by at least four separate German chroniclers in the 1380s, was from Lübeck. The protagonist dressed as a woman by night and sold sex out of a booth. By day, he was a priest and was eventually discovered when a client recognised him celebrating mass. The medieval historian Jeremy Goldberg has compared the Lübeck and Rykener cases: both involved "cross-dressing, dishonesty, the close association of priests with homosexual activity, and the eventual intervention of the city authorities". Life All that is known of Rykener's life comes from the answers given during the interrogation in the Lord Mayor's court, following Rykener's arrest in December 1394. At these proceedings, Rykener described in some detail coming to learn the trades of prostitution and needlecraft when living with a London embroideress, also telling the court with whom and where Rykener subsequently plied those trades. According to the transcription of the proceedings, Rykener had only recently returned to London after visiting other parts of southern England prior to being arrested in Cheapside, a busy commercial district of London. At Elizabeth Brouderer's house At the interrogation, Rykener described being first dressed as a woman at the Bishopsgate house of one Elizabeth Brouderer. Following the 1348–1349 outbreak of bubonic plague—which killed between one quarter and one half of the English population—female apprenticeships had become as common as those for boys, particularly in London. Here Rykener was taught how to sleep with men as a woman and to be paid for doing so, as well as embroidery, and may have completed an apprenticeship under Brouderer, as female apprentices did. Rykener described the situation in some detail: The sex lessons, Rykener explained, were so that Brouderer could give her daughter, Alice, to men at night, while it was dark so they could not see her. Alice would then leave her client before daybreak, and Brouderer would tell the man that he had slept with Rykener. Rykener would be present in front of the client, wearing women's clothes and called Eleanor by Brouderer. One of the men Rykener had intercourse with in Brouderer's house was the Rector of Theydon Garnon, called Philip. After having sex with the Rector, Rykener stole two gowns from him. The latter gave up trying to retrieve his property when Rykener told Philip that Rykener was the wife of an important man in the city. This would have forced the Rector to sue Rykener's supposed-husband in