Category: Greco-Roman Culture

Is a Husband Supposed to be in Charge of His Wife?

~ Sarah J. O'Connor ~ 9 Comments

Last weekend I camped out with two of my granddaughters. To pass the time before lights out, we lounged on our sleeping bags and played some games. Everything was going fine until we ran into some difficulties with the second one.

The idea was to work together to make up a story, each person adding a line or two to the plot. The point was to see if we could keep a cohesive story going in spite of having three different authors. Continue reading “Is a Husband Supposed to be in Charge of His Wife?” →

Girls Gone Wild in Ancient Rome

~ Sarah J. O'Connor ~ 2 Comments

We tend to make assumptions about the lives and rights of ancient women, filing them away in our local Carnegie Library under no-respect, little-freedom, few-rights. We think these women had no choice but to play by the cultural rules that favored men and limited women, passing their lives with the right to make few, if any, personal choices. And we think these are the women the Apostle Paul was writing to when he encouraged them to be responsible and modest and respectful.

Well, some did play by those rules.

And some didn’t. Continue reading “Girls Gone Wild in Ancient Rome” →

Deformed Males and Lazy Parasites: Ancient Views of Women

mythologcial fountain statue
~ Sarah J. O'Connor ~ 7 Comments

People have been trying to identify the essential differences between men and women for millennia and, I might add, have come up with some insomnia-inducing conclusions. We have our modern debates, for sure, like whether men are from Mars and women from Venus (figuratively speaking, of course) or whether gender distinctions are nothing more than one big fat delusion. None of the current discussions fascinates me the way ancient ideas of gender do, however. Continue reading “Deformed Males and Lazy Parasites: Ancient Views of Women” →

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