Womens Status Subordinate to Men's in Ancient Cultures

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Since ancient times women haven’t been treated equally, even now-a-days they still aren’t completely treated as equally as men. After reviewing these documents it is clear to me that ancient cultures show us that women’s status was subordinate to men’s status because women didn’t always have a choice in what happened to them. They were considered property, while they also brought in most of the food by gathering and through agriculture. Even with inequality women had their ways of manipulating the men. To better understand how these documents relate to each other, a document about the time period from a woman’s point of view such as “The Life and Words of an !Kung Woman” because it is hard to look at the subject without looking at both sides, male and female. For example, document 1, The Gilgamesh Epic, and document 2, The “Peace” Panel, both express how men were at the top of the genders because document 1 portrays a very famous epic and it clearly shows that men were more important and had higher power. They were more connected to the gods; the deities they believed ruled them. “Thou man of Shurippak, son of Ubara-Tutu, Build a house, construct a ship: Forsake thy possessions, take heed for thy life! Abandon thy goods, save (thy) life, And bring living seed of every kind into the ship.” To me this shows how they want a male saving the creatures from the flood coming in the epic. They state to bring “living seed of every kind into the ship”, but it doesn’t state for him to bring his family or his wife, also all the gods are men. Document 2 also shows the typical lifestyle in ancient cultures, men working and women taking care of the household and bearing children. These are one sided, they leave you to interpret them on your own. A document like “The Life and Words of an !Kung Woman” would show people the perspective of women. They were used to living the way

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