The developments of citizens were influenced by the achievements of the leaders in their society. In most cases leaders were men as the ancient world was a male dominant society but every now and then due to the circumstances forced upon them some women would rise to be leaders. This was very true in the case of Boudicca due to the circumstances and ill-treatment of her family she rallied her people to take on the might of the roman empire but Zenobia was in a unique position in a society that tolerated the influence of power and women even so she had to improve herself. These women forged a place in themselves in history by their action and achievements providing rule models for future generations.
Boudicca’s life was mostly shrouded in mystery, form the time she was born in AD 25 to a royal family in Celtic Britain. Whereas Zenobia lived a normal life; she was born in 240 AD and got married had children. These two women lived similar but yet completely different lives; another side of the girls was the way the fought and handled themselves in daily life.
These two women came to fame at very different times in very different societies. Boudicca celebrated the queen’s, wife
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The warriors of Boudicca’s warriors successfully defeated the Roman and absolutely destroyed the Romans, in their own capital. They even went on to destroy London and St Albans. The army of Romans left these particular towns largely unprotected. The cost of Boudicca’s victory in these first three battles, this is in terms of human lives, was high. The battle of warfare was brutal for majority of the time and all the towns were totally destroyed. Thousands of people left the cities; and raffle 70,000 and 80,000 citizens were killed, with out of those were 2000 Roman soldiers. With two of the soldiers having no interest in the taking or selling prisoners, Tacitus and Britons, instead they used slaughter by Gilbert, fire or
Barbara Strozzi was one of the most talented figures of the seventeenth century. Strozzi was born in Venice in 1619 to Isabella Garzoni, servant to Giulio Strozzi. In 1628, Giulio Strozzi acknowledged Barbara as his natural daughter by referring to her in his will as his “figliuola elettiva”, meaning elective daughter and designating her as his heiress. (Spiller, Melanie. 2012)
In Ancient Greece, women had little to no freedom in their lives. For instance, they had no role in politics, leaving that completely to men, were expected to stay indoors for the majority of their lives doing household work because they were under the control of a male relative, usually being their father or husband, and they were not allowed to study medicine. These standards were set by great writers such as Aristotle who wrote of women being inferior to men. He believed women were more emotional, which is why they would be useless in politics, and they were more deceptive and mischievous. Because only men were doctors, many women were dying during childbirth due to the fact that they felt uncomfortable about having a man handle their pregnancy.
The story of Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII, has been elusive to historians since her death in 1536 at the hands of her husband. This, in part, can be attributed to the destruction of almost everything she touched soon after her execution. On orders of the king, the castles that were once her home had all memory stripped of her. Portraits were destroyed, letters disappeared, their symbol of the H and A intertwined had the A ripped away. The remnants of her time on the throne are pieces of history that were overlooked in the workers haste to strip the castles in preparation for Jane Seymour to become queen. There are few hints left of what really happened during Anne’s life and how important she was during her reign which has created the widespread infatuation with Anne and who she really was. Why is Anne’s life of such interest to us then? The reasons are many and include the desire to know her role in the English reformation, being the first queen of England to ever be executed, and the impact it had on her daughter and the later Queen Elizabeth I.
Towards the end of the book after more of his comrades were killed Baumer saw more of the futility of war. Even though it was clear to all the soldiers and Baumer that they were losing the war, they were still required to fight. More recruits were dumped into battles only to die due to their inexperience. “A single flyer routed two companies of them for a joke, just as they got off the train- before they ever heard of such a thing as cover”(237). This quote shows how all the new recruits were sent to their deaths, its describes how two companies of recruits were killed right when they got off the train to the front. They didn’t even get to learn how to survive because it was not taught in the training. Even though Baumer had learned to survive the war and had lasted longer than anyone else, he was still killed right before the war ended.
...an occupation of Briton that the Romans were tested and nearly broke. She stood up and showed the Romans how all Celtic people felt about their Roman rulers. Although some of the actions displayed by Boudicca and her horde may have seemed brutal, even barbaric to some, this was reflection of the time she lived in. Boudicca’s revolt was an act of revenge and the lack of respect shown to the Celtic people, in particular Boudicca and her family, by the Romans was reflected the way the Celtic people reacted. If Boudicca had of succeeded in defeating Suetonius in this last battle, the Romans would have retreated and the history of Britain would have been extremely different. Boudicca was not only a national hero but hero to all women as she led a revolt that challenged the foreign Roman rule, in a time when women were viewed by most as weak and inferior to men.
History is divided on whether Boudica a scorned woman or did she have a justified reason for her retaliation. The book, Real Lives Boudica the story of the Fearless Icini Queen, by Gaby Halberstam, published by A&C Black in London, is a story told by Boudica herself. She is known for taking down over 70,000 Roman men and women due to the pain that they inflicted on her and her people. The book is written in the first person about the historical events that unfolded in Boudica’s life in a fictional story. This book does an amazing job at making the reader feel as if they were Boudica and an idea of what her personality would have been. Halberstam was able to give details through research and filling in the blanks. There are many famous men and women from our history that we would like to have a personal conversation with and this book is almost like sitting across from Boudica, listening to her tell her story.
It was not all work and no play for Queen Elizabeth I, she also had an love for the arts.
As a child, I was fascinated by Greek mythology and history, and I made it my business in elementary school to read as much as possible about the subject, including the outstanding stories and the pantheon of gods presented. I thought of them as fantastic, supernatural tales with fitful gods and brave heroes, and I never stopped to consider that the mythologies could be representative of the cultural views and habits of the Greeks, specifically regarding gender roles. One such representaton is Virgil's epic Aeneid, which contains depictions of women in positions of power, and also characterizes these women as irrational, emotional to the point of hysteria, and consequently, unfit rulers.
Boudica, having been treated and indeed flogged as a slave, decided to rebel. She joined forces with the Trinovantes, who had their own reasons to hate the Romans. Some of their land had been taken from them to form part of Camulodunum (now Colchester). One of buildings in it was the Temple Of Claudius, it was hated by the oppressed masses and became the first target of Boudica’s attack. The colonists appealed for help and troops were sent from Londinium, but these amounted to just 200 and were ill equipped for the task. The veterans and the troops took cover in the Temple but were soundly beaten after two days, the temple was destroyed and the town sacked. Petillius Cerialis, camped with Legio IX eight miles away at Longthorpe heard of the revolt and set off for the town, but he was ambushed and at length defeated. Boudica heartened by this success now marched on Londinium.
The Roman Empire had a social system that was based on autonomy, heredity, citizenship and property as well as distinguishing men and women by their social status. The women had the lowest position in society which were depended on the status of their husbands and fathers. They lacked independence and ...
In male dominated societies, Boudicca is often interpreted negatively, due to the masculine perspective of her going against gender norms being unnatural. This began with the Roman authors Dio Cassius and Tacitus, the only two early sources on Boudicca. Tacitus viewed Boudicca’s leadership as a symbol of her savage society, reflecting the negative opinion Romans had of women in their own country. Dio had similar views, as he says that the fact that Rome’s ruin was brought by a woman ‘caused them the greatest shame’. In going on to describe her terrifying stature and fierce demeanour, Roman writing is shown to reduce Boudicca to little more than a barbarian, in order to lessen their discomfort with Boudicca’s defiance of gender stereotypes. Because these are the sole accounts of Boudicca from classical times, this image has continued throughout history. During the rule of James I (1603-25), the first male monarch since Boudicca’s rise in popularity during the Renaissance, people focused on the negative portrayals perpetuated by the Romans. John Flet...
Henrik Ibsen once said, “A woman cannot be herself in the society of the present day, which is an exclusively masculine society, with laws framed by men and with a judicial system that judges feminine conduct from a masculine point of view.”(Notable Quotes) Ibsen’s statement exemplifies what life was like for women during ancient times. In many of the organized ancient civilizations, it was very common to find a primarily patriarchal civilization in government as well as in society. The causing factors can be attributed to different reasons, the main being the Neolithic Revolution and the new found dependence on manpower it caused. As a result of this, a woman found herself to be placed into an entirely different view in the eye of society. In comparison to the early Paleolithic matriarchal societies, the kinds of changes that came about for women due to the introduction of agriculture are shocking. Since the beginnings of the Neolithic era, the role and rights of women in many ancient civilizations began to become limited and discriminatory as a result of their gender.
Their limitations amongst society can also be noticed by the amount of education that they are entitled to. Plato’s Republic mentions how the role of women is determined by the status of their spouse. For instance, if a woman were to be the wife of a guard, then she would be expected to live at the level of that status, too. She is expected to be able to contribute to society a great deal more rather than stay at home and take care of her children and household.
Due to biased Roman sources, the way in which modern society views both Cleopatra and Boudicca is far removed from the entire truth. Cleopatra is portrayed today as a physically beautiful harlot and the fact that her story is impossibly intertwined with both Julius Caesar’s and Marc Antony’s provide a source for gossip. She is also misrepresented through various plays and films including William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra and Elizabeth Taylor’s portrayal of Cleopatra in Cleopatra (INCLUDE A PIC ON MY POWERPOINT!!! ALSO DESCRIBE THIS). Many of the false claims surrounding Cleopatra stem from Octavian’s propaganda during his civil war with Marc Antony. Octavian’s campaign of slander was successful as by the end of the civil war, the Roman’s viewed “Cleopatra as a woman whose beauty clouded men’s minds” (Roberts, R 1999:82).
Women in antiquity did not have an easy lot in life. They had few, if any, rights. Surviving early records of the civilizations of antiquity from ancient Greece, Egypt, China, and Rome suggest the diversity of women’s roles differed little from region to region. There were a few exceptions, mostly concerning women of nobility and the city-state of Sparta. Excluding the rare instances mentioned most antique women were generally limited on education, mobility, and almost all possibilities interfering with domestic or childbearing responsibilities. The limited social roles of women in antiquity suggest the perceived c...