services rendered and for her lifetime commitment to the department of (medieval) History as a teacher, as a senior researcher and scholar, as a mentor, as a colleague and as a friend. It contains the republication of a selection of Thérèse de Hemptinne’s most important and acclaimed articles and book chapters published during her academic career at Ghent University. The twenty one selected essays of Thérèse de Hemptinne are gathered around three themes: ‘Charters and Chanceries’, ‘Gender and Politics’, and ‘Women and Literacy’. Each chapter is introduced by an expert of international prominence.