Title IX as Ancient as Egypt

¶ … Ancient as Egypt

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C.S. § 1681-1688 law established in 1972 was a groundbreaking law prohibiting sex-based discrimination in much of education. 20 U.S.C.S. § 1681(a) states that "no person in the United States shall on the basis of sex be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance." Many may wonder how such a "new age" law could be relevant to ancient history. Taking a look back into the time of the Ancient Egyptians, one will see how women's rights were put into existence as early as 3100 B.C.E. In many cultures, women were not respected and did not play important roles in society. Egypt was the first group to develop a respect for women and even have them as pharaohs. Because of the high infant and child mortality rate, women were considered important for their role as child bearers and were given respect accordingly. In Egyptian society, pharaohs were considered to be kings, gods, and their highest ruler. This paper will explore Egyptian views of women from the first ruler, Sobekneferu and the most important and respected female Pharaoh, Hatshepsut, to the last known Pharaoh, Ptolemy who ruled from 51-30 B.C. By doing so, it will examine how feminism and an interest in women's rights cannot trace its roots to the suffrage movement, as so many scholars do, but must look back much further, to the first known strong female rulers in all of history.

Many people believe that feminism is a modern invention and that all historical societies were misogynistic. The belief is that older civilizations did not afford any room for advancement for women. While this is certainly true for some ancient societies, it is decidedly not true for other ancient societies. Not only is there substantial evidence supporting the notion that many prehistoric societies were matriarchal, but also that even large societies, such as ancient Egypt, which supported the notion of the powerful female. Women were considered life givers, and, thus, their roles in society were important. That is not to suggest that men achieved real equality in daily life. Just as Title IX promises to protect a woman's right to de juris equality but does not guarantee a woman access to de facto equality, the rules and norms of ancient Egypt still reflected the fact that women, as a whole, are physically weaker than men, and, thus will sometimes be abused.

With that caveat, one must explore Egyptian tradition and lore to understand the roles of males and females. The female played an important role in the creation mythology of ancient Egypt. Creation was the result of the interaction between the male Geb, who represented Earth, and the female Nut, who represented the sky. Moreover, these two interacted as equals, not establishing male superiority to females. This stands in marked contrast to ancient Greek and Roman creation mythology, which firmly establishes a male as the most powerful of the Gods. Geb and Nut had many children, two of whom were the goddess Isis and the god Osiris. The two siblings married, which established a pattern for the pharaohic leaders of Egypt. This is no surprise given that, like many other aristocracies, the Egyptian pharaohs claimed to be related to the gods or to ascend to god-like status once in power.

Furthermore, it is also important to understand that the gender roles of the aristocracy do not necessarily reflect the reality for most women in a society. Many societies have had nominally powerful female leaders while continuing to subjugate women in the general population. One need only look at the rule of Queen Elizabeth I in England to see a dramatic contrast between the conditions for a ruling woman and the conditions of an average woman. Therefore, the fact that women in Egypt could be pharaohs is not dispositive of the way that women were treated in ancient Egypt. In fact, it is clear that in Egypt this was not the case. For example, Egypt was a slave-holding country, and the history of slavery supports the notion that one of the primary reasons for people to own slaves is access to slaves kept for sexual purposes. Clearly, the lives of the women kept in these base and dehumanizing conditions were far different from the lives of women in powerful positions. On the other hand, there is evidence that women could inherit property in ancient Egypt, which differentiated Egypt from many civilizations that came afterwards. Therefore, it is important to always keep in mind that class impacted the access to rights in ancient Egypt, just as it does in modern times.

One of the critical differences between modern times and ancient times may have been the infant and female mortality rates in childbirth, as well as the high rates of child mortality. Egyptian women tended to marry in their teens. "The average woman, if she lived and remained married until her menopausal years, would have needed to give birth to about six live children for society to reproduce itself" (Bagnall and Cribiore, p.75). In some ways, this need for massive reproduction made women precious, because they were needed to perpetuate society. However, in other ways, this need for massive reproduction helped devalue women. Rather than being seen as human beings, there would have been a temptation for males to view them as reproductive units. Such a view would have contributed to young ages of marriage, multiple wives, and the keeping of harems; all historical elements known to have occurred in ancient Egypt. Therefore, while women in ancient Egypt may have had comparably more rights than women in similar societies, it would be erroneous to assume that they were on equal footing with males.

While equally important to realize that some societies are so gender-segregated that there is no possibility of a female ruler. Gaps in dynastic succession are never filled by women in those societies. Instead, the ruling roles may be filled by husbands, by far-distant relatives, or even by people outside of the family tree, so long as the ruler is a male. Ancient Egypt certainly had a male preference. Leadership went from male to male heir, and it was only when there were no males available that female rulers were a possibility. Therefore, one can see that there was not true equality in Ancient Egypt. While some women may have been afforded similar opportunities to males, this was certainly not an option for all women, even those born to royal families.

One of the lingering questions for Egyptologists is how pharaohs were chosen. There is even a theory that dynastic succession rules were matriarchal. To support this theory, people point out that "many of the royal kings (pharaohs) of ancient Egypt were married to their sisters or half-sisters. Many kings who were not themselves the son of a king were married to the daughter or sister of a king" (Lewis). These facts would support matriarchal succession rules. However, the issue is not clear-cut. Many kings were not descended from royal females. Therefore, succession appeared to be through both matrilineal and patrilineal lines. The fact that succession was fluid and not static is actually one of the factors supporting the idea that ancient Egypt was less misogynistic than many of its contemporary societies and than many societies that would follow it. Examining Egypt's female rulers, one certainly sees a history of women acting as bold and decisive rulers and being treated as such.

Perhaps the most fantastic of all the tales about female rulers is the tale of Nitocris, the last queen of the 6th dynasty. Like most female pharaohs, Nitocris came to power when no male heir was available; her brother was murdered, which gave her a position of power. The story surrounding Nitocris is that she wished to avenge her brother's death. To do so, she built an underground feasting chamber and invited her brother's murderers to a feast there. Once they were in the chamber, she opened the chamber to the Nile, drowning them. However, Nitocris did not go on to become a powerful leader; instead, she committed suicide rather than having to explain her actions to her people (Wilkinson, p.11). The problem with this story is that it does not ring true with historians. Such behavior would not have been in line with Egyptian culture, which neither encouraged that type of revenge killing nor the idea of suicide. Moreover, there is no evidence of any pharaoh by the name of Nitocris (Wilkinson, p.11). As a result, the most vengeful of all the female pharaohs may have been nothing more than myth.

One of the most famous of all of the female pharaohs was Queen Sobekneferu. She ruled Egypt for a four-year period at the end of Dynasty 12 (Hawass, p.32). Her father was the pharaoh Amenemhat III and her brother the pharaoh Amenemhat IV. There is some circumstantial evidence that she may have ruled as co-regent with her father, but she is not linked to her brother, suggesting that rather than serving as co-regent with her father, she rose to power after either her brother's death or after she took power from her brother (Hawass, p.32). However, this does suggest that she became ruler only after a male heir was unavailable or proved unsuccessful in the role. Furthermore, simply examining her title suggests that, while Egypt would tolerate and even embrace a female ruler, it was not established for a matriarchal or even a gender-neutral hereditary aristocracy, but, rather, a male-dominated one. For example, Sobekneferu proclaimed herself the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, not the queen of the same region (Hawass, p.32). She was aware that she was filling a traditionally male role and she did not try to change that to a gender-friendly designation as queen. That does not mean that her leadership was questioned or that she was considered a lesser ruler because of her gender; historians always incorporated her into the lists of pharaohs, which suggested that no one really contested her claim that she was a pharaoh; her leadership was always considered legitimate (Wilkinson, p.12).

After Sobekneferu, Egypt suffered a general decline, which lasted for several dynasties. The next really powerful dynasty was dynasty 17. One of the reasons for its success is believed to be a series of strong females in positions of power. Many of these women ruled when their husbands, the kings, were away, or when the kings proved unable to rule by themselves. However, they did so in a way that reaffirmed, rather than challenged the male hierarchy. They did not seek to be declared kings, like Sobekneferu did (Hawass, p.32). "Where there was a strong line of male heirs, queens were able to exercise power as consorts or mothers within the existing tradition" (Hawass, p.32). However, because the women relied upon the male line for power, when the males were weak, the females were weak.

The next dynamic queen figure in ancient Egypt is Queen Hatshepsut. She is probably the most fascinating of all the ancient Egyptian female pharaohs because she came to power when there was a male heir available. When her husband and half-brother, Thutmose II, died, he left a single male heir; Thutmose III. Not only was Thutmose III too young to rule alone, he was the son of a minor harem girl. Hatshepsut took over as the regent, and continued to use feminine titles, such as queen, to describe her role as she effectively managed Egypt. Sometime before the seventh year of Thutmose III's reign, Hatshepsut "abandoned the pretense of being a mere regent and declared herself ruler and senior co-regent with her stepson" (Hawass, p.33). From then, she gradually eased her stepson out of any real exercise of power or authority, declaring herself the king of Egypt.

However, as with Sobekneferu, Hatshepsut's reign is complicated. The fact that she had to declare herself king, rather than queen shows a continuing patriarchal system. Many of the representations of her show her in the typical male regalia associated with the king. She was responsible for a large amount of building and creation in Egypt. However, her reign was associated with some sort of strife. Later pharaohs sought to destroy evidence of her reign, perhaps to bolster the legitimacy of the claim that Thutmose III and his heirs had to the throne. How did Hatshepsut ascend to power? Why was that power recognized as legitimate? Why was it critical to challenge her role as pharaoh? These questions may never be fully answered by modern historians, but they do help reveal some of the complexities in the ancient Egyptian monarchy.

The most famous of all of Egypt's female pharaohs, Cleopatra, was not actually an Egyptian, which makes her ascension to the position of ruler the most interesting of all of the pharaohs. Cleopatra was a Macedonian, and descended from a line of Ptolemaic kings (Roller, p.15). When her father died, Cleopatra ascended to the throne. However, by that time, while it was established that men and women could be co-regents, and it was also a legal requirement that female rulers have male consorts. As a result, Cleopatra married her younger brother. However, she did not rule as a co-ruler, but as the sole ruler of Egypt. When her brother/husband Ptolemy XIII sent her into exile, Cleopatra sought Roman support, giving herself to Caesar. This union could have brought about a unified Rome-Egypt, but Caesar's assassination prevented that type of union. Cleopatra's romantic entanglements eventually led to the death of her lover, Marc Antony, and Cleopatra's suicide. The fact that Cleopatra's suicide preceded an abrupt downfall of Egypt suggests that she was an unusually powerful ruler, since there were living male Ptolemaic descendants to take over ruling Egypt.