(Cover image – © Unknown Artist – The Guardian Nigeria)
This year’s theme for the International Women’s Day is “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality”, which goes hand in hand with the theme for the upcoming 67th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW-67): “Innovation and technological change, and education in the digital age for achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls”{1}. Each year, a new issue to highlight is chosen to try to make our society an equal one.
This so called celebration started during the labor and voting rights movements and it evolved into a full on event that stands for far more than that{1}. The date was chosen by a hundred women from 17 different countries and it has stayed that way ever since{1}.
Why is it important?
In a world in which the successes of men are exalted and repeated in history classes ad nauseam; a world that minimizes the role of women, that hides them and often silences them and prevents them from reaching the sky; a world that has forced hundreds or perhaps thousands of women to disguise themselves in order to receive a decent education, to use another name in order to express themselves artistically or to marry (most times by force) a man in order to be respected and survive...
…The question should be why not to do so.
Celebrating and trumpeting women's achievements and denouncing the crimes committed against our so-called weaker sex is not only a natural consequence, but a necessary one that is needed to teach younger generations the path that has led them to their current status.
But this revolution could have only been made possible thanks to brave women that paved the way.
Let’s explore a bit of the lives of some women who helped shape our world as we know it now.
. . .
Theodora, Empress of Byzantium (c497-548)
Theodora, born c. AD 500, and her sisters, Comito and Anastasia, had a rough start in life, having to work in a brothel and perform on stage{2}. This took place in the mythical Constantinople during the first years of the Byzantine empire.
Around 18 years old, Theodora took the chance and went to North Africa as the lover of an official named Hecebolus, but she’d eventually end up in Alexandria, where it’s said she converted to Miaphysite Christianity and stumbled upon an informer of future Emperor Justinian. Three weeks after meeting Justinian, they were living together and on 4th of April 527 they both ascended to the throne, 4 years after their marriage{3}.
Theodora wasn’t just a wife, she took part in her husband’s decisions and actively participated in political life. Emperor Justinian once called her his "partner in my deliberations", in Novel 8.1 (AD 535), an anti-corruption legislation{2}.
But she did something even more relevant. Never forgetting where she had come from, she fought for women’s protection, closing down brothels, promoting laws that forbade forced prostitution and creating protection homes. They also upgraded women rights in case of divorce and landowning, as well as endorsing the capital punishment for those who raped. Death punishment for cheating women was also abolished{5}.
Even after Theodora died, women maintained far more rights than those living in Europe and the Middle East.
Bettisia Gozzadini (1237)
Today, in most countries, a girl can choose what career she wants to study and what she wants to do with her life. It does not even cross her mind that just because of her sex or gender the doors to higher education will be closed to her. In fact, there are more women than men in university classrooms and it is common to find women professors teaching{5}.
But it wasn’t always like that.
The University of Bologna was founded around 1088 and is considered the oldest university in Europe{6}. It was renowned above all for its law degree, which is precisely what Bettisia Gozzadini studied in the 13th century{7}. To do so, she had to disguise herself as a man{8}, but she achieved her goal by graduating in 1237 and joining the teaching corps two years later{9}. To this day she is believed to have been the first female university professor in history, paving the way for future generations. She was one of the many who fought and took the first steps so that we don’t have to wonder whether or not we will be able to access an equal education.
Katherine, Lady Berkeley (1300’s)
Katherine Berkeley was born to Emma and Sir John de Clevedon of Somerset and Worcestershire within the 1300’s, but her exact birth date remains unknown{10}. We do know that she married and became a widow twice in her life, outliving her last husband, Thomas Berkeley, 3rd Baron Berkeley, by more than 20 years{11}.
After this, in 1384, she obtained a royal license and built a school that still lives on today and that became the first one founded by a woman as well as the first one offering free education for all. The first teacher was a priest that gave mass as well as lessons and it is said that Katherine Lady Berkeley created and/or introduced the idea of a chantry school{10} (which are schools attached to endowed chantries){12}.
It’s believed that Katharine Lady Berkeley's School is the oldest in England{10}.
Isabella of Castile (1451 - 1504)
Isabella I of Castile was a Spanish queen that lived mostly in the 1400s. She was known as Isabella the Catholic thanks to Pope Alexander VI giving that title to both her and her husband, Ferdinand of Aragon{13}. Their union would glorify and unify Spain{14}.
Even if nowadays we remember her for the Inquisition, she did a lot more than that.
She was mother to Joanna the Mad,{15} Maria of Aragon{16}Queen of Portugal, and Catherine of Aragon, English consort queen that married both Arthur Tudor and Henry VIII{17}. Her influence and her power were both great and feared.
But her biggest history feature was when she granted Columbus help and support to patronage his adventurous voyage that resulted in the occupation of America{13}. This provided Isabella and her country a whole new world of resources but also proved to be a challenge. Even though the Papacy annexed to the Spanish crown the discovered lands, queen Isabella was of the thinking of giving freedom to the so called “indians”, freeing some of the slaves Columbus had brought back from America{13}.
Agnes Waterhouse (c.1503 – 1566)
Agnes has the dubious honour of being the first woman executed for witchcraft in England{18}. Agnes, who was known as Mother Waterhouse, was accused along with Elizabeth Francis and Joan Waterhouse (her daughter), and they were said to have caused the deaths of some cows and a few neighbors{18} through magic.
All the evidence against Agnes came from the hands of a fellow namesake, Agnes Brown, a 12 year-old. The child said that a demonic dog appeared before her and when asked whose it was it named Agnes Waterhouse{19}.
She was executed only two days after the trial, having repented and asking for God’s forgiveness{19}.
Katharine Parr (1512-1548)
We all know the old tale. Divorced. Beheaded. Died. Divorced. Beheaded. Survived. The survivor of the English womanizer Tudor king Henry VIII is Katherine Parr.
She was born to Sir Thomas Parr, lord of the manor of Kendal in Westmorland, and Maud Green, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Thomas Green, lord of Greens Norton, Northamptonshire, and Joan Fogge{20}.
Katherine, also called Catherine, was the first Queen of England that also got the title of Queen of Ireland{20}. She got on well with all of Henry’s children and was an overall positive influence on him{21}. A believed protestant, her tactful demeanor and intelligence saved her from the conservatives{21}.
Henry trusted her so much that he named her regent when he left for France for a last campaign, in 1544{22}. Maybe that’s what emboldened her to publish a book under her own name one year later. It was titled Prayers or Meditations, and it followed a previous work of hers named Psalms or Prayers. Katherine’s books not only helped the country develop and define the new religion, but made her the first woman to publish a book under her very own name{22}.
Mary I of England (1516-1558)
Mary I of England was the only surviving child of Catherine of Aragon (daughter of the aforementioned Isabella of Castille) and king Henry VIII, as well as Katherine Parr’s stepdaughter. Although she didn’t have an easy life due to her father’s dismissal of her mother and the long list of stepmothers that followed, she finally occupied the throne in 1553, aged 37, after her little brother Edward VI passed away{23}. Even though she came to be known as Bloody Mary during her reign in her attempts to bring England back to Rome and Catholicism,{23} we are now remembering her as the first Queen Regnant, that means she reigned by her own right and not via marriage to a king{24}. She restored the old religion and erased the title of Supreme Head of the Church that her father had previously established for himself in the peak of his break from Rome{24}.
Catherine the Great (born Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, 1729-1796)
Catherine the Great became the reigning empress of Russia after overthrowing her husband, Peter III{25}. She wore the crown for over 34 years, making her the longest female ruler in the country{26}.
Within her list of aspirations was that of setting up a court that shadowed Versailles and nurture a national culture that was truly Russian, and not an imitation of the French. She also secularized the property of the clergy, who owned one-third of the land, in an attempt to replenish the state treasury{26}.
Catherine’s known to have been an enlightened empress that read and wrote. Her works consisted in books, pamphlets and other educational documents that aimed at improving the Russian educational system{27}. But she wasn’t only a letters and literature kind of woman, she appreciated arts as well, creating a stunning art collection in St. Petersburg’s Winter Palace, and giving composing music a try{27}.
This little and absolutely incomplete selection of powerful women’s just the top of the iceberg. When the 8th of March approaches next time, try and look up information about some badass women that made life easier (not easy yet) for you today. Try and remember Bettisia when you feel lazy and like not going to class. Think about Catherine the Great when you doubt if you’d be able to make it without a man holding your hand. Reminisce Isabella’s story when fearing a new horizon. You’re here today and you matter. Let’s keep paving the road for all the ones that’ll come after us. Let’s keep on changing the world even if they try to silence us. We remember. We rule.
- Have a ‘Tudor-fic’ week!
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