Editing Women's rights (section)

==== Greece ====
{{Main|Women in Greece}}

{{multiple image|align=right|total_width=300
| image1=Clothes washing Louvre G547.jpg|width1=2050|height1=1990|alt1=Photograph of a red-figure vase showing two women washing clothes
| image2=Street vendor Pan Painter MAN.jpg|width2=1750|height2=2625|alt2=Photograph of a red-figure vase showing a woman selling food
| footer=Respectable Athenian women were expected to involve themselves in domestic tasks such as washing clothes (left); in reality, many worked (right).
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Although most women lacked political and equal rights in the [[city states]] of ancient Greece, they enjoyed a certain freedom of movement until the [[Archaic Greece|Archaic age]].<ref name=":10">{{Cite book|title = Women of Ancient Greece|url = https://archive.org/details/worldhistoryseri00donn_0|url-access = registration|last = Nardo|first = Don|publisher = Lucent Books|year = 2000|location = San Diego|page = [https://archive.org/details/worldhistoryseri00donn_0/page/28 28]|isbn = 9781560066460}}</ref> Records also exist of women in ancient [[Delphi]], [[Gortyn]], [[Thessaly]], [[Megara]], and [[Sparta]] owning land, the most prestigious form of [[private property]] at the time.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Gerhard| first = Ute| title = Debating women's equality: toward a feminist theory of law from a European perspective| publisher = Rutgers University Press| year = 2001| page = 33| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=XMohyLfGDDsC&q=women+right+to+property| isbn = 978-0-8135-2905-9}}</ref> However, after the Archaic age, legislators began to enact laws enforcing gender segregation, resulting in decreased rights for women.<ref name=":10" />

[[Women in Classical Athens]] had no legal personhood and were assumed to be part of the ''[[oikos]]'' headed by the male ''[[Kurios|kyrios]]''. Until marriage, women were under the guardianship{{Cn|date=October 2024}} of their father or another male relative. Once married, the husband became a woman's ''kyrios''. As women were barred from conducting legal proceedings, the ''kyrios'' would do so on their behalf.<ref name="google114">{{Cite book| last = Blundell| first =Sue| title = Women in ancient Greece, Volume 1995, Part 2| publisher = Harvard University Press| year = 1995| page = 114| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Xfx1VaSIOgQC&q=women+ancient+greece| isbn = 978-0-674-95473-1}}</ref> Athenian women could only acquire rights over [[property]] through gifts, dowry, and inheritance, though her ''kyrios'' had the right to dispose of a woman's property.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Blundell| first =Sue| title = Women in ancient Greece, Volume 1995, Part 2| publisher = Harvard University Press| year = 1995| page = 115| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Xfx1VaSIOgQC&q=women+ancient+greece| isbn = 978-0-674-95473-1}}</ref> Athenian women could only enter into a contract worth less than the value of a "''[[medimno]]s'' of barley" (a measure of grain), allowing women to engage in petty trading.<ref name="google114"/> Women were excluded from ancient [[Athenian democracy]], both in principle and in practice. Slaves could become Athenian citizens after being freed, but no woman ever acquired citizenship in ancient Athens.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Robinson| first = Eric W.| title = Ancient Greek democracy: readings and sources| publisher = Wiley-Blackwell| year = 2004| page = 302| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Jug6crxEImIC&q=Aristophanes+ecclesiazusae+women%27s+rights| isbn = 978-0-631-23394-7 }}</ref>

In [[classical Athens]] women were also barred from becoming poets, scholars, politicians, or artists.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|url = http://digitalcommons.apus.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1030&context=saberandscroll|title = Social and Political Roles of Women in Athens and Sparta|last = Pry|first = Kay O|year = 2012|journal = Sabre and Scroll |volume=1 |issue=2|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170513082146/http://digitalcommons.apus.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1030&context=saberandscroll|archive-date = 13 May 2017|url-status = dead}}</ref> During the [[Hellenistic period]] in Athens, the philosopher [[Aristotle]] thought that women would bring disorder and evil, therefore it was best to keep women separate from the rest of the society. This separation would entail living in a room called a ''[[gynaeceum|gynaikeion]]'', while looking after the duties in the home and having very little exposure to the male world. This was also to ensure that wives only had legitimate children from their husbands. Athenian women received little education, except home tutorship for basic skills such as spinning, weaving, cooking, and some knowledge of money.<ref name=":0" />

Although [[Spartan]] women were formally excluded from military and political life, an extremely small group enjoyed considerable status as mothers of Spartan warriors. As men engaged in military activity, women took responsibility for running estates. Following protracted warfare in the 4th century&nbsp;BC, Spartan women owned approximately between 35% and 40% of all Spartan land and property.<ref name="Pomeroy" /><ref>{{Cite book| last = Tierney| first = Helen| title = Women's studies encyclopaedia, Volume 2| publisher = Greenwood Publishing Group| year = 1999| pages = 609–10| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=2bDxJW3x4f8C&q=spartan+women| isbn = 978-0-313-31072-0}}</ref> By the Hellenistic Period, some of the wealthiest Spartans were women.<ref>Pomeroy, Sarah B. ''Spartan Women''. Oxford University Press, 2002. p. 137 [https://books.google.com/books?id=c3k2AN1GulYC&q=ethnicity]</ref> Spartan women controlled their own properties, as well as the properties of male relatives who were away with the army.<ref name="Pomeroy">[[Sarah B. Pomeroy|Pomeroy, Sarah B.]] ''Goddess, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity''. New York: Schocken Books, 1975. pp. 60–62.</ref> But despite relatively greater [[freedom of movement]] for Spartan women, their role in politics was the same as Athenian women.<ref name=":0" />

[[Plato]] acknowledged that extending [[civil and political rights]] to women would substantively alter the nature of the household and the state.<ref>{{Cite book| last = Robinson| first = Eric W.| title = Ancient Greek democracy: readings and sources| publisher = Wiley-Blackwell| year = 2004| page = 300| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Jug6crxEImIC&q=Aristophanes+ecclesiazusae+women%27s+rights| isbn = 978-0-631-23394-7 }}</ref> [[Aristotle]] denied that women were slaves or subject to property, arguing that "nature has distinguished between the female and the slave", but he considered wives to be "bought". He argued that women's main economic activity is that of safeguarding the household property created by men. According to Aristotle, the labour of women added no value because "the art of household management is not identical with the art of getting wealth, for the one uses the material which the other provides".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Gerhard| first = Ute| title = Debating women's equality: toward a feminist theory of law from a European perspective| publisher = Rutgers University Press| year = 2001| pages = 32–35| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=XMohyLfGDDsC&q=women+right+to+property| isbn = 978-0-8135-2905-9}}</ref>

Contrary to Plato's views, the [[Stoicism|Stoic philosophers]] argued for equality of the sexes, sexual inequality being in their view contrary to the laws of nature.<ref name="Colish">{{cite book |title=The Stoic Tradition from Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages: Stoicism in classical Latin literature |last=Colish |first=Marcia L. |author-link=Marcia Colish |year=1990 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-90-04-09327-0 |pages=37–38  |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WY-2MeZqoK0C&q=stoics%2Bslavery&pg=PA36}}</ref> In doing so, they followed the [[Cynicism (philosophy)|Cynics]], who argued that men and women should wear the same clothing and receive the same kind of education. They also saw marriage as a moral companionship between equals rather than a biological or social necessity. The Stoics adopted the views of the Cynics and added them to their own theories of human nature, thus putting their sexual egalitarianism on a strong philosophical basis.<ref name="Colish"/>