… (and sometimes cruel) conduct that marked the earlier part of the century. 2 Relatedly, constructions of female sexuality also gradually changed. The acknowledgement of women’s sexual appetite in the early modern period was followed by its increasing smothering and denial by the beginning of the … Women and Politeness in Eighteenth Century England (London: Routledge, 2018) 3 . Faramerz Dabhoiwala, The Origins of Sex: A History of the First Sexual Revolution (London: Allen Lane, 2012), p. 354. In 1715-16, when he was 24, the …