has been thrown upon the social customs of the people in the valleys of
the Euphrates and the Tigris. In Babylonia the woman did not suffer
greatly before the law from the fact that she was the weaker vessel.
Indeed, the scales were held quite evenly as between the sexes. A woman
might hold her own property, appear in public, and attend to her own
business. Frequently, Assyrian women are depicted upon monuments riding
on the highways upon mules. Woman might even hold office and plead in a
court of justice--so far did Babylonia anticipate the progress of modern
Western ideas. Agreements have been discovered upon tablets by which it
was covenanted between a man and his wife that should the husband marry
another during the lifetime of the first wife, all the dowry of the
first shall be returned to her and she shall be allowed to go where she
pleases. The law concerning divorce, however, would seem to lack that
fairness which characterizes many other regulations of social life. A
man might divorce his wife by the payment of a pecuniary consideration;
but if a woman undertook the initiative in annulling the marriage
contract, she might be condemned to death by drowning.
In the formula for the exorcism used by the priests to break the spell
the gods had sent upon one possessed or sick, we discover that despising
the mother was regarded as being as culpable as dishonoring the father.
"Has he perchance set his parents or relations at variance, sinned
against God, despised father or mother, lied, cheated, dishonored his
neighbor's wife, shed his neighbor's blood, etc. Indeed, an ancient law,
which is thought to go back even to Accadian precedents, even gives to
the woman, if she be a mother, greater honor than to the man for it is
prescribed that if a son denies his father he is to be fined; if he
denies his mother, he is to be banished."
It must be said, however, that the social freedom of the women depended
much upon their social rank. The women of the lower walks of life were
singularly independent for an Oriental community. Indeed, their liberty
was practically unrestricted. They could be seen upon the public
highways, with both head and face uncovered. They could make their
purchases at the market place, attend to any business that they might
find necessary, and visit the homes of their friends without restraint.
While all women, whatever might be their rank, had the same standing
before the laws of the land, unbending custom kept women of the highest
plane of social life within the seclusion of the home. Even when allowed
the privilege of being seen in public, they must go attended by eunuchs
or pages, so that both seeing and being seen were difficult processes.
Of course, in the highest lady of the land, the queen, was found the
culmination of dignity and exclusiveness, and she was rarely seen by
anyone except her husband, members of the royal family, and her
servants. Thus rank, instead of giving freedom and enlarged powers,
tended only to bring monotony and seclusion.
The women of the lower classes usually went with bare feet, as well as
bare heads. With their long shaggy garments they did not present a very
picturesque or attractive appearance. The truth is, the costumes of the
people of Babylonia and Assyria were wanting in that grace and beauty
which is discoverable among some other people of the Orient. The
garments lacked that lightness of effect which flowing robes and drapery
make possible. The designs and materials were stiff, and with the
profusion of borders and fringes presented a heavy aspect. The women did
not choose so to dress as to show their natural figure, but by
concealing themselves in heavy and sometimes padded garments, their
forms were far from beautiful, and contrast most unfavorably with the
Greek and Egyptian grace of womanly dress and carriage. The women as
well as the men used much embroidery, which was generally very heavy and
often elaborate. Some of the designs were highly ornate and beautiful.
Of the education of women in Babylonia and Assyria little definite is
known, except that it was common for women as well as men to read and
write. Exercises and translations of school children have been exhumed
from the mounds of ancient Babylonian cities. Dolls and other playthings
of the children have also been brought to light, showing that the
children of all ages have much the same tastes and occupations. Music,
dancing, embroidery, besides reading and writing, were among the
accomplishments of the girls of these lands.
Households were amply equipped religiously, for every home must be
provided with some method of keeping itself free from the power of evil
spirits. When all believe that the world is peopled with demons who are
perpetually trying to ensnare men and bring them to ruin if possible, we
might expect that the women would be especially superstitious and
punctilious to the last degree in order that all evil spirits may be
frightened from their dwellings. Hence, they hung amulets in almost
every conceivable place. Talismans, statuettes of the dreaded spirits
might be seen in every home. Every charm was used to thwart the enemies
of human happiness in their attempt to destroy domestic peace, estrange
husband from wife, drive the head of the family from his own roof, and
send barrenness and blight in every quarter.
The ancient Babylonians had a queer way of marrying off their daughters,
if we may believe Herodotus--which we do not. Not any period in the year
might the maiden select as the time to become a matron, but only on one
occasion during the year, and that a public festival, was marriage
permitted. On this occasion, the daughters of marriageable age were put
up at public auction. The crier took his place, while the young men who
were looking for wives or the young men's parents who were to pay for
them, stood about watching their opportunity to exchange their money for
feminine values. It is said that the girls were put up for purchase,
according to their beauty--the prettiest first, and so on to the end of
the sale. Often the contest of buyers would run high in excitement, and
large prices were offered for the coveted prize.
After the good-looking damsels were all sold at fair prices, then came
the less attractive maidens, who, we are informed, were not sold, but
offered as wives with a dowry, the proceeds of the beauties being used
to add to the value of their less fortunate sisters. When the auction
was over, the marriage followed, and the brides accompanied their
new-made husbands to their homes. There was no escape from this method
of wedlock. The procedure was not optional, but imperative. There was no
marriage ring or bracelet to commemorate the event, but each new wife
was given a bit of baked clay in the form of an olive. Through this
model a hole was pierced so that it might be worn continually about the
neck, and upon it were inscribed the names of the parties to the
transaction and the date of their marriage. Several of these clay
memorials have been found as mute witnesses of the days when girls were
put up at the annual sale of wives in the month of Sabat and knocked
down to the highest bidder.
Later, however, this custom gave way to one more rational, when marriage
came to be considered both "an act of civil law and a rite of domestic
worship." It became a contract entered into by two parties. A scribe
must be called in to draw up the marriage bond. It is to be properly
witnessed and filed away with a public notary for future reference.
There is a long period of social evolution between these two methods of
conducting marriage. And it is not to be supposed that all trace of
bargain and sale have disappeared. Not at all. The following happy
effort has been made at reproducing a scene which might have easily
occurred between the father of a young man who seeks in marriage the
hand of a certain damsel and the father of the girl at the home of the
latter.
"'Will you give your daughter Bilitsonnon in marriage to my son
Zamamanadin?' The father consents and without further delay the two men
arrange the dowry. Both fathers are generous and rich, but they are also
men of business habits. One begins by asking too much, the other replies
by offering too little; it is only after some hours of bargaining that
they finally agree and settle upon what each knew from the beginning was
a reasonable dowry--a mana of silver, three servants, a trousseau and
furniture, with permission for the father to substitute articles of
equal value for the cash." There being no further obstacles the marriage
is accordingly fixed for a day of the next week.
But does not the young lady need a longer time to prepare for an event
of so great moment in her life? No, because she has been anticipating
for some time that such a transaction will be effected by her parents;
for has she not already arrived at the age of thirteen? She has
therefore not let the past months slip idly through her fingers. She has
been busy sewing, embroidering, and making other things of beauty and
usefulness for her expected home. But nothing has concerned her more
than to see that her own person shall be attractive to her new husband
when the veil is lifted on her wedding day. Odors and ornaments ample
have been provided.
Early upon the appointed day the friends may be seen moving toward the
home of the bride-elect. The scribe who is to draw up the marriage
contract is present ready to perform his important task. With his
triangular stylus he indents the covenant in soft clay. This is to be
inserted in an envelope also of clay that there may be a double
impression of the words of the contract. This is to be carefully baked
and filed away for possible future use--it may be to be found thousands
of years afterward by some explorer digging in the ruins of a long
buried city. The day has dawned beautiful, for the astrologer has said
that all would be propitious. The hands of the bride and groom are tied
together with a thread of wool, the customary emblem of the union into
which they have now entered. The marriage contract is clearly read
before the assembled company, and the witnesses make their mark upon the
soft tablet, the dowry and other presents are given over. Prayer is made
to the proper gods for the happy pair, and curses are invited upon any
who shall undertake to annul the covenant or revoke the gifts.
Next comes the banqueting, of which the Assyrians were so fond. Music
and dancing, jesting and telling happy tales, with eating and drinking,
make up the round of merriment. At length the time comes for the bridal
party to make its way to the home of the groom's parents. All along the
way are signs of rejoicing, in which all are expected to join. The
groom's house is reached, and here the festivities are resumed and
carried on for several days, till all are fatigued and sated with mirth
and quite ready to see the young couple settle down to their new life as
home makers.
Polygamy was rare for the Orient, especially at so early a period; but
where polygamy was practised at all, the harem existed. In Assyria, the
king might have more than one legitimate wife, to say nothing of those
who were not so ranked. Sargon had three lawful wives, for each of whom
he erected a separate apartment in his royal palace of Dur-Sargina. Like
Oriental houses generally, the several apartments are entered from a
central court. The queen's apartments were usually rich in decoration
and furnishings. The harem of Sargon's palace, which may be taken as
typical, was entered by gates. One of these had upon the front two huge
bronze palm trees, on each side one. Since the palm tree is emblematic
of both grace and fecundity, the significance of its use is apparent.
There were anterooms and drawing rooms, as well as bedrooms, for the
use of the queen. These were plastered, and mural decorations were
abundant, the designs being sometimes conventional, sometimes depicting
religious ideas in symbolism. Of course, the winged bull and the winged
lion, watchful guardians of Assyrian interest, were often painted upon
the walls. The gods were favorite subjects. In the women's apartments
were chairs, stools, tables, and the floors of brick or stone were
covered with carpets and mats. The bed, more like a modern lounge, was
raised upon wooden legs, and held a mattress and appropriate coverings,
and placed in a highly ornamented alcove, gave to the bedroom an
attractive air.
But how does the queen amuse herself? for long indeed must the hours
often have seemed as she lived out her life a comparative prisoner. G.
Maspero, the noted French assyriologist, has thus described the
occupation of the queens, as they try to fill the idle hours: "Dress,
embroidery, needlework, and housekeeping, long conversation with their
slaves, the exchange of visits, and the festivals, with dancing and
singing with which they entertained each other, serve for occupation and
amusement. From time to time the king passes some hours amongst them, or
invites them to dine with him and amuse themselves in the hanging
gardens of the palace. The wives of the princes and great nobles are
sometimes admitted to pay homage to them, but very rarely, for fear they
should serve as intermediaries between the recluses and the outer
world."
The kings of both Assyria and Babylonia were, as a rule, kings of
insatiable conquest. Hence, much of the year was spent with the army in
some distant territory, or, it may be, in lion hunting, a sport which
had great attractiveness to a number of the kings. It will be thus seen
how little the wives of the monarch enjoyed his real companionship.
There was ample time for monotony, broken now and again by jealousies,
followed by bitter hatred and deadly plottings. One wife would almost
inevitably share more of the attention of the king than the rest. Those
who had reason to believe themselves neglected would certainly be
incensed against the more favored rival. The servants of the palace
would often be drawn into the disputes, which sometimes had a tragic
end. The whole harem, combining against a favorite, might, through the
use of poison or by some other clandestine means, end the life of her
who was so unfortunate as to be loved by the king beyond the measure
thought by her rivals to be her due.
One happy effort tended to relieve at least a little the dull seclusion
of the ladies of the harem. This was the planting of a garden in a court
adjacent to the house of the women. Often these gardens would be most
elaborate and beautiful. The hanging gardens of Babylon, accounted as
among the Seven Wonders of the World, were built in honor of a favorite
queen. The garden of the harem consisted of trees, such as the sycamore,
the poplar, or the cypress, and other plants selected to please the eye
of those whose seclusion must have made this suggestion of the country
most grateful.
Feasting played an important role in the heyday of Nineveh's grandeur,
as also in the Babylon of later days. The king has just returned from a
great triumph in the Westland. The whole city is agog. For days the
round of drinking and carousing has proceeded, till the whole city is
drunken. The queen wishes to have a part in the expressions of victory
and rejoicing. She, with some trepidation, invites the king to dine with
her in her apartments in the harem. At the appointed hour all is
arranged. The gorgeous couch the queen has prepared for the king to
recline upon while he sips his wine scented with aromatic spices, the
rich drapery of the couch, the small table near by, laden with golden
and silver vessels of costliness and elegance, the slaves who attend
upon the lord's wishes, the poet-laureate to sing the conqueror's
praises in elaborate lines of flattery--all conspire to make the
occasion one of great magnificence. Thus, from king and queen to the
lowliest of the great city, the spirit of revelry, the love of carousal,
and the habit of intoxication, took hold of the luxuriant capital. We
recognize the appropriateness of the familiar words of Nahum, the Hebrew
prophet of Elkosh, who had been an eyewitness of the growing effeminacy
of the great Assyrian capital, Nineveh, when he foretold the fall of the
once glorious city: "Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are women,
the gates of thy land shall be set wide open unto thy enemies; the fire
shall devour thy bars."
How did the ordinary housewife spend her time? M. Maspero attempts to
reproduce the daily life of the Assyrian woman of about the eighth
century before the Christian era in these graphic words:
"The Assyrian women spend a great deal of time upon the roofs. They
remain there all the morning till driven away by the noonday heat, and
they go back as soon as the sun declines in the evening. There they
perform all their household duties, chatting from one terrace to the
other. They knead the bread, prepare the cooking, wash the linen and
hang it out to dry, or if they have slaves to relieve them from these
menial labors, they install themselves upon cushions, and chat or
embroider in the open air. During the hottest hours of the day they
descend and take refuge indoors. The coolest room in the house is often
below the level of the courtyard and receives very little light." Thus
the Assyrian lady adapts herself as well as she may to her surroundings,
which were usually very simple as to furnishings and such things as a
modern inhabitant of the West would classify under the head of
"comforts." An Assyrian housewife was usually satisfied with a few
chairs and stools of various heights and sizes. There were few beds,
except among the rich. The people generally slept upon mats, which could
be folded and put away during the daytime. Taking care of the house was
woman's work, unless the family was rich enough to own slaves to attend
to the menial work of domestic life. The women had the care of the oven,
which was usually built in one corner of the court, and the meats were
cooked by them at the open fireplace. Care of the culinary work of an
Assyrian home was no small task, for the Assyrians were good
feeders,--and as for drinking, here they surpassed even their powers at
eating. So the woman of the house would find it necessary to care for
the wine skins and water jars that might be seen hanging about the
porches to keep them cool.
The people along the waterways lived largely upon fish. These were
caught in great numbers and dried. The industrious housewife would take
these dried fish, pound them in a crude mortar, and then make them into
cakes, which Herodotus tells us were almost the sole diet of those who
lived in the lower or marshy regions of the Mesopotamian valley.
Ordinarily, men and women partook together their daily repast from a
common dish, into which all dipped, but on the occasion of great
banquets it was customary for the women to be served separately.
VI
THE LAND OF THE LOTUS
"Concerning the virtues of women, O Cleanthes, I am not of the same mind
with Thucydides, for he would prove that she is the best woman
concerning whom there is least discourse made by people abroad, either
to her praise or her dispraise; judging that, as the person, so the very
name of a good woman ought to be retired and not gad abroad. But to us
Gorgias seems more accurate, who requires that not only the face, but
the fame of a woman should be known to many. For the Roman law seems
exceedingly good, which permits due praise to be given publicly both to
men and to women after death." These words of Plutarch find application
in the life of the women of the land of the Nile. There is no lack of
praise for the Egyptian women both while living and after they had
passed away, as the testimony of the monuments amply prove.
It should be remembered that the history of Egypt extends over a very
wide stretch of time, and that changes are to be reckoned with even in a
region where everything moves slowly. For this reason it is not always
possible to say that this or that was true of the Egyptian women. For
there were the ancient, middle and later kingdoms, with each of which
came new influences, and these differed in many respects from the period
of Greek or Macedonian power; and the Egypt of to-day is a very
different Egypt from that of the Pharaohs and the Ptolemies.
There are many widely differing people in the land of the Nile to-day.
The traveller finds great diversity of scenery and of social conditions,
and one has said of this marvellous land as the great dramatist wrote of
one of her most notable daughters:
"Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety."
The oldest book in the world is an ancient Egyptian papyrus discovered
by M. Prisse at Thebes. It goes back to a period probably not later than
B.C. 3580, being a collection of didactic sayings, or precepts, of
Phtahhotep, a prince of the fifth dynasty. What so early an Egyptian
sage has to say concerning women should be of no little interest. In
giving advice to husbands, he gives this counsel, which we might imagine
a wise man of to-day might easily have written: "If thou be wise, guard
thy house; honor thy wife, and love her exceedingly; feed her stomach
and clothe her back, for this is the duty of a husband. Give her
abundance of ointment, fail not each day to caress her, let the desire
of her heart be fulfilled, for verily he that is kind to his wife and
honoreth her, the same honoreth himself. Withhold thy hand from
violence, and thy heart from cruelty, softly entreat her and win her to
thy way, consider her desires and deny not the wish of her heart. Thus
shalt thou keep her heart from wandering; but if thou harden thyself
against her, she will turn from thee. Speak to her, yield her thy love,
she will have respect unto thee; open thy arms, she will come unto
thee."
Ancient Egyptian literature does not lack its reference to women. One
of the most famous of the stories that have been presented to us from
Egyptian sources is _The Tale of the Two Brothers_. This goes back to
the day of Moses, and has suggested to many the Hebrew account of
Joseph. It reveals the charms of her whose beauty the sea leaped up to
embrace, and the acacia flowers envied. This romance, written for the
entertainment of Seti II. when he was yet crown prince, and considered,
by Mr. Flinders Petrie, to be connected with the ancient Phrygian of
Atys, gives us an early illustration of the fact that many ills and many
pleasures have been born to the race through love of a woman.
The women of Babylonia and Assyria enjoyed a measure of freedom that was
exceptional for the Orient, and yet the Egyptian woman was more
independent still. Indeed, the respect that was paid to womankind by the
Egyptians is one of the fairest elements in the civilization of the
valley of the Nile. Motherhood also was highly respected. But one
illustration, referred to by Lenormant, will suffice to prove this
statement. A woman while _enceinte_, condemned to death for murder or
any other crime, could not be executed till after the birth of the
child; for it was considered the height of injustice to make the
innocent participate in the punishment of the guilty, and to visit the
crime of one person upon two. And he adds: "The judges who put to death
an innocent person were held as guilty as if they had acquitted a
murderer."
Before the law woman's rights were respected. In the division of the
paternal estate, the daughters shared equally with the sons, and were
more responsible than the sons for the care of the parents. In worship,
the queen is sometimes depicted as standing near her husband in the
temple--behind him, to be sure, as the king was the head of the religion
and indeed "son of the Sun," but with him, like Isis behind Osiris,
lifting her hand in sympathetic protection and shaking the sistrum, or
beating the tambourine to dispel all evil spirits, or holding the
libation vase or bouquet.