The connection between the power of women and politics in the ancient world can be found in the Hellenistic period. An example is shown in a marriage arrangement by a military officer by the name of Antipater. Antipater (397 BC - 319 BC), was a general in the army of Alexander the Great.
Antipater had three daughters, Nicaea, Phila, and Eurydice, with whom he opened negotiations for their marriage to two of Alexander's generals, Perdiccas and Craterus. The third selected male was Ptolemy (367 BC - 283 BC), who was a Greco-Egyptian writer.
In the case of the two generals, Antipater planned to make them his sons-in-law, which was clearly a political move to maintain the "collegiate leadership" under Alexander the Great. As a result, Perdiccas, became engaged to General Nicaea, General Craterus agreed to marry Phila, and Ptolemy accepted the hand of Eurydice.
Antipater, however, had a formidable enemy in the person of the aged Olympias, who was the mother of Alexander the Great. Olympias lived in exile in her native land in Epirus where she devised a plan to play Perdiccas against Antipater: she offered Antipater the hand of her daughter Cleopatra, the sister of Alexander the Great,
Perdiccas was thus trapped between the promise he had given to Antipater, whose daughter was about to arrive at his headquarters, unknowingly at the same time as Cleopatra's arrival. The tempting visions conjured up by a marriage to Cleopatra, would have made him the posthumous son-in-law of Philip II, the posthumous brother-in-law of Alexander the Great, and the uncle of the young Alexander IV gave him pause.. However, it seems the attitude of Perdiccas was equivocal. He did not break off the engagement with Nicaea, and he did not refuse the hand of Cleopatra.
After much political discussion and thought, he married Cleopatra.
This is not the first time we see the female factor intervening in Hellenistic affairs.
For all the abilities and political importance of Some Hellenistic queens and the occasional appearance of wealthy women making loans to the state , receiving thanks and honours in public decrees, or contributing creatively to intellectual and artistic life, most women remained confined to the private domain.
Women were the transmitters of citizen status and rights without being able to exercise their privileges themselves.
Marriage was mainly used as an instrument for child creation and being owned property.
Also, consolidation of a dynasty may have been behind the adoption of marriage within the same family (e.g. brother-sister, father-daughter, etc.) up to the time of Cleopatra, of which she was the last member of the practice in a royal dynasty.
In the Old Testament, men were permitted to have concubines and wet nurses. One reason was the demand to produce children (www.whensexwasreligion.org). If a wife did not produce a child, it was assumed that the wife was sterile, and bareness was a just cause for her husband to procure a divorce. As an alternative he was allowed to take another wife without having to divorce the first.
Among the Greeks and Romans, monogamy was the prevailing system, although in both instances concubines were wide spread. Concubines were women usually captured during warfare, taken for the purpose of cohabitation, and they did not have the legal status as wives.
The Greeks held their women, including wives, in low esteem, but they patronized the hetairal. a sophisticated class of prostitutes, many of whom were well educated and conversant with political and historical matters.
By 312 BC, Christianity was granted legal recognition in the Roman Empire, and the new religion had marked effects on the institution of marriage. Concubines and prostitution were discouraged, and plural marriage was prohibited.
The Churches gradually assumed control over marriage during the Middle Ages, and by the 10th century the marriage ceremony was being held in the Churchyard where a member of the clergy was required to be present.
By the 13th century the wedding ceremony was held inside the Church.
At the Council of Trent (1545 AD - 63 AD), The church proclaimed the sacramental nature of marriage to be a divine creation. Henceforth, all marriages were to be under the auspices of the Church, and once solemnized, marriages were held to be indissoluble until death.
It was during the Middle Ages that the Church began granting annulments, the voiding of a marriage because of a premarital impediment. In some cases, a remote blood relationship was deemed sufficient ground for an annulment.
The Church could also grant divortium a mensa et thoro (" a divorce from bread and board"), which though it did not allow remarriage, it did permit the spouses to live apart.
By the 16th century the Church was under increasing attack and open revolt broke out. It was led by Martin Luther King, an Augustinian monk. The revolt soon spread from Germany to France and Scotland, where John Calvin and John Knox also protested against what they considered the misuse of ecclesiastical authority. Luther felt that marriage should be under civil rather than religious auspices, despite the fact that he believed marriage was spiritual in nature and that individual couples should have their marital unions solemnized in Church.
This led to the modern belief by the Christian Church that marriage is a perpetual and exclusive bond.
Among the Greeks and Romans, monogamy was the prevailing system, although in both instances concubines were wide spread. Concubines were women usually captured during warfare, taken for the purpose of cohabitation, and they did not have the legal status as wives.
The Greeks held their women, including wives, in low esteem, but they patronized the hetairal. a sophisticated class of prostitutes, many of whom were well educated and conversant with political and historical matters.
By 312 BC, Christianity was granted legal recognition in the Roman Empire, and the new religion had marked effects on the institution of marriage. Concubines and prostitution were discouraged, and plural marriage was prohibited.
The Churches gradually assumed control over marriage during the Middle Ages, and by the 10th century the marriage ceremony was being held in the Churchyard where a member of the clergy was required to be present.
By the 13th century the wedding ceremony was held inside the Church.
At the Council of Trent (1545 AD - 63 AD), The church proclaimed the sacramental nature of marriage to be a divine creation. Henceforth, all marriages were to be under the auspices of the Church, and once solemnized, marriages were held to be indissoluble until death.
It was during the Middle Ages that the Church began granting annulments, the voiding of a marriage because of a premarital impediment. In some cases, a remote blood relationship was deemed sufficient ground for an annulment.
The Church could also grant divortium a mensa et thoro (" a divorce from bread and board"), which though it did not allow remarriage, it did permit the spouses to live apart.
By the 16th century the Church was under increasing attack and open revolt broke out. It was led by Martin Luther King, an Augustinian monk. The revolt soon spread from Germany to France and Scotland, where John Calvin and John Knox also protested against what they considered the misuse of ecclesiastical authority. Luther felt that marriage should be under civil rather than religious auspices, despite the fact that he believed marriage was spiritual in nature and that individual couples should have their marital unions solemnized in Church.
This led to the modern belief by the Christian Church that marriage is a perpetual and exclusive bond.
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