Thanks again - it makes perfect sense to a grandmother that the men moved to the female's family. Women understand the need for support with childbirth and child rearing and they know they can depend on their own family for that.
Great summary Team. I am working on something for this in the next couple of weeks, and I too had to re-read every paragraph in the paper, probably about 6 times!
You guys are saving my sanity by giving me something other than our American news cycle and politics to focus on. Thank you for giving me something more to do with my brain! I've been binge watching you two all week.
You don't avoid politics by bringing it up. No, you "subtly" wanted to express an opinion. The American people have spoken and voted democratically and have a president doing what the majourity wants. This may not be portrayed correctly or even unbiasedly by certain News outlets but it is blatantly the case by the cast votes. This should not be the place.
Another Fab report, please please do go down that rabbit hole and do a program on the movement of languages, along with DNA, it adds so much understanding to the archaeology! 🙏👍😊
You don't need scientific analysis to know how the Romans felt about women in general and women in positions of power in particular. No, I'm not speaking of Cleopatra tropes that were probably complete fabrications. It was indeed the Celtic women they commented on the most. Seeing women ordering men around had to have been a scene out of their deepest fears and nightmares 😂
When you feel so morally superior over people in the past, it's no wonder that you start imagining such things. Just pretend there was no praise for women, no nuance in views, and paint a picture of 1 dimensional bigots whose nightmares center around equally. How modern.
Julius Caesar was so shocked about Cleopatra being the Pharaoh that he needed six months with her on her ship sailing the Nile to recover. He intimidated in to placing a gilded statue of her in the temple of Venus. Writers in later generations were still having nightmares about her power, compelling them to praise her intelligence, charm and mastery of languages.
@@CandideSchmyles A bit of both I imagine. As a citizen of a country that, in *recent* history, TWICE rejected obviously capable female leaders in favor of...well...point made I think 😂
Thank you for that! I think it's very interesting to discuss archaeological and genetic evidence from various sites, to assess the role of women in pre-Roman Britain , but surely the topic could be expanded somehow. Ireland, a Celtic country, was never invaded by the Romans, and so a lot could be learned from there, from a culture, that remained isolated for so longer. The ancient and sophisticated Brehon Law system in Ireland for example, remained "relatively" intact right up until the plantation of Ulster / Ireland, until it was outlawed and condemned as "primitive" and "barbaric". The Brehon Law's were very very detailed, and there was a lot of references to women, and their equality in law: when it came to divorce, the division of land, heredity etc etc. There is no comparison. Celtic society was (absolutely) not a primitive feudal system, or a system of primogeniture, or a church father St Augustine of Hippo cult, where sex, women, and temptation played a (negative) role - it was (way) far more sophisticated than that. We should try hard to visualise Celtic society and how they lived back then - and not compare the times then, with our current, male based, mindset, culture and zeitgeist - that would be a mistake - in my view.
Your video title is a little understated for the strength of what is happening in this study. Women were more than just empowered and deserve the honor, afforded other leaders from the past.
Finally got back to watch the rest of this and really, really enjoyed it. I totally agree about the jaw-dropping about finding archaeological evidence; it's so much fun when something like that turns up! But the paragraph you find confusing I don't find confusing at all, I think it makes perfect sense... anyways! And about rabbit holes -- my personal intellectual landscape is littered with so many it's a wonder I haven't broken a leg in one.
You need no scientist to work this out. No Irishman would argue with their mam without their being consequences. Mams rule whether you think so or not and I'd say that's the way its been all through the generations. The Irish mam is 'King' even in a republic.
Maybe a suggestion-bring the paper’s author on to speak directly … mention basic info bring them on … I know it’s hard for calendar… but it would give these amazing people the chance to let the un-media-ed version be heard! You do great work … Grueling … work 😆😆
Watched about half of this and possibly I am just waffling in ignorance Anyhow it struck me that at least in my family ( working class family, now in England but originating from Ireland and Wales.) Anyhow there is a strong trend that women kept the family ties. They would keep the connections , visit, communicate with relatives through female relatives. The males or husbands just kind of tagged along with this and without the famales lost contact with the wider family and became disconnected, maybe this is just a common thing but it is defimitely a strong pattern in my family Family was all about the women.
Being Welsh …always told A son is a son ‘til he finds a wife & a daughter, is a daughter for the rest of your life. Your son does go and live with the wife’s family still….your husband is incorporated into your family, and your daughter tells her teenage daughter that she will not escape….ever, just bring back another to join the household……😂
Bouddica, no doubt, was a huge part of the Romans fear. You could do a story on her alone. Were there any Mediterranean examples of female warrior leaders?
@@celsus7979 There are records of Boudicca leading her troops into battle and defeating the Roman's, including the bloody battle of Watling street. Even her name Boudicca means Victory and was given to her after the battles.
Thank you both for such great videos. Digging deeper is the best! Keep up the great videos on great subject matter. I watch them all!! Peace 🕊️ and hugs 🤗 to you both! Keep going. My family is Celtic through and through
My guess is that this occurred more frequently than otherwise believed. Or a mix thereof. There are many of these societies in what is now known as the Americas. It is easier to know the mother than the father.
The practice of husbands moving in with the wife's family does not suggest female dominance. In Japan prior to the Shogunate it was also the practice of husbands to movie in with the wife's family, but Japanese society was anything but female dominated. It just meant that it was the wife's father who gained from the match more than the husband's father.
Ancient Japonese society was matriarchal, with female shamans as rulers. Maybe the tradition of men moving in with the wife's family is from those ancient times.
makes sense , as a woman of mixed ancestry ( Metis from Canada ) most of the males here tended to move in with their wives families. The women also kept track of the bloodlines in many tribes , before the Europeans came over. In fact still to this day at communal feasts Elder women are fed first then pregnant females then Elder males then children ....and then the young men ( warriors or craftsmen ) younger women were the ones serving.the young women enforce the practice and make sure the young males don't get out of line. ( usually with words but not averse to physical admonishment if required) God Help the young man who strikes back at her or an Elder or a child. They will be trying to live that down for the rest of their life. While there were patriarchal Tribes , they still had women of high rank and protocols to follow. The next generation is what women bring forth in the world....THE most important thing for any people.
The stories and legends have told of this alteady. We knew this to be true, some of us anyway. Problem is most people think or are told, they are just myths.
Matriarchal society vs patriarchal! I’m indigenous and come from a culture where pre colonial times women had way more autonomy and power compared to European women. This is also seen in how our languages does not have any genders, and they were way more accepting and open minded when it came to gender identity and sexuality understanding that gender was fluid. This was extremely shocking and appalling to the Spaniards that had a horrible view in regard to women who colonized us for 300 years, England for a year then USA took over for the remaining until Japan invaded during WW2.
DnA testing wasnt even a thing in the 60's and 70's. It was barely a thing in the 80's. How young are you that you know mitochondrial dna but not how new the testing technology actually is?
They just found a Roman treasure mixed with Celtic coins in the Netherlands...this is gonna change the whole story about the Roman invasions...I have always claimed they came via the Rhine...
Cerne abbot giant is in the same pose as Hercules with club and Egyptian pharaoh with mace, they are all in the shape of the constellation of Orion IMO.
@@free_gold4467 The giant most likely is Hercules. There's evidence that the outstretched arm on the right once had a cloth like shape hanging from it suggesting the lion skin that Hercules had. A number of Germnanic and Celtic tribes worshipped Hercules as their tribal god. Or rather they worshipped a god similar to Hercules and during the time of the Roman empire adopted the Roman depiction of this god.
The following is from an interlude in Britain Begins by Sir Barry Cunliffe. I must agree with it insofar as it isn’t plausible that a minority group entering Britain via sea would have succeeded to gain an absolute cultural supremacy over what history have taught us were pre-Celtic Britons. Prior to the Roman invasion no attempt had been made to take over the island of Britain. Available evidence suggests that Veltic culture and identity began in the Atlantic zone and then moved eastwards, not the other way around. Attempting to relate archaeology and language is a difficult and academically dangerous task, but it is so that we have to face if we are to attempt to write history. The hypothesis of the Atlantic origin of the Celtic languages is more in harmony with the available evidence than the myth of the eastern origin of the celt first mooted in the seventeenth century, which formed the basis of the traditional view. It is, I believe, a useful working hypothesis rather than a new myth... if the hypothesis offered here is correct, then the inhabitants of Britain and Ireland were speaking Celtic dialects by 2000 BC, and some communities, particularly in the Irish Sea zone, may have been speaking Celtic for a lot longer.
Sorry, forgot to preface im only commenting about the origin of Celtic identity in Britain here. Historians have always been aware that there was at very least a parity between the sexes in Britain in the Iron Age, possibly before. It’s interesting that Tacitus wrote that during the invasion of Mona it was women in black clothes whom faced down the Romans. Perhaps the Druids had more women among them than men, and maybe even held higher rank within their orders?
The European invaders of North America shared the same mentality. In west coast cultures clan alliances superseded tribal delineation. Clans are controlled by women. The Big Woman of a clan appoints all male and female tribal leaders. The male oriented negotiation marginalized this heredity . This changed power base from meritocracy to paternal lineage , good or bad.
Honestly I wish we didn’t as a community refer to them as “ Celtic “ , they were Britons , they didn’t perceive themselves as “ Celtic “ , in fact the whole Celtic terminology is largely a Victorian construct
One of the first to link the Celts with the peoples of Britain was the Scottish scholar George Buchanan writing in the mid 16th century. Paul-Yvez Pezron was a Breton writing in the early 18th century, he was followed closely by Edward Lhwyd from Wales in the same period. These three are largely responsible for linking the Brythonic and Goidelic traditions with those of the ancient Celts, 130 years before the Victorian era.
@ “ is largely a Victorian construct “ it didn’t say “ is a Victorian construct “. I studied this subject for my masters I’m well aware of how carefully I’m writing my sentences. Thank you for your input though because it kinda proves the point I am making , a point which is not just shared by myself.
There is considerable and widespread support for at the least significantly more equal gender in Iron Age society based just on the mythology of Ireland, England, and the Norse. Cuchulain for instance was trained by a female Scottish warrior. You mention Boddica and Cartimandua, and in Norse history, myth and archaeology there is extensive evidence that women wielded far more influence than commonly assumed in these post-Victorian times. One point of immense significance that is generally ignored in anthropology is the gender switch of the sun and moon when you cross the Alps. South of the Alps, discussion is of sun _gods_ and moon -goddesses_. However to the north, the sun is gendered female and the moon male. Tolkien even plays with this in the early part of the Fellowship of the Ring. In archaeology, one of the best known, 19th century Norse warrior burials was recently shown to be a female skeleton. In addition, the myth of the Amazons has proven to be closer to historical fact with discoveries of female burials equipped for war in Eastern Europe, and even a direct lineal descendant of one of these living in Asia. The changes are largely caused by the dominance of Classicists in archaeology and history, viewing all of Europe from a Mediterranean perspective that dismisses historical accounts by travelers as exaggeration.
Beware the wrathful fury of the Cymru Welsh mam. The Welsh mam has always ruled the roost and continues to do so to the present. The men were happier going to war with all and sundry, and centuries later, grafting for 12 hours underground rather than live under the iron cosh of a furious valley girl. Welsh mams are a force of nature and are still naturally revered and feared by all male family members. The matriarchal order of the ancient Britons is not new news. The Cymru 16:03 always acknowledged it, and it is recorded by some of themore enlightened historians. By the way, there are no Celts in Britain.
@@andrewwhelan7311 Well said Sir. I’ve got three Celtic Mam Queens in my Welsh family, and they scare the living shit out of me too I think we tended to be more secure in our masculinity than the patriarchal races that invaded us.😊🏴👍Cofion o Lundain.
Durotriges probably means people who lived in fortified places, which is hardly surprising in Dorset! BTW you are the only people who could ever get me to visit a Dorchester car park, thank you!
it is not all that "jaw dropping" (media hyperbole), that women had a more equitable position in pre-classical societies. even in Mediterranean societies, pre bronze-age collapse, there is ample evidence that women had higher status than we allow them, even in our own day and age, and certainly higher than the cloistered existence ancient greeks and romans permitted them. why that changed is a question i would like answered.
That’s a question I don’t have an answer for. I wish I did and I have studied history for years. It could be something that had to do with the Bronze Age collapse but honestly without more research into the genetic history of Greece I can’t say for certain. You raise a very good question however.
a focus shift in physical strength. romans didn't share food and healers in fights or compared numbers to have a fair fight. it is only a small step to declare men as stronger and tell them to control their women. you only need to control half the population.
Strabo stated that the differences between the Celts (Gauls) and Belgae in countenance, language, politics and way of life was a small one, unlike the difference between the Aquitanians and Celts.
Julius Caesar describes Gaul at the time of his conquests (58-51 BC) as divided into three parts, inhabited by the Aquitani in the southwest, the Gauls in the biggest central part, who in their own language were called Celtae, and the Belgae in the north. Each of these three parts, he says, differed in terms of customs, laws and language. He noted that the Belgae, were "the bravest, because they are furthest from the civilization and refinement of [our] Province, and merchants least frequently resort to them, and import those things which tend to effeminate the mind; and they are the nearest to the Germans, who dwell beyond the Rhine, with whom they are continually waging war
The Picts were supposed to be a Matrilineal society? Also the kingship from the time of Kenneth MacAlpin to MacBeth was passed on by Tanistry, this was MacBeth's claim to be King of Scots. Malcolm Canmore eliminated any rival branches and instituded promogeniture which he learnt while in Anglo Saxon England.
Tanistry was a form of patriarchy. Instead of the new ruler being the son of the previous one, an heir was selected from a group of men who shared a common male ancestor. The Pictish custom was apparently to also allow men descended via a female line but they still needed to be descended from the given male ancestor. This is likely why the McNeills of Barra claim ancestry from Niall of the Nine Hostages but the male bloodline is actually norse. There was obviously a daughter descended from this Nial lineage whose descendents decided their Irish ancestry was more important than their Norse ancestry.
Well we allready knew this. Just read the laws of Hywel Dda, codified from ancient customary laws, to see how women were considered in Brython society.
When it comes to Family Dynasties, it surely makes more sense to base them on the Mother not the Father? Fathers can always be debated while the Mother is Certain. Edit At least until now with DNA testing proving Paternity.
No, it's not weird, livelihood in iron age was already about the land and if the land belongs to your partner family well, yes, your livelihood depends on your partner's family, they are the ones who decides who gets what after the harvest.
Tbh I need to watch this again and read the paper... But.. can I suggest a different perspective? Forget power and status. Remember love. I'm thinking of a place I know well with very recent (even exanct) roots in polyandry, practised for population control where farming is difficult. The love of mother is obvious to see. As for polyandry, I suppose dna analyses tell about particular sites but we should remember sites only tell of themselves and not all contemporary sites.
As someone who has studied archaeology, this comes as no surprise. Right up to the late medieval ages, if not later, women hunted, knew how to use bow, arrow and sword, and were as efficient if not more efficient as the men. Perhaps it was when the men realised that without women, there would be no future generations , that they began to stop them hunting and fighting.
Are you sure "Celtic" is a good word for British history or prehistory? Those people never used the term, which was, I believe coined by the Greeks, where Keltoi described quite different people, mainly in Anatolia. BRITISH, PRITANNI or any number of other words are more appropriate. "Celtic" is both a modern usage, inaccurate and not neutral. When was it first coined in relation to Britain, the 18th century? I add this because I know you are sticklers for fact and dislike unsubstantiated assumptions and terminology which is neither useful nor accurate.
Ancient Germans didn't call themselves Germans or even Germanic but we do. Also the Irish get squiggly when you suggest that the ancient peoples referred to the British Isles as basically the same name and that Britons once made up a major chunk of the Irish population - Cruithin. You're correct that Brythonic or similar would be better but using the Celtic label is convenient when considering the cultural closeness of the Britons and Gauls. It also draws attention to the cultural ties between the British Isles, western France and western Iberia which were all part of the Atlantic Bronze Age and all later known Celtic speaking regions.
Languages are not entirely disconnected from genetics as, from birth, we're able to mimic the rhythm and cadence/the accent of our mother tongue (what we hear in the womb), and this persists in whichever language we first acquire, and into any languages we later acquire later.
Entertainment, content or enlightenment. Tricky when dealing with new cutting edge research. I trust your selection and wish the stream was a bit longer. 🌍🌎🌏
Insane--killing (sacrificing in horrific ways) thousands of her own people to assure victory over the Romans WOULD give any sane person a definite impression of Celtic women.
Lovely report, as you say DNA evidence has such strength! And of course the papers are almost unreadable... I've got a parallel interest in astrophysics, and my whole strategy there with reading original research is to read the Abstract and see if I understand anything; if I do, I'll go on to read the Introduction, ignoring anything I don't understand, and then on to the Discussion and Conclusion, basically gleaning scraps of intelligible English from the otherwise impenetrable erudition, to find out the author's own expression in more or less layman's terms, what all the massive noise (to my barely educated eye) in the middle of the paper is about. I figure all the noise is for the people who can actually understand it, to demonstrate (hopefully) that the author(s) really did their due diligence scientifically, and I'm happy to rely on the peer review process to tell me they did a good enough job, at least for this week, until someone comes up with some new twist of math and deep science to say, "Well, actually........." I'm fascinated by the evolution of thinking around dark matter and dark energy, which I'm reasonably certain are in fact the essentially cancerous growth out of some fundamental errors in the model, errors made back in the 1930's, really, that somehow caught on and have had a disastrous effect on cosmology, which is not at all a precision science, whatever they may claim.
🤣🤣🤣. As a man who has grown up in the north of England and married a "maccam" I can confirm it's deffo the women who are in charge! You didn't need research, just pop up here and you would soon find out. x
Empowerment of women, is a given about pre-history, as the men have to go about on hunts and defensive or offensive attacks. I've always said, that women needed to train, as well, to defend the camp, or village, from raiders and such, so why be surprised that a woman is buried with war impliments. Tribes had kings or war lords, and sometimes there were no sons to pass that on to, so, a woman takes the crown, as in your last Elizabeth. No one need be surprised as such things. Or, for that matter, that dna shows a relative line of women in certain areas, suggesting that men moved to that area from elsewhere. It's in nature, that you see the young males move away from the home camp, to start a new family elsewhere. Anyway, good segment, as always.
Interesting. Beware small sample size and overstating the case. One cemetary only takes you so far. Ancient writers would note the odd, and the unusual in their attempt to entertain readers. Putting women in charge of anything really important probably did produce a few chuckles among the Romans. I doubt it was fear. The Romans didn't scare easily. Tacitus gives the speech by Suetonius (long after the event) before the battle with Boudica and it seems to capture the Roman view on the matter.
The mtDNA haplogroup of great-great-grandmother of the group under study is "U" [a Paleolithic Hunter/gatherer group]. "H" [a Steppe Nomad group] is most common in Europe, but "U" is subdominant to "H" in Germany, Sweden, and especially Finland. So, this matrilineal line in Britain was a relict hunter/gatherer line.
Well...Bodicea and her daughters were most certainly an astonishing apparation to the Romans. On the subject of men leaving their tribes to join their future wives and mothers of their children: it is very nearly biblical for the instruction that 'men must leave their mothers and their fathers and cleave to their wives.'
@@megw7312 That recitation was absolutely brilliant, as was the amazing story behind it. Thank you for suggesting that. Let me know when another Jemima appears in Wales or elsewhere and I shall join her ranks!
we should be wary about drawing conclusions from dna analysis until we have a greater data set. one problem of such analysis is that it depends on the historical paradigm we view it with, eg Julian Richards Blood of the vikings" where trying to differentiate between anglo-saxons-jutes and danish vikings, when they all come from the same region?? like looking for a needle in a haystack made of needles???
16:10 I have a wild idea regarding this time period. I was wondering if farming & animal husbandry was happening…. Would they have done so with humans as well? It could answer to some of the trade evidence as well as the genetic. I would assume it would have been based on less superficial characteristics and more skill or mental capacity based, but it popped into my head when overlooking some of the genetic data
There was a paper from Reich lab about how the majority Y haplogroups in British Isles suddenly changed from I to R around 2500 BCE while mtDNA did not. It was attributed to potential massacre of men by incoming corded-ware males. This research could suggest that the women in British isles just decided to marry foreigners for some reason - may be they had great technology, looks or exotic accent 😅.
The Romans were not afraid of the Celts. They had conquered Gaul and they successfully invaded Britain. They did rather fear Germans, however. Were German women 'empowered'? Or did the opposite apply?
Thanks chaps, fascinating ~ I think, in a speculative way, that where Humanity went wrong was in the Bronze Age, when reliable deadly weaponry began to be produced. Because then social hierarchies began to be dominated by the warriors and the warlords : and social structures therefore became ultra Patriarchal and brutal, leading to the rise of brutal empires such as the Assyrian and the Roman ~ I have no evidence, as a lay person who is just fascinated by pre BC history, but studies such as the ones you were citing could speak to this idea ~ I think where social groups were dominated by women, such as at Catalhoyuk, they were more peaceful and egalitarian ~ which is what we are sorely in need of now ~ my hypothesis is that early, really early civilisations were likely dominated by women and that the big change to brutalized societies came with the Patriarchy, which itself was incipient from the bronze age. What do you guys think?
Interesting question, when did the patriarchy begin and women become property to be bought (esp in the upper classes) and doomed to a domestic, indoors existence, whilst breeding endlessly to provide daddy with a supply of heirs. In my view the Christian church played an outsize part in that transformation. I wonder if we are now returning to pre-Christian, pre-Roman times as men (in western cultures) now often leave the home and set up house and breed with a new female, leaving the former female to bring up his progeny while he avoids, as much as possible, paying any maintenance.
around beginning of 1000 women was taken the right to own property all over Europe. Ireland sees short living female monisteries popping up as women only could keep their property in a monestry setting.
Christian England had no problem with the Lady of the Mercians and queens could rule as regent upon death of the king until a new king was appointed or came of age. It was common amongst the peasantry for women to work in the industry that the husband worked in. So a blacksmith's wife would help keep the fires burning, keep buckets of water on hand and other duties as needed, a farming wife would work in the fields - typically men did heavier jobs like cutting straw and women raked it in piles for collection. As for breeding endlessly, the royal lineages frequently failed and infant mortality was high. It was normal for women to have children right up to the 1960s. Since then the birthrates in western countries have dropped so low that there is actual population decline in many places. It's only huge numbers of immigrants coming in that keeps the population from dropping. In the UK a third of all children are now of non-British origin, in London the percentage of native British children is 25%. That's what happens to a population that stops producing babies, people from other parts of the world where children are still important are brought in to replace them.
So "some " women were empowered you say! well I never! that has never happend before or since that time i'm sure! I mean, some women being superior to most men and some men men being subordinate to some women! what a crazy topsy turvey world the iron age was ! It couldnt possibly have happend in the time of my youth, the late Queeen ,the poor old drudge, what a hard time she had ! spending her long days day queening hard and then hoovering and washing and ironing for the patriarchy, it makes me weep and yearn for those wild celtical matriarcical days when unicorns and rainbows covered the forested and mystical land while shield maidens flocked to boudicas banners and unalived all the nasty roman men in a stabby stabby way, one can only dream...................
Boudicca had the Romans on the Ropes, & then the MEN had to have a Battle of Decision against some 4-8,000 soldiers on their way to London & away to Gaul for safety...😊😊😊😊😊😊😊
Thanks again - it makes perfect sense to a grandmother that the men moved to the female's family. Women understand the need for support with childbirth and child rearing and they know they can depend on their own family for that.
Great summary Team. I am working on something for this in the next couple of weeks, and I too had to re-read every paragraph in the paper, probably about 6 times!
You guys are saving my sanity by giving me something other than our American news cycle and politics to focus on. Thank you for giving me something more to do with my brain! I've been binge watching you two all week.
ditto - I'm a political junky and horrified by every headline - this place is my sanctuary from the hype and madness.
You don't avoid politics by bringing it up. No, you "subtly" wanted to express an opinion. The American people have spoken and voted democratically and have a president doing what the majourity wants. This may not be portrayed correctly or even unbiasedly by certain News outlets but it is blatantly the case by the cast votes. This should not be the place.
@@jasoncox7257The US president can go to the underworld though 🔥🔥🔥
@@jasoncox7257freedom of speech, cry about it
Another Fab report, please please do go down that rabbit hole and do a program on the movement of languages, along with DNA, it adds so much understanding to the archaeology! 🙏👍😊
You don't need scientific analysis to know how the Romans felt about women in general and women in positions of power in particular. No, I'm not speaking of Cleopatra tropes that were probably complete fabrications. It was indeed the Celtic women they commented on the most. Seeing women ordering men around had to have been a scene out of their deepest fears and nightmares 😂
When you feel so morally superior over people in the past, it's no wonder that you start imagining such things.
Just pretend there was no praise for women, no nuance in views, and paint a picture of 1 dimensional bigots whose nightmares center around equally. How modern.
Julius Caesar was so shocked about Cleopatra being the Pharaoh that he needed six months with her on her ship sailing the Nile to recover.
He intimidated in to placing a gilded statue of her in the temple of Venus.
Writers in later generations were still having nightmares about her power, compelling them to praise her intelligence, charm and mastery of languages.
Doubt it was fear. More like aghast and dumbfounded that you let any woman anywhere near decision making.
Yes, and the primacy of Paterfamilias.
@@CandideSchmyles A bit of both I imagine. As a citizen of a country that, in *recent* history, TWICE rejected obviously capable female leaders in favor of...well...point made I think 😂
Thank you for that! I think it's very interesting to discuss archaeological and genetic evidence from various sites, to assess the role of women in pre-Roman Britain , but surely the topic could be expanded somehow. Ireland, a Celtic country, was never invaded by the Romans, and so a lot could be learned from there, from a culture, that remained isolated for so longer. The ancient and sophisticated Brehon Law system in Ireland for example, remained "relatively" intact right up until the plantation of Ulster / Ireland, until it was outlawed and condemned as "primitive" and "barbaric". The Brehon Law's were very very detailed, and there was a lot of references to women, and their equality in law: when it came to divorce, the division of land, heredity etc etc. There is no comparison. Celtic society was (absolutely) not a primitive feudal system, or a system of primogeniture, or a church father St Augustine of Hippo cult, where sex, women, and temptation played a (negative) role - it was (way) far more sophisticated than that. We should try hard to visualise Celtic society and how they lived back then - and not compare the times then, with our current, male based, mindset, culture and zeitgeist - that would be a mistake - in my view.
Your video title is a little understated for the strength of what is happening in this study. Women were more than just empowered and deserve the honor, afforded other leaders from the past.
Thanks for the post. The Prehistory Guys always have something interesting to ponder.
😂
Immediately subscribed! Greetings from an unofficial enthusiast of prehistoric SW-Asia
Finally got back to watch the rest of this and really, really enjoyed it. I totally agree about the jaw-dropping about finding archaeological evidence; it's so much fun when something like that turns up! But the paragraph you find confusing I don't find confusing at all, I think it makes perfect sense... anyways! And about rabbit holes -- my personal intellectual landscape is littered with so many it's a wonder I haven't broken a leg in one.
You need no scientist to work this out. No Irishman would argue with their mam without their being consequences. Mams rule whether you think so or not and I'd say that's the way its been all through the generations.
The Irish mam is 'King' even in a republic.
Maybe a suggestion-bring the paper’s author on to speak directly … mention basic info bring them on … I know it’s hard for calendar… but it would give these amazing people the chance to let the un-media-ed version be heard! You do great work …
Grueling … work 😆😆
Watched about half of this and possibly I am just waffling in ignorance
Anyhow it struck me that at least in my family ( working class family, now in England but originating from Ireland and Wales.) Anyhow there is a strong trend that women kept the family ties. They would keep the connections , visit, communicate with relatives through female relatives. The males or husbands just kind of tagged along with this and without the famales lost contact with the wider family and became disconnected, maybe this is just a common thing but it is defimitely a strong pattern in my family
Family was all about the women.
Being Welsh …always told A son is a son ‘til he finds a wife & a daughter, is a daughter for the rest of your life. Your son does go and live with the wife’s family still….your husband is incorporated into your family, and your daughter tells her teenage daughter that she will not escape….ever, just bring back another to join the household……😂
Spot on.
Bouddica, no doubt, was a huge part of the Romans fear. You could do a story on her alone. Were there any Mediterranean examples of female warrior leaders?
Kleopatra
Kleopatra
@@Pirrata123Sort of. Aggressive female leader, but not a warrior in the same sense. An major influence along the same lines though for sure.
There are no records of Bouddica fighting in battle. She's just a much or as little a warrior as Cleopatra.
@@celsus7979
There are records of Boudicca leading her troops into battle and defeating the Roman's, including the bloody battle of Watling street.
Even her name Boudicca means Victory and was given to her after the battles.
My name means bright headed warrior in Celtic . It’s carried me very well through life.
One reason why I watch, you call out what has been sensationalized by media. And yall are fun and funny to learn from.
Thank you both for such great videos. Digging deeper is the best! Keep up the great videos on great subject matter. I watch them all!! Peace 🕊️ and hugs 🤗 to you both! Keep going. My family is Celtic through and through
My guess is that this occurred more frequently than otherwise believed. Or a mix thereof. There are many of these societies in what is now known as the Americas. It is easier to know the mother than the father.
I think your last sentence makes a very important observation.
Thanks!
Thanks so much Trish!!
The practice of husbands moving in with the wife's family does not suggest female dominance. In Japan prior to the Shogunate it was also the practice of husbands to movie in with the wife's family, but Japanese society was anything but female dominated. It just meant that it was the wife's father who gained from the match more than the husband's father.
That is very interesting- thanks.
Ancient Japonese society was matriarchal, with female shamans as rulers. Maybe the tradition of men moving in with the wife's family is from those ancient times.
Exactly. Matriarchy and matrilocality are two différent things
For what its worth. Latinos/Hispanics take the mothers name.
Good afternoon from the SF Bay Area. Thanks for another interesting podcast.
Could we have a link to the article or source you are reading for this video? thanks
durotriges dna women
I suspect if you did a search for that you'd find links.👍
Wonderfull and very fascinating news. Thank you.
makes sense , as a woman of mixed ancestry ( Metis from Canada ) most of the males here tended to move in with their wives families. The women also kept track of the bloodlines in many tribes , before the Europeans came over. In fact still to this day at communal feasts Elder women are fed first then pregnant females then Elder males then children ....and then the young men ( warriors or craftsmen ) younger women were the ones serving.the young women enforce the practice and make sure the young males don't get out of line. ( usually with words but not averse to physical admonishment if required) God Help the young man who strikes back at her or an Elder or a child. They will be trying to live that down for the rest of their life. While there were patriarchal Tribes , they still had women of high rank and protocols to follow. The next generation is what women bring forth in the world....THE most important thing for any people.
The stories and legends have told of this alteady. We knew this to be true, some of us anyway. Problem is most people think or are told, they are just myths.
Because it was. Now it's facts.
@M.M.83-U lol you don't get it.
New sub. Go women
England knew nothing of the celts, we were undefeated, hadrians wall, men faught and led
England the homeland of the Engle was in or near Jutland back then. We (culturally) weren't in Britain.
I’ve already subscribed. THE REST OF YOU NEED TO HURRY UP 😂lol
Matriarchal society vs patriarchal! I’m indigenous and come from a culture where pre colonial times women had way more autonomy and power compared to European women. This is also seen in how our languages does not have any genders, and they were way more accepting and open minded when it came to gender identity and sexuality understanding that gender was fluid. This was extremely shocking and appalling to the Spaniards that had a horrible view in regard to women who colonized us for 300 years, England for a year then USA took over for the remaining until Japan invaded during WW2.
DnA testing wasnt even a thing in the 60's and 70's. It was barely a thing in the 80's. How young are you that you know mitochondrial dna but not how new the testing technology actually is?
They just found a Roman treasure mixed with Celtic coins in the Netherlands...this is gonna change the whole story about the Roman invasions...I have always claimed they came via the Rhine...
Cerne abbot giant is in the same pose as Hercules with club and Egyptian pharaoh with mace, they are all in the shape of the constellation of Orion IMO.
That's an interesting thought.
@@free_gold4467 The giant most likely is Hercules. There's evidence that the outstretched arm on the right once had a cloth like shape hanging from it suggesting the lion skin that Hercules had. A number of Germnanic and Celtic tribes worshipped Hercules as their tribal god. Or rather they worshipped a god similar to Hercules and during the time of the Roman empire adopted the Roman depiction of this god.
@@damionkeeling3103 Yes, the parallels with Hercules are striking.
Is Robert Graves forgotten? =Does The White Goddess not ring a bell? J.E.Harrison's work?
In fact a woman with career military background recently stated women should not be in Congress their emotions do not work out well in politics. 🤔
Thank goodness males are objective. 😂
The following is from an interlude in Britain Begins by Sir Barry Cunliffe. I must agree with it insofar as it isn’t plausible that a minority group entering Britain via sea would have succeeded to gain an absolute cultural supremacy over what history have taught us were pre-Celtic Britons. Prior to the Roman invasion no attempt had been made to take over the island of Britain. Available evidence suggests that Veltic culture and identity began in the Atlantic zone and then moved eastwards, not the other way around.
Attempting to relate archaeology and language is a difficult and academically dangerous task, but it is so that we have to face if we are to attempt to write history. The hypothesis of the Atlantic origin of the Celtic languages is more in harmony with the available evidence than the myth of the eastern origin of the celt first mooted in the seventeenth century, which formed the basis of the traditional view. It is, I believe, a useful working hypothesis rather than a new myth... if the hypothesis offered here is correct, then the inhabitants of Britain and Ireland were speaking Celtic dialects by 2000 BC, and some communities, particularly in the Irish Sea zone, may have been speaking Celtic for a lot longer.
Sorry, forgot to preface im only commenting about the origin of Celtic identity in Britain here. Historians have always been aware that there was at very least a parity between the sexes in Britain in the Iron Age, possibly before. It’s interesting that Tacitus wrote that during the invasion of Mona it was women in black clothes whom faced down the Romans. Perhaps the Druids had more women among them than men, and maybe even held higher rank within their orders?
❤❤❤❤ oh I enjoyed this one a lot sirs, thank you!!! Hope you and yours are well!
The European invaders of North America shared the same mentality. In west coast cultures clan alliances superseded tribal delineation. Clans are controlled by women. The Big Woman of a clan appoints all male and female tribal leaders. The male oriented negotiation marginalized this heredity . This changed power base from meritocracy to paternal lineage , good or bad.
Honestly I wish we didn’t as a community refer to them as “ Celtic “ , they were Britons , they didn’t perceive themselves as “ Celtic “ , in fact the whole Celtic terminology is largely a Victorian construct
They spoke a (few) celtic language(s). The material culture was, mostly, in the La Thene tradition.
@ I’m afraid that’s an over simplification and pretty lazy definition.
One of the first to link the Celts with the peoples of Britain was the Scottish scholar George Buchanan writing in the mid 16th century. Paul-Yvez Pezron was a Breton writing in the early 18th century, he was followed closely by Edward Lhwyd from Wales in the same period. These three are largely responsible for linking the Brythonic and Goidelic traditions with those of the ancient Celts, 130 years before the Victorian era.
@ “ is largely a Victorian construct “ it didn’t say “ is a Victorian construct “. I studied this subject for my masters I’m well aware of how carefully I’m writing my sentences. Thank you for your input though because it kinda proves the point I am making , a point which is not just shared by myself.
There is considerable and widespread support for at the least significantly more equal gender in Iron Age society based just on the mythology of Ireland, England, and the Norse. Cuchulain for instance was trained by a female Scottish warrior. You mention Boddica and Cartimandua, and in Norse history, myth and archaeology there is extensive evidence that women wielded far more influence than commonly assumed in these post-Victorian times. One point of immense significance that is generally ignored in anthropology is the gender switch of the sun and moon when you cross the Alps. South of the Alps, discussion is of sun _gods_ and moon -goddesses_. However to the north, the sun is gendered female and the moon male. Tolkien even plays with this in the early part of the Fellowship of the Ring. In archaeology, one of the best known, 19th century Norse warrior burials was recently shown to be a female skeleton. In addition, the myth of the Amazons has proven to be closer to historical fact with discoveries of female burials equipped for war in Eastern Europe, and even a direct lineal descendant of one of these living in Asia. The changes are largely caused by the dominance of Classicists in archaeology and history, viewing all of Europe from a Mediterranean perspective that dismisses historical accounts by travelers as exaggeration.
Beware the wrathful fury of the Cymru Welsh mam. The Welsh mam has always ruled the roost and continues to do so to the present. The men were happier going to war with all and sundry, and centuries later, grafting for 12 hours underground rather than live under the iron cosh of a furious valley girl. Welsh mams are a force of nature and are still naturally revered and feared by all male family members. The matriarchal order of the ancient Britons is not new news. The Cymru 16:03 always acknowledged it, and it is recorded by some of themore enlightened historians. By the way, there are no Celts in Britain.
Modern role model: Jemima Nicholas? Ryan Davies recites ‘Napoleon vs Mam’ 😂
@@andrewwhelan7311 Well said Sir. I’ve got three Celtic Mam Queens in my Welsh family, and they scare the living shit out of me too I think we tended to be more secure in our masculinity than the patriarchal races that invaded us.😊🏴👍Cofion o Lundain.
Yes, rabbit hole of languages.
Durotriges probably means people who lived in fortified places, which is hardly surprising in Dorset! BTW you are the only people who could ever get me to visit a Dorchester car park, thank you!
it is not all that "jaw dropping" (media hyperbole), that women had a more equitable position in pre-classical societies.
even in Mediterranean societies, pre bronze-age collapse, there is ample evidence
that women had higher status than we allow them, even in our own day and age,
and certainly higher than the cloistered existence ancient greeks and romans permitted them.
why that changed is a question i would like answered.
That’s a question I don’t have an answer for. I wish I did and I have studied history for years. It could be something that had to do with the Bronze Age collapse but honestly without more research into the genetic history of Greece I can’t say for certain. You raise a very good question however.
a focus shift in physical strength. romans didn't share food and healers in fights or compared numbers to have a fair fight. it is only a small step to declare men as stronger and tell them to control their women. you only need to control half the population.
So when did it change and why? ie when did men start to dominate?
Strabo stated that the differences between the Celts (Gauls) and Belgae in countenance, language, politics and way of life was a small one, unlike the difference between the Aquitanians and Celts.
Julius Caesar describes Gaul at the time of his conquests (58-51 BC) as divided into three parts, inhabited by the Aquitani in the southwest, the Gauls in the biggest central part, who in their own language were called Celtae, and the Belgae in the north. Each of these three parts, he says, differed in terms of customs, laws and language. He noted that the Belgae, were "the bravest, because they are furthest from the civilization and refinement of [our] Province, and merchants least frequently resort to them, and import those things which tend to effeminate the mind; and they are the nearest to the Germans, who dwell beyond the Rhine, with whom they are continually waging war
The Picts were supposed to be a Matrilineal society? Also the kingship from the time of Kenneth MacAlpin to MacBeth was passed on by Tanistry, this was MacBeth's claim to be King of Scots. Malcolm Canmore eliminated any rival branches and instituded promogeniture which he learnt while in Anglo Saxon England.
Tanistry was a form of patriarchy. Instead of the new ruler being the son of the previous one, an heir was selected from a group of men who shared a common male ancestor. The Pictish custom was apparently to also allow men descended via a female line but they still needed to be descended from the given male ancestor. This is likely why the McNeills of Barra claim ancestry from Niall of the Nine Hostages but the male bloodline is actually norse. There was obviously a daughter descended from this Nial lineage whose descendents decided their Irish ancestry was more important than their Norse ancestry.
Well we allready knew this. Just read the laws of Hywel Dda, codified from ancient customary laws, to see how women were considered in Brython society.
No mention of warrior women, the Amazons?
When it comes to Family Dynasties, it surely makes more sense to base them on the Mother not the Father? Fathers can always be debated while the Mother is Certain. Edit At least until now with DNA testing proving Paternity.
No, powerful men want to know their children are theirs, particularly sons.
No, it's not weird, livelihood in iron age was already about the land and if the land belongs to your partner family well, yes, your livelihood depends on your partner's family, they are the ones who decides who gets what after the harvest.
Too bad the article did not specify if matrilocality was established in the other European Celts.
Tbh I need to watch this again and read the paper... But.. can I suggest a different perspective? Forget power and status. Remember love. I'm thinking of a place I know well with very recent (even exanct) roots in polyandry, practised for population control where farming is difficult. The love of mother is obvious to see. As for polyandry, I suppose dna analyses tell about particular sites but we should remember sites only tell of themselves and not all contemporary sites.
A tempting rabbit hole indeed👍
As someone who has studied archaeology, this comes as no surprise. Right up to the late medieval ages, if not later, women hunted, knew how to use bow, arrow and sword, and were as efficient if not more efficient as the men. Perhaps it was when the men realised that without women, there would be no future generations , that they began to stop them hunting and fighting.
When power became concentrated in the hands of a male dominated church they relegated women to appliances that made babies.
Wasn't there a neolithic river in Europe where over time there were successive patrilineal and matrilineal periods recorded along its banks?
MOTHER EARTH NATURE SPIRITUAL TEACHINGS WHITE HOLY SPIRIT GODESS 🙏🐈🐈⬛️🐕🌟😇✨️🥰😘
You need to learn Welsh, it would make life much easier for you. Durotriges was pretty clear to any Welsh speaker, especially academics.
Are you sure "Celtic" is a good word for British history or prehistory? Those people never used the term, which was, I believe coined by the Greeks, where Keltoi described quite different people, mainly in Anatolia. BRITISH, PRITANNI or any number of other words are more appropriate. "Celtic" is both a modern usage, inaccurate and not neutral. When was it first coined in relation to Britain, the 18th century? I add this because I know you are sticklers for fact and dislike unsubstantiated assumptions and terminology which is neither useful nor accurate.
They spoke a (few) celtic language(s). The material culture was, mostly, in the La Thene tradition.
Ancient Germans didn't call themselves Germans or even Germanic but we do. Also the Irish get squiggly when you suggest that the ancient peoples referred to the British Isles as basically the same name and that Britons once made up a major chunk of the Irish population - Cruithin.
You're correct that Brythonic or similar would be better but using the Celtic label is convenient when considering the cultural closeness of the Britons and Gauls. It also draws attention to the cultural ties between the British Isles, western France and western Iberia which were all part of the Atlantic Bronze Age and all later known Celtic speaking regions.
Languages are not entirely disconnected from genetics as, from birth, we're able to mimic the rhythm and cadence/the accent of our mother tongue (what we hear in the womb), and this persists in whichever language we first acquire, and into any languages we later acquire later.
I always wondered how they identified mitochondrial DNA, so small loops that don't integrate makes perfect sense.
Entertainment, content or enlightenment. Tricky when dealing with new cutting edge research. I trust your selection and wish the stream was a bit longer. 🌍🌎🌏
I have shared dna with the Winterbourne remains.
THE TOOK THE DEVINE FEMINE FROM THE BIBLE 😢
It’s time to take patriarchal binoculars off when looking into the past.
Yeah
The name Durotriges would probably have sounded better in the original Welsh.
Boudica - I rest my case.
Insane--killing (sacrificing in horrific ways) thousands of her own people to assure victory over the Romans WOULD give any sane person a definite impression of Celtic women.
Iberian, celtic and celtic-iberian women were the same
Lovely report, as you say DNA evidence has such strength! And of course the papers are almost unreadable... I've got a parallel interest in astrophysics, and my whole strategy there with reading original research is to read the Abstract and see if I understand anything; if I do, I'll go on to read the Introduction, ignoring anything I don't understand, and then on to the Discussion and Conclusion, basically gleaning scraps of intelligible English from the otherwise impenetrable erudition, to find out the author's own expression in more or less layman's terms, what all the massive noise (to my barely educated eye) in the middle of the paper is about. I figure all the noise is for the people who can actually understand it, to demonstrate (hopefully) that the author(s) really did their due diligence scientifically, and I'm happy to rely on the peer review process to tell me they did a good enough job, at least for this week, until someone comes up with some new twist of math and deep science to say, "Well, actually........." I'm fascinated by the evolution of thinking around dark matter and dark energy, which I'm reasonably certain are in fact the essentially cancerous growth out of some fundamental errors in the model, errors made back in the 1930's, really, that somehow caught on and have had a disastrous effect on cosmology, which is not at all a precision science, whatever they may claim.
I think that's a good strategy!
🤣🤣🤣. As a man who has grown up in the north of England and married a "maccam" I can confirm it's deffo the women who are in charge! You didn't need research, just pop up here and you would soon find out. x
Absolutely, I from Ireland and live in Liverpool, the matriarchs are in charge in both places for sure!
The Sern giant carved into the chalk had a belly button, until relatively recently (decades) his hog was half the length and not ridiculous.
duro-trigays.. duro - trig -es ... dur... dunno.. that's how I'd say it. Love this, all the matriachs.. makes sense.
I wonder if the “female empowerment” in the title has attracted rightwing bots to leave rude and irrelevant comments.
or can people have options other then you. is that ok...oh an I looked down the comments there none not one "right-wing" comment.
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Empowerment of women, is a given about pre-history, as the men have to go about on hunts and defensive or offensive attacks. I've always said, that women needed to train, as well, to defend the camp, or village, from raiders and such, so why be surprised that a woman is buried with war impliments. Tribes had kings or war lords, and sometimes there were no sons to pass that on to, so, a woman takes the crown, as in your last Elizabeth. No one need be surprised as such things. Or, for that matter, that dna shows a relative line of women in certain areas, suggesting that men moved to that area from elsewhere. It's in nature, that you see the young males move away from the home camp, to start a new family elsewhere. Anyway, good segment, as always.
could it be, that the women were buried with the nicest stuff, because they were loved and treasured by men?
Thank you--more food for thiught.
Interesting. Beware small sample size and overstating the case. One cemetary only takes you so far. Ancient writers would note the odd, and the unusual in their attempt to entertain readers. Putting women in charge of anything really important probably did produce a few chuckles among the Romans. I doubt it was fear. The Romans didn't scare easily. Tacitus gives the speech by Suetonius (long after the event) before the battle with Boudica and it seems to capture the Roman view on the matter.
Some in media love to stir up controversary
The mtDNA haplogroup of great-great-grandmother of the group under study is "U" [a Paleolithic Hunter/gatherer group].
"H" [a Steppe Nomad group] is most common in Europe, but "U" is subdominant to "H" in Germany, Sweden, and especially Finland.
So, this matrilineal line in Britain was a relict hunter/gatherer line.
Neanderthals o denisovans
Keltic the picts
Well...Bodicea and her daughters were most certainly an astonishing apparation to the Romans.
On the subject of men leaving their tribes to join their future wives and mothers of their children: it is very nearly biblical for the instruction that 'men must leave their mothers and their fathers and cleave to their wives.'
Jemima Nicholas 1797. Ryan Davies recites ‘Napoleon vs Mam’.
@@megw7312 That recitation was absolutely brilliant, as was the amazing story behind it. Thank you for suggesting that.
Let me know when another Jemima appears in Wales or elsewhere and I shall join her ranks!
That means men need to look after their own households and not be reliant on their parents.
we should be wary about drawing conclusions from dna analysis until we have a greater data set. one problem of such analysis is that it depends on the historical paradigm we view it with, eg Julian Richards Blood of the vikings" where trying to differentiate between anglo-saxons-jutes and danish vikings, when they all come from the same region?? like looking for a needle in a haystack made of needles???
:)
I was about to say, surely this was well known since Roman times? I mean, look at Boudicca for a start.
{:o:O:}
16:10 I have a wild idea regarding this time period. I was wondering if farming & animal husbandry was happening…. Would they have done so with humans as well? It could answer to some of the trade evidence as well as the genetic. I would assume it would have been based on less superficial characteristics and more skill or mental capacity based, but it popped into my head when overlooking some of the genetic data
There was a paper from Reich lab about how the majority Y haplogroups in British Isles suddenly changed from I to R around 2500 BCE while mtDNA did not. It was attributed to potential massacre of men by incoming corded-ware males. This research could suggest that the women in British isles just decided to marry foreigners for some reason - may be they had great technology, looks or exotic accent 😅.
women know that you weaken with inbreeding.
The Romans were not afraid of the Celts. They had conquered Gaul and they successfully invaded Britain.
They did rather fear Germans, however. Were German women 'empowered'? Or did the opposite apply?
Biggus Dickus!
Cerne Abbas. Proof that Jeremy Clarkson has a very old family tree.
Thanks chaps, fascinating ~ I think, in a speculative way, that where Humanity went wrong was in the Bronze Age, when reliable deadly weaponry began to be produced. Because then social hierarchies began to be dominated by the warriors and the warlords : and social structures therefore became ultra Patriarchal and brutal, leading to the rise of brutal empires such as the Assyrian and the Roman ~ I have no evidence, as a lay person who is just fascinated by pre BC history, but studies such as the ones you were citing could speak to this idea ~ I think where social groups were dominated by women, such as at Catalhoyuk, they were more peaceful and egalitarian ~ which is what we are sorely in need of now ~ my hypothesis is that early, really early civilisations were likely dominated by women and that the big change to brutalized societies came with the Patriarchy, which itself was incipient from the bronze age.
What do you guys think?
Interesting question, when did the patriarchy begin and women become property to be bought (esp in the upper classes) and doomed to a domestic, indoors existence, whilst breeding endlessly to provide daddy with a supply of heirs. In my view the Christian church played an outsize part in that transformation. I wonder if we are now returning to pre-Christian, pre-Roman times as men (in western cultures) now often leave the home and set up house and breed with a new female, leaving the former female to bring up his progeny while he avoids, as much as possible, paying any maintenance.
around beginning of 1000 women was taken the right to own property all over Europe. Ireland sees short living female monisteries popping up as women only could keep their property in a monestry setting.
Christian England had no problem with the Lady of the Mercians and queens could rule as regent upon death of the king until a new king was appointed or came of age. It was common amongst the peasantry for women to work in the industry that the husband worked in. So a blacksmith's wife would help keep the fires burning, keep buckets of water on hand and other duties as needed, a farming wife would work in the fields - typically men did heavier jobs like cutting straw and women raked it in piles for collection.
As for breeding endlessly, the royal lineages frequently failed and infant mortality was high. It was normal for women to have children right up to the 1960s. Since then the birthrates in western countries have dropped so low that there is actual population decline in many places. It's only huge numbers of immigrants coming in that keeps the population from dropping. In the UK a third of all children are now of non-British origin, in London the percentage of native British children is 25%. That's what happens to a population that stops producing babies, people from other parts of the world where children are still important are brought in to replace them.
Jokes
So "some " women were empowered you say! well I never! that has never happend before or since that time i'm sure! I mean, some women being superior to most men and some men men being subordinate to some women! what a crazy topsy turvey world the iron age was ! It couldnt possibly have happend in the time of my youth, the late Queeen ,the poor old drudge, what a hard time she had ! spending her long days day queening hard and then hoovering and washing and ironing for the patriarchy, it makes me weep and yearn for those wild celtical matriarcical days when unicorns and rainbows covered the forested and mystical land while shield maidens flocked to boudicas banners and unalived all the nasty roman men in a stabby stabby way, one can only dream...................
Even if you recognise that 'Celtic' is a cultural label, you still seem happy to stick the 'Celtic' label on to any Iron Age population in NW Europe.
🤘
Trees and mudpits
Boudicca had the Romans on the Ropes, & then the MEN had to have a Battle of Decision against some 4-8,000 soldiers on their way to London & away to Gaul for safety...😊😊😊😊😊😊😊
Empowered. Must you?