Schlain now turns to ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and the evolution of their writing along with the changing of the depiction of the creator of the Earth from two goddesses working together to create all of humanity to a single god who created everything on his own. With the origination of Egyptian writing around 3100 BCE written down were the creation story of the Vulture Goddess, Nekhbet of Upper Egypt and the Cobra Goddess, Wadjet of Lower Egypt. Egyptian writing was originally made up mostly of glyphs but they also had a series of 25 symbols that represented their language's consonants—a type of alphabet. By the time of the Middle Kingdom, around 2400 BCE, as literacy became more established, writing became more masculine based and so did masculine-based creation stories. (Schlain 55) Creation goes from two goddesses intertwining to one god Atum, “masturbating into existence the Ennead, a family of eight gods and goddesses.” (Schlain 55) So, the creation of the all important deities in Egypt went from the work of two goddesses, to a single-handed job by Atum.
The evolution of writing in Egypt from the Early Dynasty to the New Dynasty also showed a change from the use of glyphs, to the use of the hieratic script, their consonant based alphabet. So, with the change from symbols to create their stories to a form of letters and words, came the change from the feminine creation to masculine creation. As the power of Egypt, and therefore the ego of the rulers grew, local gods were no longer sufficient enough to please the rulers of Egypt. They began to raise a singular god above the rest, starting with Amon, then Maat, Aton and back to Amon. (Schlain, 59)
Egypt, in comparison to Mesopotamia at the time, held women in a much higher regard. Women were allowed to partake in commerce, be in public alone, drink and even were the ones who proposed marriage to men. However, as writing in Egypt evolved, and therefore the importance of goddesses evolved, the role of women was progressively lessened as they began to lose power.
Schlain seems to easily make his point in terms of Egypt in that as its writing evolves, along with literacy and male dominance, so did the prominence of gods over goddesses. He puts forth the argument alongside the evidence of the ruling men of the time trying to put forth the idea of an all-important god.
Comparison of Egyptian hieroglyphs and hieratic script
It seems interesting to me that women had high regard in Egypt when glyphs were prominently used, but as they began to switch to symbols for sounds, as the Mesopotamians did, that the role of women in society diminished. So, do you think the change from hieroglyphs to symbols representing words was a big part of the diminishing role of women in Egypt? Why or why not?
According to Shlain, the changing from hieroglyphs to symbols representing words is the primary reasoning for the diminishing role women played in Egyptian society. Reading further into Shlain he also mentions that the creation of a male God helped help to establish make dominance, and further into the book he claims that the story in Genesis of Adam and Eve creates a villain out of the serpent which was once seen as a power symbol for women. I feel that several aspects of society caused Egyptian woman's role in society to diminish. The switching of hieroglyphs to symbol like words could be part of this equation, but can not be entirely responsible. I feel that this switch in Egyptian society gave men a tool to use to put themselves ahead of women and that it was definitely a big contributor to the fall of woman's equality in Egypt.
ReplyDeleteYes I agree that the change from hieroglyphs to symbols played a big role in the diminishing of the women role. This change gave men the power to be the creator. Also the creation of the male God I feel just sent things over the top because now they have a God to compete with the Goddess, and with that creation it slowly began to over power the Goddess.
ReplyDeletethe changing of glyphs to symbols representing words for sounds only represents the evolution and creation of language. the fact that things were becoming more masculine was most likely just coincidental. It is more likely that things were becoming more masculine simply because men were doing the writing and they wanted to see themselves in better light instead of always worshiping goddesses.
ReplyDeleteI think the change from hieroglyphs to symbols change a great deal of things. One of which is more and more people could understand writing language. Furthermore, because of the diminish of hieroglyphs and rise of symbols more abstract ideas could be written. Therefore, Schlain states that writing of a male God became more popular and “the female deity lost ground to the male deity… women lost their hold and fell from grace—economically, politically, and spiritually.” So I believe writing may have played a role along with many other factors in the diminishing role of women in Egypt.
ReplyDeleteI will have to agree mostly with Marissa's statement. The change from hieroglyphs to writing symbols did change a lot of things for the culture. For instance, the fact that they switched writing forms changed the way some looked at religion, including Gods and Goddesses. Because of this, many cultures took to following and praising male Gods, which in turn diminished the value of females. It took a great toll on the live of many different women. The change did have its positives, such as an easier language, better communication between cultures as well as more in-depth relationships. However, nothing has a positive without a negative side, and I think the negative would be the female side of it.
ReplyDeleteI am not totally on board with Schlain yet. He makes convincing arguments about words contributing to the diminishing role of women in Egypt. I feel that writing itself is not the factor that lead to misogyny and patriarchy. Like Marissa, there are many other factors. Like any piece of literature the pen, paper, and the words that are written have no value until they are compiled by the writing to "say something". When the Hyksos invaded, they not only did they bring a different style of writing but different ideas how women should be treated as well. I do not understand how Schlain's thesis is mainly putting focus on writing. The Hyksos influenced the Egyptian writing to hieroglyphs to hieratic script but why doesn't Schlain mention if they Hyksos outwardly shared their values towards women too? Like Emily, I feel as if the masculine traits were coincidental. In my logic, I feel as if the Hyksos, from Mesopotamia, who had already established a patriarchy in there culture, told the men they were better than women and the men liked it. They didn't bring writing, they brought the idea of misogyny.
ReplyDeleteUsing symbols helped to get the message of male gods out to the masses. The idea became more popluar than goddesses and this is the reason the feminine values were overshadowed by male ones. Or at least this is the opinion of Shlain. Reading previous comments about it being a coincidence that a preference for masculine values came about during the same time as writing makes me question Shlain's beliefs, but I also feel as if there is in fact some correlation between the emergence of symbols and the suppression of the goddess.
ReplyDeleteI think the switch to symbols was a huge factor in the way society was structured. Writing was considered masculine when creation stories were being written. Males were writing the stories so the creator was often was male. Male gods were booming in Egypt when the country was gaining power. All these things considered equal a male dominated society, symbols may have been the spark.
ReplyDeleteBefore I respond to Jesse question, I want to thank him for his good summary. I especially like the comparison of hieroglyphs to hieratic script--very interesting. These images prompt me to ask a question: when comparing (and contrasting) these two writing forms, what do you see? What are the similarities? The differences? And what do they reflect or suggest?
ReplyDeleteNow to Jesse's question. Like my answer to a previous poster's question, I think the changes in writing reflect cultural, ideological, and social changes of the time. I think language is a social construction (I think most everything is). For me, these changes from more concrete, imagistic writing to more abstract, verbal writing act as a both a kind of mirror and vehicle for perpetuating particular ideals. So, in a way, yes; the change from heiroglyphs to symbols (see Schlain 58-60) was part of the diminishing value and voice of women.
Test post.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that agree changes in hieroglyphs to symbols caused the women to lose somewhat of there part in society, which was big. Which kind of boosted the power of men figuratively and literally. With saying that came the invention of a GOD that was males which started to dominate over the Goddesses, and that was a big impact to it with the GOD becoming more popular, with more praise.
ReplyDeleteI think it's crazy that there would be a correlation but his argument is convincing. I think there were a lot of other factors going on in Egypt that resulted in this shift, but did those other issues stem from the shift from hieroglyphics? I feel like drawing pictures or "drawing" letters is kind of the same though. Pictures are significant to us because they have meaning we look at a stereotypical apple or house and think apple or house. We look at the letter A and think... apple.. and a bunch of other words that A stands for. When we see the word apple we think... apple. I just feel like the argument that he makes about the alphabet being a totally intangible thing is wrong. Symbols are symbols weather they're a guy with three spears or the word hunter its still just a symbol that has meaning to the "reader." If this is true then what's happening in the brain is the same we are recognizing a symbol and giving it meaning in order to convey a thought. If this is true then this has nothing to do with masculine or feminine anything.
ReplyDeleteI'm also cautious about gendering brain functions. I think where Schlain's argument about the correlation between abstract writing helping to bring about changes in the way people (women and men) think, and those changes leading to patriarchy, becomes plausible for me is here: letters and images are both representations of something, but in the case of letters, what they represent is purely arbitrary and abstract. Drawing pictures and drawing letters is not the same.
ReplyDeleteThe letter A stands for nothing but A; and for A to really mean something, it has to be combined with other letters or images. Those letters have to be arranged in particular combinations to form words, sentences, paragraphs, etc. We can't just throw any combination of letters out there and have it mean something; they have to be arranged and read in a linear way according to grammatical and syntactic rules that are also purely arbitrary and abstract. And A might mean apple to English speakers, but the actual concept of apple isn’t even called apple in French and it starts with a P (what A stands for in one language is not what A stands for in other languages).
Images, on the other hand, can and do stand for something concrete (if we look at the whole image and not just a part); interpreting their meaning is less abstract and convoluted. Images are viewed in an all at once gestaldt; their meaning is all at once.
Schlain's point is that the brain works differently to read letters than it does to read images, and this is what he says causes the fall of the Goddess.
I believe the decline of Egyptian women came about as a result of the increase in Egyptian military actions. Upon the expulsion of the Hyksos, Egypt began a new military policy of violent expansion. This expansion would have necessitated more males in the society in order to serve in the military. The bigger military was needed to conquer and control surrounding territories. Such a need for males would have propagated the idea that male babies were more desirable, ultimately leading to the society in general believing men are better.
ReplyDelete