Home for unmarried ladies of rank, Odense

Facts

Collective home and library for unmarried ladies of rank

By Johnny Grandjean Gøgsig Jakobsen, Postdoc, Ph.D. Nordisk Forskningsinstitut, KU (13 stories)

The red brick building on Albani Square was built in 1504-08 by the last Catholic bishop of Odense, Jens Andersen Beldenak as a fortified bishop's palace. After the Reformation in 1536, the palace was owned first by royalty and then by nobility. Karen Brahe took over the house in 1700, and in 1716 she had the old palace converted into a home for single gentlewomen of rank. The spinsters had rooms on the first floor and a large library on the ground floor at their disposal. Two half-timbered side buildings were built in the mid-18th century. One still stands. The house was a home for unmarried ladies of rank until 1970, and today it is used by the Karen Brahe Society and the University of Southern Denmark.

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Collective home for unmarried ladies of rank

Story written by Johnny Grandjean Gøgsig Jakobsen

Time / Periode 1504 1508

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The mediaeval Catholic abbeys were closed down during the Reformation in 1536. But in about 1700, the monastic concept was revived with the homes for unmarried ladies of rank. They were a kind of collective housing where unmarried noblewomen could live together in a chaste environment appropriate to their rank. Unlike the mediaeval abbeys, religion was not heavily in focus. But the women had to be orthodox – in other words Lutheran-Evangelical. Homes were established in Roskilde, Odense, Vemmetofte and Vallø. The Odense home had room for eight well-read spinsters from only the best families. After all, the abbey's huge collection of books shouldn't go to waste.