hout Europe and North America in the early modern period (1480-1750). ²
             With the advent of Enlightenment, women started questioning their roles in society and developing a new intellect, and the attitude towards them started gradually to improve. For the first time there was the idea that women, as well as men, have a history and that they too can change with changing times. However, the domestic private sphere was still the place where women found ways to know the new intellectual movements. This was possible thanks to their participation in the salon culture, the major venue where debate and discussions through intellectuals took place. Salons played the political and social function of the television and press today: they were social gatherings for entertainment and fun, as well as sources of intellectual stimulation. Women hosted a salon in their own home or in a hotel dining room, and they assumed a role of governance. Women could take place in salons because they were a sort of "protectorate". ³
             "The women of the salons played a role not unlike the one traditionally played by women in court society: offering protection, acting on behalf of such or such a person, mobilizing ministers or courtesans. Whether it be in adverting the wrath of censors, helping an intrepid author out of the Bastille, securing an audience or a pension, or jockeying for a place in the French Academy, membership in high society and the support of female protectors was indispensable". ⁴
             The other reason women were involved in salons was because
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