Although I agree with @lotus253 concerning women hunting and egalitarian societies - that it is a good thing and should appear in the game, I think we might be missing a point here. Ancient Cities is a game which aims to recreate the birth of society.
During the Paleolithic (#AncientCitiesDLC), society didn’t exist yet, humanity was a mosaic of scattered tribes. From an utilitarian point of view, it seems clear that women shouldn’t have been put at risk by hunting, because they were the only means to repopulate the tribe. Men were thus more expendable than women. That is why men hunted and women stayed at the camp, inevitably taking care of the children and elderly who could not leave to hunt.
I believe those gendered roles didn’t imply any superiority of any kind and it was just the safest way of life, because Paleolithic tribes weren’t living, they were surviving. To clarify my point, I believe women could hunt if they wanted (there were no explicit bans) but internalized the fact that they shouldn’t - for the sake of the tribe.
During the Neolithic, new, safer trades emerged, like farming, etc. That meant everyday life was less dangerous and the Paleothic gendered roles were not useful anymore. But we must ask ourselves the question of how much early society was influenced by ancient times. In my opinion, the “man hunter and female gatherer” trope remained and this is how patriarchal societies appeared, at the beggining of the Neolithic period.
In any case, most of the screenshots revealed at the moment present a small Neolithic village. Small population cores were more likely to be egalitarian societies.
On a completely different subject, I don’t think we should integrate present societal problematics like those of non binary genders. I understand gender is something complicated today, but I doubt such primitive societies had the luxury to reflect and debate about how they consider or classify genders. Let’s keep contemporary debates out of a game depicting the first faltering steps of society. Not to negate their existence, but to be as close as possible to reality (and to spare some work to the devs :’). [quote=“louis.mervoyer, post:78, topic:581”]
All genders diversity could be add later with mods
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I agree that the society would be mostly patriarchal (though I like the idea that women do surpass this now and then and we will sometimes see them in the game aiding in defense of the tribe, as well as men helping with “female” tasks.)
As for transgender people, I don’t expect to see them in the game (nor have I suggested this), but I don’t think we can dismiss them in prehistory as being too problematic to deal with. There is evidence of transgender people in the prehistoric world. The find by Katerina Semradova, as an example. Unfortunately, the media paraded the find as a “gay caveman” which is nonsensical as transgender people are not automatically gave (nor was it a caveman). This caused significant issues with that research. Regardless, I suspect it was an issue confronted by tribes in prehistoric times. In the Americas, we find many tribes accepting third genders and integrating well with such folk.
(Also, no worries with the language. The game is developed in [I believe] Spain, so I am also a foreigner lol)
Think, this is a particularly emotional issue in our time. Perhaps, at that time much more pragmatic was avoided? He / she can do this? Then, he/she do this! Most of such people also have special talents - valuable for the community. Bring it on!
As I understand it the Greeks did not treat people who were different very well. I think there are more examples but my brain is in neutral. Unusual people were treated as gods or killed. Depending on how much different they were or if they were classified as breaking the societies norms (beliefs enter into this).
Maybe. I know many cultures held transgender folks in high regard, while others did not. Our current culture being more of the ladder. =/
Ancient Greece is not something I am well versed on.
As an example, I could imagine that early societies with this theme are similar to the one illustrated in the series “Vikings”. Think of Lagertha, who always showed new character traits during her life. Think it came to the person himself.
Would be interesting, if such a thing would be playable. But I’m not sure, if a build simulation like AC is the right genre to allow for the development of the possibilities. That would rather work in an RPG or mmo (like Sim’s).(?)
Many reason, including (esp.) religion. Vikings had many gods, some female. The Abrahamic religions tended to discourage women having power. For example, you find the Picts had female warriors (e.g. Shacha) until the Law of Innocence in 697CE ended this.
Not sure the Vikings were really egalitarian, per se, but they did have female warriors to some extent.
Also think, of the predominantly male property claim disguised by religion. Probably the dilemma in the Middle East began with the emergence of the first city states or larger empires. In Central- and Northern Europe this may have arisen with the gradual Christianization. The Bible degraded from the history of creation to the woman in the second row. Written by a man …
Yes, I agree that religious-based misogyny is the result of men using the fear of deities to their benefit. This is why you see this occur in many different religions. Keep in mind, the Gods of the Vikings were hardly sweet and innocent, either. They sanctioned raids and Slaughter of others, they just didn’t discriminate as badly against women as some others.
What is interesting to note, however, is that societies which did not preclude women from combat did not appear encumbered by the women they allowed to fight. Examples include the Sarmatians, the Picts (my lot), the Vikings and several others.
The women from those societies fought with heavier equipment and more brutal, organized combat than did prehistoric people. This does not provide evidence for prehistoric female warriors, but it goes a long way in removing any arguments based on physical ability or in society preventing women from fighting, en masse.
We can now surmise that women physically can fight and often found roles in combat, even when the prevailing social trend was male exclusive. Given thousands of years of history and millions of people, it becomes less realistic to suppose that women did not on occasion find themselves as combatants.
Yes, I would imagine so. Women already have to contend with high maternal mortality rates during pregnancy. My guess is that the majority of women would never engaged in combat. But every now and then, a woman comes along who cannot be content with the role other women took.
Yes. I believe they reported the male Neolithic body buried as a woman (maybe transgender!!!) as a “gay caveman”. The headline is quite ignorant. Gender does not equate to homosexuality, nor was this person a “caveman”.
i very much like the idea of female warriors and non gender specific roles . just a thought from my minor amount of research , i am no expert in this field so am open for debate.
before modern medicine it was still very common for woman to die inn child birth, and thorough out history woman have been known as healers and life bringers etc. my thoughts behind why woman have been given " safer" gender based roles is because they where less expendable. woman where literally the way in which your tribe moved into the future. without the proper amount of births and child nursed into adult hood the tribe dies out. woman where the most important asset for a growing tribe or village , hence why in some cultures they where readily stolen and jealously guarded.
in response to a comment made by lotus253 “Gets even more confusing when we consider additional genders beyond classical male and female.” .
i totally agree . in some cultures, being gay , bi or anything in between was sometimes viewed as being multi spirited or souled and made these people powerful personalities within the group for their connection to the spirit realm.
You have gender, sexual orientation (which you mentioned), gender presentation, biological sex, and general sexual inclination. These are the five different metrics which are all too often lumped together as though they are the same, though they are not.
It is quite true that in ancient societies, people who differed from the norm experienced both very positive and very negative results, depending on the culture. Given the need for hard working people in a tribe, my guess is that prehistoric societies tended to be pragmatic and accepting of differences in general, as rejecting them would not benefit the tribe.
