Tag: feminist

Four Strong Women of the Distant Past

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

During Wone’s Herstory Week, I would like to share some of my favorite very historical women with you, all role models for 21st century feminist seeking to reclaim their heritage.  Two of them you most certainly have heard of and the other two, maybe not.  In chronological order, they are Boudicca, Hypatia, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Joan of Arc, or in her native French, Jeanne d’Arc.

Boudicca was queen of the Iceni, a Celtric tribe of western Britain during Roman rule, born in 60 or 61 CE.  Her husband had signed a will leaving his kingdom half to his widow and half to Rome.  Rome wasn’t satisfied.   In fact, they expressed their dissatisfaction by raping Boudicca’s daughters and flogging the queen in public. Outraged, Boudicca raised an army, captured Londinium (London), and defeated the Roman army a second time before losing the third and final battle.  She took poison rather than being paraded through Rome and being thrown to the lions.

Hypatia was a scholar, an astronomer, mathematician and philosopher who taught and wrote and studied in “Alexandria, Egypt in the late 4th and early 5th centuries before the fall of Rome. It was extremely rare for a woman to be found in such an exalted scholarly role. Although she was a pagan, she had cordial relations with the Christians and taught both pagan and Christian students.  She was renowned as a teacher. In March 415, she was attacked and murdered by a band of angry Christians.

Our second queen was Eleanor of Aquitaine, born in 1124 CE. She was first married to the dauphin of France and, after annulment, to Henry II of England, Henry was 11 years younger than Eleanor. It was a stormy marriage. He spent much time abroad fighting and she took care of the kingdom and her eight children in his absence.  When he returned, she supported an unsuccessful attempt by her sons to overthrow their father. Outraged, Henry imprisoned Eleanor for 15 years until his death in 1189. She returned to her ancestral lands of Aquitaine and lived there until her death in 1206, the only one of the four to die a natural death.

Joan of Arc was born in 1412 CE in the little French town of Domremy.  A17-year-old peasant girl, she heard voices telling her to go to the aid of the uncrowned  French king Charles VII. She put on armor and set off  to meet the king, who believed her story and sent her to lead the French army against the Burgundians, French allies of the invading English. The King must be crowned in Orleans.  Defeating the Burgundians, she accompanied Charles to his coronation.  However, things took a turn for the worst, and in a subseuqnt battle she was captured by the Burgundians, who forced her to wear women’s clothing, tried her for  heresy, and burned her a the stake in the town of Rouen at the tender age of 19. Her Hershey conviction was later overturned. The patron saint of France, Joan was canonized by the Catholic church in 1920. The second Sunday in May (Mothers’ Day in the United States) is dedicated in France to honoring the nation’s patron saint.

As I watched NCAAW basketball playoffs this week, I hope the young women who played so well know that they come from log line of strong, brave, accomplished women who made a difference in the world.

Celebrate the Women

~ purplesage41 ~ 1 Comment

March is Women’s History month, a practice started in the United States in 1897 and joined by Australia (starting in 2000), Canada, the United Kingdom, Russia, Hungary and Ukraine. We do have to share the month with the spring equinox and Saint Patrick’s Day, but it’s still a good time to recall a little “herstory” as we celebrate the women who made a difference in significant ways.  Before we do that, however, I want to remind you of a practice that has help to hide or erase history, and that is the common practice of women changing their last name to their husband’s. Remember the old song about “I’ll be with you in apple Blossom time ,I’ll be with you to change your name to m…,” The name change was for a long time just the tip of the iceberg.  Married women were the property of their husbands, who also owned the kids, her assets, her earnings. As they sing in the musical “Suffs”, a women dies when she gets married. She has ceased to exist as a separate person.

 Most of that changed since the suffragists caught the car they were chasing for 72 years and climbed in the back seat in 1920, but the name change is still a widely common practice in more recent years. I changed my name in 1962.  Two of my daughters did the same in 1993 and 1994, and in 2022 so did one of my grandchildren. My oldest daughter who still lives in our hometown told me only partly in jest that her decision to change her name was not only to acquire a name that was easier to spell and pronounce than Ulbrich but also one that would keep her from always being identified with her somewhat outspoken, activist mother.

There is also the challenge of connecting children to both parents, which is easier if the parents share a last name. Hyphenation is an awkward solution, especially in subsequent generations. What last name would you give to the offspring of Joseph Hall- Berwyck and Annabelle Shultz-Foster?   Where do we go next?

But now there is a new reason to NOT change your name.  If you want to be able to vote, get a credit card in your own name, get a passport, or a variety of other things you just might want to do, it is a whole lot simpler for you to do like your brother or your son or your spouse and just say, “This is me. I was named Susan Smith on the day I was born and I’m keeping that name till I die.  No, dear, it doesn’t mean I don’t love you.  But how can I love someone else if I don’t love myself enough to affirm separateness in togetherness?

Having a clear record of name changes since birth is pretty important.  Especially if you married and divorced and changed your name again.   had a grandmother whose name was Gladys Lillian Barber Hewitt Schultz Rockefeller. She carried her whole marital history on her shoulders.

Norse culture had a solution of sorts to the dilemma of family identification and the right to one’s own name.  If Susan Ingridsdottir and John Larson married, their male children would have the last name Johson and their female children would bear the surname Susansdottir. Only siblings of the same gender would share a surname .It might work in a small culture, but probably not in one as large and diverse as ours. And it relies too much on first names which results in a smaller pool of surnames.

So there is a simple solution.  Here’s your name, kid.  My infant great grandchild). .Mabel Kay Didio, bears her father’s surname. At age three weeks, she has no opinion, but she might develop one.  Got a problem with it?  Complain to your parents or hire a lawyer and change it, just like a movie star. Or find a husband with a last name you like better.   But don’t expect the Board of Elections to trust you unless you go through all those papers around the house to provide proof of name when you want to exercise your duty and privilege of choosing the people who run your country.

In subsequent blogs, I am going to offer brief bios of a selection of female heroines I especially admire for defying convention and/or making a significant impact on the course of human evenes..  I invite you to share your own.  Next installment: will feature ancient and medieval women I admire—Hypatia, Boudicca, Joan of Arc, Eleanor of Aquitaine.