Ladies First: Exploring the Origins of Chivalry
Friday, 16 Jul 2010 — Contributed by Kuncen
Image by One lucky guy via Flickr
It has many meanings, but when we speak of chivalry we are usually talking about respect and courtesy toward women. The concept has its origin in the Middle Ages, when knights were trained and expected to defend the honor of all ladies. This evolved to gentlemen throwing their coat over a patch of mud to allow a lady to pass over it safely, and eventually to holding the door at the entrance of a building and letting ladies go first, among other niceties.
While this respect and kindness toward women was (and is) admirable, it certainly doesn't correspond directly to women's rights per se. These same ladies who were given coats to walk on were not given the right to vote, own property, or in many cases even make their own decisions. And when a man today holds the door open to an office building, it doesn't imply any more respect than is immediately apparent. That same man might very well hold sexist attitudes or make inappropriate comments later in the day.
So if it wasn't women's rights, what inspired the widespread adoption of this 'courtly love' form of chivalry? Since it has its roots in medieval times, is it possible that it developed as a direct response to attitudes toward women that were observed in the Middle East during the Crusades?
I'll engage in a bit of speculation here, as I'm no expert on the subject and would love for someone more knowledgeable to shed some light on the topic. But it seems plausible that crusaders might have been exposed to practices such as stoning to punish adultery and honor killings which seemed to treat women poorly, and decided to adopt attitudes that focused on honoring the woman instead. They probably didn't witness female genital mutilation but may have nevertheless been aware of it, and found it so abhorrent that they veered - however unconsciously - in the other direction.
Image via Wikipedia
Conversely, some might argue that these so-called 'oppressive' practices observed in the Middle East had (and still have) direct parallels in the West. While raging against the burqa and the subjugation of women it represents, it's easy to forget that ladies of the court were also dressed in hoods, veils, chastity belts, and other types of clothing designed to reduce their attractiveness to men. The Virgin Mary is typically depicted wearing a hood, arguably to emphasize purity, but you could argue that it was a form of control. Old European fairy tales involving princesses kept in towers are likewise symbolic of the control of women.
We dismiss as ridiculous other countries' laws that make it illegal for a woman to travel without a male family member. Yet women traveling alone in the West have historically been (and still are) assumed by many to be immoral or otherwise 'loose'. With respect to punishment, it wasn't so long ago that we drowned or burned women at the stake for suspicion of witchcraft. And though a work of fiction, The Scarlet Letter symbolized the stigma punishment placed upon women who committed adultery in Puritan early America, a punishment which did not exist for the guilty man.
Yet another viewpoint suggests that chivalrous attitudes toward women were not a reaction to Muslim practices witnessed during the Crusades, but were actually inspired by them and adopted when the Crusaders returned home. "Within less than half a century, disregarded Woman had been transformed into honored Lady..." explains author Reay Tannahill.
So what's your opinion? Is chivalry the polar opposite of attitudes toward women that we see in the Middle East and other parts of the world? Or is it more closely related than we realize? Did Europeans import the best or the worst of the Middle East during the Crusades? Seize the skull - post a comment below!
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I'm not really very big on
I'm not really very big on chivalry. Seems to hurt women's right more than help
Chivalry towards men
It seems that the western culture is blind to male-bashing in the media. So often, men are portrayed as insensitive, selfish, or dumb. When I watch TV, I often think, "If they made that joke about a woman, there would be a backlash, but nobody notices when it is against a man."
I think of that "randoms acts of kindness" movement. What if we women decided that we would be chivalrous (sp?) towards men, regardless of whether we knew if the guy was honorable or not? Who am I to judge anyway?
Guess I'm late for father's day. My Dad worked so hard. Whenever I call in a plumber, an electrician, a roofer, or a gardener, I try to treat him with respect. I call him "sir." If we start with the assumption that a man is good and hard-working, we can't miss, and it may change the world. We must honor each other as human beings. "Pay it forward."
Amen. :) It's not just the
Amen. :) It's not just the women who need honoring. Us guys have feelings too :D
Let me start by saying I am a
Let me start by saying I am a woman and a feminist. However I do not believe in inequality in any form. I understand what you are saying and it is valid. I also believe I understand why it happens. Every pendulum swings both ways. That is to say, when any group is oppressed, as they begin to take back the rights denied to them, that momentum either on purpose or by accident does tend to push back at the group or groups that oppressed them. Further more, through out history, words were all women had. I read somewhere, that in some historical empires, a woman had so few rights and was so little a threat, that she could say whatever she wanted, with little legal consequences because she was no political threat. However it is important that we as a society recognize that NO OPPRESSION is acceptable. There are two victims of oppression. The oppressed are obviously victims of a group who oppressed them, however the oppressors are also oppressed. I believe Gandhi said something to that effect.
In my mind the oppressor's oppression is different but still crippling. They may be pushed into a society that forces them from a tender age to display a specific persona. Laws, culture, parents or loved ones molded belief systems that created a norm which denied them from ever benefiting fully from healthy mutually benifical relationships (friendships, marriages etc) with others simply because that person belonged to a different group. Further more, how could any man born of a woman grow up feeling whole when they are raised to disrespect or look down on the parent who where their primary care giver as a child, simply because of their sex. Further more, when a class of people are defined by a society as being beneath others jobs or roles are often assigned to them and those outside that particular group are likely treated poorly if they were to choose those jobs or roles. Any stay at home dad out there, who love being in this role in their family? Any male nurses who love their jobs? Even a generation or two earlier and these would hardly be an option for you.
Do I think women still have a climb ahead of them? Of course I do, we still get 75 cents to every dollar a man gets. Does centuries of oppression still effect us? Yes but remember that in saying these things you become the oppressor and so are oppressed.
Chivalry in the Middle Ages
In the Middle Ages, women did not have the rights that women have grown accustomed-to in the modern era. Women were viewed as property (sometimes literally being attached to a plot of land in legal documents), subservient to men, incapable of holding office, having a voice of any kind, or even being allowed literacy. Like castles and customs portrayed in Hollywood movies, the idea that women were catered-to in the Middle Ages is a myth. The life for a woman in the Middle Ages, according to Ruth Dean in her book "Women of the Middle Ages", was harsh and brutal. Very few made it out of this status, although some of the incredibly rare exceptions were artists, writers, administrators of estates as a high lady, or even queens in their own right. Still, the position for women was one of a wife and mother, and even Queen Elizabeth I of England remarked many times the "I being only a woman" statement in regard to herself.
It is hard to imagine that women would be so quick to point to chivalry as the ideal of how to treat women, frankly.
It is important to remember
It is important to remember that in the Middle Ages women (along with children) where viewed as the property of a man (often either their father or their husband). Keeping this perspective in mind, chivalry, it could be said, is less about respecting woman than respecting the property of another man. Conversely one could argue that women where considered too frail or weak or undereducated to do for themselves and so if left to their own devices needed a man to assist them.
At worst respect for another man's property and at best an act of pity, chivalry does not come off as honoring women.
Seize the skull!
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