Jasper County Democrat, Volume 3, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 October 1900 — WOMEN IN OLD EGYPT. [ARTICLE]

WOMEN IN OLD EGYPT.

llwx Shared with the Men AU Their Pastimes and Pleasures. j - In ancient Egypt monogamy was practiced, although It was not enjoined by law. There Is no evidence of tho existence of a marriage ceremony, but the marriage contract secured to the wife certain rights, one of which was that of complete control over her husband, who promised to yield her Implicit obedience! Nearness of relationship was no barrier to wedlock, the union of brother and sister being quite common. Women, both married and unmarried, participated with men In all the pleasures of social intercourse. They took part in tlie public festivals, shared Its banquets, drove out in tbelr chariots, and made pleasure excursions on the Nile. At banquets the guests were entertained chiefly with music and dancing. Singing was also an esteemed accomplishment, and the more solid part of tbelr education must have been attended to, as women often held important offices in the priesthood. They presided at births and burials. Ladies of rank occupied their spare moments in embroidery and in the cultivation of flowers, of which they were passionately fond, aud which were lavishly used on all festive occasions. Women of the humbler classes were employed in spinning and in the rural districts In tending cattle and sheqp, and in carrying water—the heavier employments being left to the men. This halcyon state of affairs lasted only during the days of Egypt’s greatness; during the period of her decline her daughters were fearfully downtrodden and degraded. The hardest manual labor was assigned to them, and they suffered cruel punishments for the crimes of their fathers, husbands or brothers, as the case might be. Sometimes they were publicly beaten with sticks, at others thrown Into dungeons or sent to work in the mines, where the miseries they endured were so great that, as the old historian . tells us, they longed for death as far preferable to life.—Tlie Westminster Review.