A collection of essays, documents, letters and first-hand accounts of women's treatment trough history, from antiquity (Greece,Rome,Byzantium) trough Hebrew and Muslim world to European Middle Ages, Renaissance and late 19th century. The editors - Julia O'Faolain and Lauro Martines have succeeded in making a interesting (although naturally somewhat sad, angry and depressing) story with a point - no matter what society, it wasn't until recently that women were finally recognized as right partners to men, trough thousands of years they were treated as feeble minded cattle who depends on husband/father/brother and suffered without any possibility of lifting their voices.
O'Faolain and Martinez have skipped famous women in history because all those warrior queens and aristocrats are not really representatives of society - they are focused on anonymous women who have lived, worked and shared their destiny with others in sisterhood. Again and again we encounter depressing stories about women who brought their wealth to a marriage, just to have it completely taken by "master" (husband) who had all the rights to enjoy it, spend it, beat her and command her, without any possibility that she actually might have right to say something about the matter. It is not said so openly but obviously religion, church and tradition has a lot to do with it - time and time again women were reminded of Eve's sin and countless Biblical characters whenever situation called for it. Even simple thing as education and literacy took forever to actually be recognized as something positive - for centuries women were kept in the dark and assumed they are better off without any education (since they will spend their lives in the kitchen anyway) - with exception of occasional monastery Abbess who could read and write, thousands of women were living incredibly drab, dull lives, constantly in fear of being beaten up, hungry and left starving by husbands who have right over them. (Either father or husband.) Than the witch hunts and such - not very happy story but somewhere along the way renaissance got things little brightened up and by the time of reformation women's voices were finally heard in public. Unfortunately there was still a long way to go - the last few chapters deal with 18th and 19th century where wealthy women enjoyed nice treatments but working women suffered as much as before - if one was born poor and without a influential friends/family, there was a very thin line between legal and illegal options. Interestingly enough, as the collection deals with legal rights of women as well, here is that I read for the first time that women got right to vote (and therefore have been recognized as equal citizens) only in 1944 - imagine that! - what the book somehow side-steps is the big question of mental conditioning that produced generations and generations of women who actually accepted this treatment and expected everybody else to suffer their position in silence. That should be another book.
