Contributing an original dimension to the study of women in 16th-century England, this pioneering work examines the largest corpus of women’s private writings available: their wills. Through an intensive analysis of more than 1200 wills, women from all parts of the country and all strata of society are revealed as articulate, opportunistic, and capable individuals who, despite legal and cultural limitations, exercised authority over their own lives and influenced the lives of their heirs after their death.