Northern Albania is still home today to so-called »Sworn Virgins« – the last men-women in Europe. A collection of laws from the Middle Ages, passed down over the centuries by word of mouth, allows families who have lost their patriarch – not seldom through blood feuds – to select a woman as head of the household. But only under the condition that she make an irrevocable vow to remain a virgin for the rest of her life. These sworn virgins are highly respected by their families and attain the status of men. They do men’s work and dress and behave like men, but are regarded as male in a social rather than a sexual sense. The sworn virgins fill their roles so per- fectly that, over time, they are no longer regarded as women outside their own family.

Pepa Hristova (b. 1977 in Bulgaria) lives in Hamburg. Among other distinctions, she has received the Otto Steinert Award and the C/O Berlin Talents Award. Her works have been exhibited at venues including the Deichtorhallen Hamburg, C/O Berlin and the Academy of the Arts, Berlin. She is a member of the Ostkreuz Photographers Agency.

Editor: F. C. Gundlach
Authors: Danail Yankov, Sophia Greiff
Artists: Pepa Hristova

Design: -SYB-

Hardcover
22 x 26,5 cm
228 pages
100-page insert
71 color and 63 b/w ills.
English
available
ISBN
49,90 Euro
2013