Gender Roles In Ancient Egypt

In current times in America, the role of women and the role of men is about equal. When it comes to home life, it’s just as common for women to go out and work as it is for a man to do it. Women have even run for President. However, in the Harappan society in ancient India, and in Sumerian times in ancient Mesopotamia, the equality and respect of women weren’t as strong as it is today. Regardless, women were respected to a certain level. Overall, the respect of women in ancient India was similar to the respect of women in Mesopotamia because goddesses were seen as powerful, young women were admired, and women were highly regarded for being able to give birth.

Gender roles in ancient Mesopotamia were clearly defined (teachmiddleeast.edu). Generally, men worked outside of the home and women stayed inside of the home while focusing on raising their children and keeping up with work that took place in the home. However, there were exceptions; we know of women who were “bartenders” and even women who were priestesses, but with limited responsibility. Due to the fact that some were from socially higher families and owned large amounts of property, those women were not allowed to marry. Women at the time were given much less freedom than men, however, women were more protected than men, which is seen in Hammurabi’s Code of Law, specifically in his 130th law:

Although ancient Egyptian women were not completely equal to the men in their society, they still had more rights than women in other ancient societies. Unlike women in other ancient societies, Egyptian women enjoyed most of the same legal and economic rights that Egyptian men did. In ancient Egypt “the disparities between people's legal rights were based on differences in social class and not on gender.”

Throughout history women have faced many struggles in gaining equality with men. Freedoms and boundaries have been dependent upon the time period, rulers, religions and civilization. Ancient Greek women and Ancient Egyptian women were both equal to men as far as the law was concerned in certain areas; however, their equalities were different in the sense that Greek women were married out of necessity and viewed as property while Egyptian women were respected and loved by their husbands. Ancient Greek women and Ancient Egyptian women also both lived with limitations such as being thought of as domestic servants, yet these views solely depended on the time and polis.

Gender roles of diverse cultures have differed immensely throughout history. The evolution of gender roles first began in the Paleolithic Age and then began to transform with the transformation of the Paleolithic Age to the Neolithic Age. Women in Mesopotamia, India, Greece, China, and Rome were not treated as equals and viewed as inferior to men. Cultures like Egypt and Persia had similar laws for women and treated them with more respect out of any of the other cultures.

Gender roles are the roles that men and women are expected to occupy based on their sex. Traditionally, many Western societies have believed that women are more nurturing then men . . . . One way that a woman might engage in the traditional feminine gender role would be to nurture her family by working full-time within the home rather than taking employment outside of the home. (Blackstone)

What is a gender role? It is the behaviors that are considered acceptable for people based on their sex. Throughout history, societies have constructed gender roles. As times change, roles tend to change. In the twenty-first century, American society has created the role of women being great academics and men only being athletes. This has not always been true in the past. Although America is not perfect, it is working on intellectual and physical equality.

Gender roles have played a major part in society. According to the book “The Psyche of Feminism” “A gender role is a theoretical construct in the social sciences that refers to a set of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be socially appropriate

Throughout written history, women have experienced status submissive to the men they lived with. Commonly, most cultures known to modern historians followed a typical pattern of men being given the role of the defender and breadwinner of the family, whereas women were given responsibilities of domestic servitude. The roles of females differed greatly among the ancient societies of Egypt and Mesopotamia. The most part, ancient women in Egypt enjoyed more rights and privileges than their Mesopotamian counterparts in matters of marriage and property ownership. Women in ancient Egyptian civilization were perceived as liberated citizens with the same potential to operate as part of a legal system as men, and they can even be priestess.

Gender roles describe the normative expectations of a culture group regarding the position that both sexes should hold in society. It also refers to the division of labor tasks, differences in behaviors, preferences, abilities; personalities that society expects of specific genders, (Kaiser, C. R., & Miller, C. T. 2009). It concerns the processes of how gender roles socialize and interact with each other in society as a whole and as an individual, (Stockard & Johnson, 1980; Thomas, 1986). Gender role deals with identity and at times are conceptualized as the acceptance and identification with social roles and behaviors associated with

Women throughout time have experienced position changes more times than can be counted. Not just in modern times, gender roles began in the B.C.E era. In Egypt and India, gender roles were a huge part of society. In both locations, male’s word was law. What they said was the final answer and a woman could not change that. The gender distinctions were similar in ways that women had minimal power in familiar locations, like their homes. They had a small opinion about certain subjects, but they never ventured out of the comfort zone of subjects they were allowed to discuss. Men were treated better than women, yes, but the power women held was used for some of the most important topics.

To begin, gender roles are the expected behaviors that are associated with one’s sex (Croteau). Reiterating, women played the role of the nurturer for most of history. They cared for their children, kept the house tidy, did some farming and some labor but never as much as the men. When more defined jobs came into play they still incorporated a role that depicted women as a caregiver. During the 19th and 20th century, the medical profession was considered suitable for females. Even then, men for the most part worked in the hospitals as nurses. Home nursing was thought to be more proper for women (Women’s History In America).

From prehistory to 600 BCE, gender roles have been influenced by religion in many civilizations. In ancient Mesopotamia, “The Mesopotamian woman's role was strictly defined. She was the daughter of her father or the wife of her husband. Women rarely acted as individuals outside the context of their families. Those who did so were usually royalty or the wives of men who had power and status” (University of Chicago). In Mesopotamia’s polytheistic religion, women were only known as the mother of a son, or the wife to a husband. This was influenced by the religion because the many gods influenced how men and women were treated in Mesopotamia. This is similar to how women were treated in another civilization at the time, Israel. In Israel, women would not own property or get a divorce, and, if involved with extramarital relations, would be put to death. According to the Oxford Research

Ancient cultures treated women more as property than people. The cultures that I will proceed to talk about are Mesopotamia, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans and how differently yet how equally treated women. Women were more of a household decoration to the men of each culture, all they did was cook, clean, and be a mother to the children. When the men got home the women were expected to make him happy no matter what.

It is difficult to fully understand the role of women in ancient Egyptian society because the understandings of the society and government are still incomplete. There are also two other major problems, those being that there is very little source material on women, and the material that has been found was biased by the ideas and minds of previous Egyptologists. The only source material that has survived from great kingdoms of Egypt is material that has been either found in tombs on the walls and sarcophaguses, or carved on major government and religious document. None of the writings on papyrus and other delicate materials survived. This material, which has survived, is the writings of the Egyptian literate male elite. In their