I have not been able to find evidence of a gallant, chivalrous,
magnanimous attitude toward women in the records of any ancient
nation, and as romantic love is inconceivable without such an
attitude, and a constant interchange of kindnesses, we may infer from
this alone that these nations were strangers to such love. Professor
Ebers makes a special plea for the Egyptians. Noting the statements of
Herodotus and Diodorus regarding the greater degree of liberty enjoyed
by their women as compared with the Greek, he bases thereon the
inference that in their treatment of women the Egyptians were superior
to all other nations of antiquity. Perhaps they were; it is not
claiming much. But Professor Kendrick notes (I., 46) that although it
may be true that the Egyptian women went to market and carried on
trades while the men remained at home working at the loom, this is
capable of receiving quite a different interpretation from that given
by Ebers. The Egyptians regarded work at the loom more as a matter of
skill than the Greeks did; and if they allowed the women to do the
marketing, that may have been because they preferred to have them
carry the heavy burdens and do the harder work, after the fashion of
savages and barbarians.
If the Egyptians ever did show any respect for women they have
carefully wiped out all traces of it in modern life. To-day,
"among the lower classes and in rural districts the wife is
her husband's servant. She works while he smokes and
gossips. But among the higher classes, too, the woman
actually stands far below the man. He never chats with her,
never communicates to her his affairs and cares. Even after
death she does not rest by his side, but is separated from
him by a wall." (Ploss, II., 450.)
Polygamy prevails, as in ancient times, and polygamy everywhere
indicates a low position of woman. Ebers comments on the
circumspection shown by the ancient Egyptians in drawing up their
marriage contracts, adding that "in many cases there were even trial
marriages"--a most amazing "even" in view of what he is trying to
prove. A modern lover, as I have said before, would reject the very
idea of such a trial marriage with the utmost scorn and indignation,
because he feels certain that his love is eternal and unalterable.
Time may show that he was mistaken, but that does not affect his
present feeling. That sublime confidence in the eternity of his
passion is one of the hall-marks of romantic love. The Egyptian had it
not. He not only sanctioned degrading trial marriages, but enacted a
barbarous law which enabled a man to divorce any wife at pleasure by
simply pronouncing the words "thou art expelled." In modern Egypt,
says Lane (I., 247-51), there are many men who have had twenty,
thirty, or more wives, and women who have had a dozen or more
husbands. Some take a new wife every month. Thus the Egyptians are
matrimonially on a level with the savage and barbarian North American
Indians, Tasmanians, Samoans, Dyaks, Malayans, Tartars, many negro
tribes, Arabs, etc.