Celts, Women, and History

Please note, that this post is not about what I am physically doing, rather where my mental and intellectual thoughts have been lately.

As part of my service here in Slovakia (service?? job?? How does one express this church job and teaching job meshed into one? Eh.. You know what I mean), I teach fifth years British and American History Review. This means we go over the entire history of Great Britain and USA just in case they pull a question out from the hat during their Maturita (the test to graduate). I am not going to lie I enjoy this class quite a bit. But then, tell me what is not amazing about teaching something you love; you can geek out about in class and your students just have to smile and deal with it!

Being a timeline orientated person, we are beginning with the country who held world power first: Great Britain. Therefore, we are beginning with the Beakers, Celts, and the Romanticized Britons. Prior to teaching this history, I did not know much about the Celts in Great Britain. I only knew that the Celts were up in Scotland and Ireland. How ignorant I was of this amazing culture!

Now these Celts came in three waves to Britain from Europe, pushing out the Beakers and the older civilizations previously living in Britain. The Celts had the technology to manipulate iron, farm Barley, and create complex religious activities. The rulers of the Celts were the top warriors and spiritual leaders - called Druids. Not much is known about Druidism, for the Romans were the ones to document the Celtic culture (we all know how that goes) and they were only interested in the fact that it included human sacrifice. We do know that all the Druids across Britain met once a year for a gathering, probably to gather information and check up on the other tribes. As the Celtics did not have a written language, the Druids memorized all of the tribe's laws, history, medicine, and other knowledge necessary for Celtic society. Imagine that: a society that is so advanced in their agricultural techniques that the great Rome was buying food from them but they did not have a written language. (Who screwed up there?? Why didn't the Celts invent a written language? Even better, why is a written language so vital for our classification of a civilization??)

While all that is quite fascinating about the culture of the Celts, the most absorbing aspect of the Celtic culture, for me, lies in their view of women. The Celtic society viewed women equivalent to men. Men and women were equal! In 700 BCE! Thus, if a King died the title did not pass directly onto his son, rather his Queen ruled until her death. The Romans were so impressed with one Celtic Queen's warrior nature that they wrote back to Rome about her and the greatness of her sex. (Granted she did burn down London and push the Romans out of London, which is quite a fleet for anyone.) Anyways, so we have this society that does not have a written language (meaning we cannot understand how they thought on a first hand basis), yet is so far advanced with their societal views that haven't been seen so openly until my parents/my generation. What is that, like, 3000 years?? 

Now further south and east, we have the Ruler Hammurabi in Mesopotamia. (Ok, so the Celts and Hammurabi were not actually at their peaks at the same time - Hammurabi was a hundred years before the Celts. But his ideas were still around at the height of Celtic rule) Hammurabi was the first ruler to document his laws by writing them down. Now Hammurabi, or his society, decided that women were inferior to men. Some of his 282 laws describe the ways in which husbands could divorce his wife (not the other way around) based on her cooking or such. Also, men could be adulterers, while women would be punished for such behavior. 

So up in the northern part of the world, on this island, we have equality. But further south, we have prejudice. We have two societies from the same common ancestor who have contrasting views on women. Where in the world did that view come from?? Literally. Who came up with that? Where did Hammurabi and his society get these views of women from? Furthermore, where did the Celts get their views of equality from?

This does not make sense to me at all. Now, I know that just because women were marginalized against in law, that does not mean they did not hold power in their own sphere. I mean, women do commonly have the most important task of raising children. They have huge influence over their children, young and old. And, furthermore, who could be married to someone without actually talking to them. So I think that women did share ideas and such with their husbands, and visa versa. Women were just not as commonly recognized by the writers of history as men were. 

But can you imagine what the world would be like today if the Celt's ideas of society dominated the world, specifically those of equality?? I wonder how many things would have been different if the Celts would have spread their society. Would we have marginalized against different races? Would we have marginalized against those with a different sexual orientation than ourselves? 

Just as a clarification, these rantings and random thoughts do not mean that I would classify myself as a feminist. I am so hesitant to put any -ist noun with my beliefs. Everyone has a tendency to define those terms differently: meaning they slapped their beliefs on your face, a place where I think my own beliefs should stand. Moreover, I fear that American society is pushing feminism too far. I worry that now we are marginalizing against those mothers who want to be housewives, just like we marginalized against men who wanted to be stay at home fathers. While that life is not for me, I can understand the joy and luxury of being the master of your own time. 

This just makes me realize how open-ended history really is. All it takes if for you to stop reading it backwards and let it unfold with all its complexities and contradictions and multi-lane roads. Then, and only then, does history show something about yourself.