Daughters of Gaia

Daughters of Gaia
Author: Bella Vivante
Publisher: Praeger
Total Pages: 272
Release: 2007
Genre: History
ISBN:

From their personal lives at home to their roles in the realms of religion, health, economics, governance, war, philosophy, and poetry, this is the story of ancient women in all their aspects. Vivante explores women's lives in four ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean: Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome. While the experiences of women in ancient cultures were certainly very different from those of most women today, a tendency to focus too much on negative or restrictive images has until now provided readers with a rather incomplete picture. Looking at this important era from a female-oriented perspective, Vivante widens the perceptual lens and makes it possible to highlight the fundamental empowered aspects of women's activities in order to present them in balance with the various limits imposed on their societal participation. Beginning with powerful images of goddesses and women's roles in the religious sphere, Vivante details the foundation for women's activities in all other social realms. While these four Mediterranean civilizations were distinctive, they also influenced each other through various forms of contact—trade, colonization, and war. Both the similarities and the differences permit richer comparisons and promote a deeper understanding of the lives of women in each.

A Companion to Gender History

A Companion to Gender History
Author: Teresa A. Meade
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 691
Release: 2008-04-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0470692820

A Companion to Gender History surveys the history of womenaround the world, studies their interaction with men in genderedsocieties, and looks at the role of gender in shaping humanbehavior over thousands of years. An extensive survey of the history of women around the world,their interaction with men, and the role of gender in shaping humanbehavior over thousands of years. Discusses family history, the history of the body andsexuality, and cultural history alongside women’s history andgender history. Considers the importance of class, region, ethnicity, race andreligion to the formation of gendered societies. Contains both thematic essays and chronological-geographicessays. Gives due weight to pre-history and the pre-modern era as wellas to the modern era. Written by scholars from across the English-speaking world andscholars for whom English is not their first language.

Jewish and Christian Women in the Ancient Mediterranean

Jewish and Christian Women in the Ancient Mediterranean
Author: Sara Parks
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 373
Release: 2021-12-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 1351005960

This engaging and accessible textbook provides an introduction to the study of ancient Jewish and Christian women in their Hellenistic and Roman contexts. This is the first textbook dedicated to introducing women’s religious roles in Judaism and Christianity in a way that is accessible to undergraduates from all disciplines. The textbook provides brief, contextualising overviews that then allow for deeper explorations of specific topics in women’s religion, including leadership, domestic ritual, women as readers and writers of scripture, and as innovators in their traditions. Using select examples from ancient sources, the textbook provides teachers and students with the raw tools to begin their own exploration of ancient religion. An introductory chapter provides an outline of common hermeneutics or "lenses" through which scholars approach the texts and artefacts of Judaism and Christianity in antiquity. The textbook also features a glossary of key terms, a list of further readings and discussion questions for each topic, and activities for classroom use. In short, the book is designed to be a complete, classroom-ready toolbox for teachers who may have never taught this subject as well as for those already familiar with it. Jewish and Christian Women in the Ancient Mediterranean is intended for use in undergraduate classrooms, its target audience undergraduate students and their instructors, although Masters students may also find the book useful. In addition, the book is accessible and lively enough that religious communities’ study groups and interested laypersons could employ the book for their own education.

The Routledge Companion to Women and Monarchy in the Ancient Mediterranean World

The Routledge Companion to Women and Monarchy in the Ancient Mediterranean World
Author: Elizabeth D. Carney
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2023-05-31
Genre:
ISBN: 9780367560256

This volume offers the first comprehensive look at the role of women in the monarchies of the ancient Mediterranean. It consistently addresses certain issues across all dynasties: title; role in succession; the situation of mothers, wives, and daughters of kings; regnant and co-regnant women; role in cult and in dynastic image; and examines a sampling of the careers of individual women while placing them within broader contexts. Written by an international group of experts, this collection is based on the assumption that women played a fundamental role in ancient monarchy, that they were part of, not apart from it, and that it is necessary to understand their role to understand ancient monarchies. This is a crucial resource for anyone interested in the role of women in antiquity.

Among Women

Among Women
Author: Nancy Sorkin Rabinowitz
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Total Pages: 416
Release: 2002-03-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780292771130

Ten papers, which originated from a session at the meetings of the American Philological Association held in 1997, draw on a wide range of archaeological, literary and historical sources to reinterpret the significance, or otherwise, of relationships between women in ancient Greece, Rome and Egypt. Subjects include: imaging the woman's world from the Bronze Age frescoes of Akrotiri; Sappho; evidence from Attic vase painting; Classical Attic tombstones; Ovid; Lucian; 5th-century AD Egypt. Contributors are drawn from the fields of archaeology, the classics and queer studies and reflect current trends in gender studies.

A Companion to Women in the Ancient World

A Companion to Women in the Ancient World
Author: Sharon L. James
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 661
Release: 2012-02-13
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1444355007

A COMPANION TO WOMEN IN THE ANCIENT WORLD A Companion to Women in the Ancient World is the first interdisciplinary, methodologically based collection of readings to address the study of women in the ancient world while weaving textual, visual, and archaeological evidence into its approach. Prominent scholars tackle the myriad problems inherent in the interpretation of the evidence, and consider the biases and interpretive categories inherited from centuries of scholarship. Essays and case studies cover an unprecedented breadth of chronological and geographical range, genres, and themes. Illuminating and insightful, A Companion to Women in the Ancient World both challenges preconceived notions and paves the way for new directions in research on women in antiquity.

The Ancient Mediterranean World

The Ancient Mediterranean World
Author: Robin W. Winks
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 255
Release: 2004
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780195155631

What is a city, and what forms did urbanization take in different times and places? How do peoples and nations define themselves and perceive foreigners? Questions like these serve as the framework for The Ancient Mediterranean World: From the Stone Age to A.D. 600. This book provides a concise overview of the history of the Mediterranean world, from Paleolithic times through the rise of Islam in the seventh century A.D. It traces the origins of the civilizations around the Mediterranean--including ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Israel, Greece, and Rome--and their interactions over time. The Ancient Mediterranean World goes beyond political history to explore the lives of ordinary men and women and investigate topics such as the relationships between social classes, the dynamics of the family, the military and society, and aristocratic values. It introduces students not only to the ancient texts on which historians rely, but also to the art and architecture that reveal how people lived and how they understood ideas like love, death, and the body. Numerous illustrations, chronological charts, excerpts from ancient texts, and in-depth discussions of specific art objects and historical methods are included. Text boxes containing primary source materials examine such diverse subjects as warfare in early Mesopotamia, sculpting the body in classical Greece, the young women of Sappho's chorus, and early descriptions of the Huns. Combining excellent chronological coverage with a clear, concise narrative, The Ancient Mediterranean World is an ideal text for undergraduate courses in ancient history and ancient civilization.

Women in Antiquity

Women in Antiquity
Author: Stephanie Lynn Budin
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 1583
Release: 2016-08-12
Genre: History
ISBN: 1317219902

This volume gathers brand new essays from some of the most respected scholars of ancient history, archaeology, and physical anthropology to create an engaging overview of the lives of women in antiquity. The book is divided into ten sections, nine focusing on a particular area, and also includes almost 200 images, maps, and charts. The sections cover Mesopotamia, Egypt, Anatolia, Cyprus, the Levant, the Aegean, Italy, and Western Europe, and include many lesser-known cultures such as the Celts, Iberia, Carthage, the Black Sea region, and Scandinavia. Women's experiences are explored, from ordinary daily life to religious ritual and practice, to motherhood, childbirth, sex, and building a career. Forensic evidence is also treated for the actual bodies of ancient women. Women in Antiquity is edited by two experts in the field, and is an invaluable resource to students of the ancient world, gender studies, and women's roles throughout history.

Greek Prostitutes in the Ancient Mediterranean, 800 BCE–200 CE

Greek Prostitutes in the Ancient Mediterranean, 800 BCE–200 CE
Author: Allison Glazebrook
Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2011-01-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 0299235637

Greek Prostitutes in the Ancient Mediterranean, 800 BCE–200 CE challenges the often-romanticized view of the prostitute as an urbane and liberated courtesan by examining the social and economic realities of the sex industry in Greco-Roman culture. Departing from the conventional focus on elite society, these essays consider the Greek prostitute as displaced foreigner, slave, and member of an urban underclass. The contributors draw on a wide range of material and textual evidence to discuss portrayals of prostitutes on painted vases and in the literary tradition, their roles at symposia (Greek drinking parties), and their place in the everyday life of the polis. Reassessing many assumptions about the people who provided and purchased sexual services, this volume yields a new look at gender, sexuality, urbanism, and economy in the ancient Mediterranean world.

Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt

Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt
Author: Jane Rowlandson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 436
Release: 1998-11-26
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780521588157

The period of Egyptian history from its rule by the Macedonian Ptolemaic dynasty to its incorporation into the Roman and Byzantine empires has left a wealth of evidence for the lives of ordinary men and women. Texts (often personal letters) written on papyrus and other materials, objects of everyday use and funerary portraits have survived from the Graeco-Roman period of Egyptian history. But much of this unparalleled resource has been available only to specialists because of the difficulty of reading and interpreting it. Now eleven leading scholars in this field have collaborated to make available to students and other non-specialists a selection of over three hundred texts translated from Greek and Egyptian, as well as more than fifty illustrations, documenting the lives of women within this society, from queens to priestesses, property-owners to slave-girls, from birth through motherhood to death. Each item is accompanied by full explanatory notes and bibliographical references.