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ui

ISSN 2056-7901

ISSUE 3: January 2016

THE SWANSEA UNIVERSITY HISTORY AND CLASSICS

STUDENT ONLINE RESEARCH JOURNAL

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This journal is published by students and staff of the Department of History and Classics at

Swansea University.

The online version of this journal can be found at

http://gorffennol.swansea.ac.uk/?page_id=500.

ISSN 2056-7901

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval

system, or in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the

publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form or binding or cover other than that in

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on the subsequent publisher.

Cover design by Jed Rual

© Swansea University, 2016

We are grateful to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston for the use of image 63.260.

We would like to thank SALT (the Swansea Academy of Learning and Teaching) for the

generous start-up funding and the College of Arts and Humanities for providing funding to

allow for reproduction of the images. This project would not be possible without them.

3

Gorffennol

Volume 3

Table of Contents

Year One Oliver Garbett, ‘Is Horace Ode 1.37 pro-Augustan, anti-Augustan, both, or neither?’,

written for Augustan Rome (CLH112)

Stephanie Brown, ‘What did Medieval people think caused the Black Death, and how

did they respond accordingly?’, written for Medieval Europe: an introduction

(HIH117)

Eugenia Gower, ‘Write your own Heracles myth’, written for Of Gods and Heroes –

Greek Mythology (CLC101)

Year Two Laura Bailey, ‘How important was farming (socially, economically, politically,

culturally) for a Greek polis?’, written for Greek City States (CLH264)

Bronwen Swain, ‘What was the league of German girls?’, written for The Practice of

History (HIH237)

Dale Cutlan, ‘How useful is Domesday Book as a source for understanding the

impact of the Norman Conquest on England?’, written for War and Society in

the Anglo-Norman World (HIH252)

Year Three Charlotte Morgan, ‘How important was it for Alexander to be recognized as pharaoh

and what did it involve?’, written for Alexandria: Multicultural Metropolis of

the Ancient World (CLE334)

Jed Rual, ‘Masculine iconography of 18th

dynasty royal women and its influence on

the perception of their role as queen’, written for Ancient Egyptian and

Ptolemaic Queens (CLE342)

Andre Chavez, ‘To what extent did British success in Europe during the Seven Years

War depend on the strength of the Fiscal-Military state?’, written for The Great

War for Empire II, 1754-1764: Europe (HIH-3306)

MA Level Andrew Morel-du-Boil, ‘A public space of varying suffering: Public lavatory

provision in Victorian Bury-St-Edmunds’, written for Directed Reading in

History (HI-M80)

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9

17

22

33

44

52

63

79

92

4

Is Horace Ode 1.37 pro-Augustan, anti-Augustan, both, or neither?

Horace’s Ode XXXVII, or the ‘Cleopatra Ode’ is a celebration of the defeat of Cleopatra VII

by Octavian and Agrippa, and is considered the height of Horace’s literary works in the way

in which he combines both political themes and Alcaeus’ style of Greek writings. The

question as to whether this Ode is pro-Augustan, anti-Augustan, both or neither has been

widely discussed. Personally, I think that Horace is writing an anti-Augustan Ode, not as a

political dissident, but as a way of expressing literary freedoms, as he demonstrates in other

Odes as well. Horace does this not out of a lack of respect, but to show that his work will not

be used as ‘propaganda’ (if the term is applicable), but as a work of creativity.

Horace does this mostly by changing the tone in the sixth stanza from a distinctly pro-

Augustan tone of the first half of the Ode to one of admiration for Cleopatra who ‘did not

have a woman’s fear’ and was a ‘humble woman in a proud triumph’. This should not be

interpreted as a factual admiration for Cleopatra, but rather that Horace is exercising his

literary freedoms, and that Augustus cannot influence Horace’s workings.1 This refusal of

Horace is not only indicated in this Ode, but throughout his workings, as he continually

declines to write the epic poetry that Augustus and Maecenas want, as will be demonstrated.

Horace’s most alarming, and perhaps most subtle, criticism of Augustus is the simple

fact that Mark Antony, Augustus’ sworn rival in the civil war, is not mentioned by name once

throughout the Ode. Cleopatra is not mentioned by name either, but we can infer that Horace

meant to mention her through descriptions of ‘the mad Queen’ and that ‘she flew from Italy;

and Caesar’. We know that Horace fought against Augustus in Mark Antony’s army, so does

Horace feel admiration for Cleopatra, and in turn Mark Anthony because of this fact? This

view would have been almost treasonous if true, and Augustus’ ruthlessness against political

1 Reid (2015).

5

opponents is well documented, as Virgil was made (almost purposefully) seriously ill by

constant travelling to meet Augustus to discuss the Aeneid. Even after Virgil’s death, it was

published on Augustus’ death, despite Virgil’s wishes for the whole works to be burnt, and

never published for public consumption. Knowing how ruthless Augustus was against those

who ‘failed’ him, it is highly unlikely that Horace would openly want to criticise Augustus in

an endeavour to anger him, but rather to show that literary freedom (to some extent) existed,

and was something to be valued as a Roman citizen. It is important to differentiate that

Horace’s ‘criticisms’ of Augustus are not viewed in the same sense as in the twenty-first

century, but from a historical perspective. Whether Horace was in fact an actual admirer of

Cleopatra is highly unlikely; what is more likely is that Horace is defying the wish of

Augustus of Maecenas to show them how the content of his poetry will not be decided by

anyone else but Horace.2 This is echoed by other odes, such as Ode XX, in which Horace

tells Maecenas that ‘You can drink your Caecuban... no Falerian vines or Formian hills soften

my wine,’ and Ode XIV in which Horace tells of how he will be drinking ‘a cask of wine that

remembers the Marsian war’ whilst the rest of Rome celebrates. As there is a precedent in

Horace’s Odes for this boldness against Augustus, this better explains why the Cleopatra Ode

can be interpreted as an anti-Augustan Ode.

Firstly, Horace’s criticism seems to be directed at how Cleopatra would have been a

prize of war, to be put on show in Rome at a victory parade, referring to how ‘she looked for

a nobler death’. This can be inferred not only as a death in a sense of mortality, but rather the

death of her dynasty (of which she was indeed the last of the Ptolemaic dynasty), and of

Egypt being independent from the Roman Empire. It is very unusual that Horace would

choose to refer to it as a ‘nobler’ death, as outside influences of Rome were often viewed

with suspicion and blamed for the moral decline of the Roman empire. As Egypt was ruled

by Greeks in the Hellenistic period after the death of Alexander the Great, it is especially odd

2 Lowrie (2013).

6

to choose to refer to a Greek ruler as preferring a ‘nobler death,’ as Greeks seemed to be the

polar opposite of Roman ideals. However, we know that Horace was widely affected by the

growing Greek influences of the period: his style of writing is directly attributable to the

Greek poet Alcaeus; and his symposiums have had great influence for hundreds of years. In

this choice of style, Horace is again choosing to model his poetry on Alcaeus, rather than a

uniform Roman style, which Augustus would have preferred. Horace again shows an

admiration for Mark Antony and Cleopatra, although they are Rome’s enemies, not because

he is a supporter of their rebellion against Octavian, but rather for the bookish freedom that it

brings Horace, and shows his Ode is anti-Augustan, as it again refuses to be part of the

Augustan propaganda program (architecture etc.).

Another way in which Horace attempts to defy Augustus is by using Augustus’

slander of Mark Antony to constantly remind the reader of him, although he is not mentioned

by name.3 The references to ‘taking the Caecuban down from its ancient rack’ and how her

mind ‘deranged by Mareotic wine’ are in fact the same slanders that Octavian, Cicero and

Agrippa used before the Battle of Actium 31 B.C.4 It was, although historically inaccurate,

believed for a long deal of time that Cleopatra was drunk when she led her army to war

against Octavian. By mentioning this, Horace is not only suggesting that he sees through

Octavian’s attempt to slander Cleopatra, and in turn Mark Antony, but also signifying that he

is further refusing the kind of historical inaccuracy that Augustus would have him write.

Instead he argues he will write the kind of poetry that invites Romans to drink to the memory

of a worthy opponent in Cleopatra and Mark Antony and commemorate their challenge to the

Roman republic, rather than have their slander recorded forever in Horace’s work, if he were

to write how Augustus wants him too.

3 Reid (2015).

4 Horace, p.155.

7

Finally, I believe that Horace shows a demonstration of admiration for Cleopatra by

using the imagery of the hunter and the prey, as a kind of noble sport, to show her bravery in

not accepting her death by Roman hands, but meeting it at a time of her choosing, which as I

have already mentioned, Horace describes as a ‘nobler death’. As hunting was widely

considered a noble sport for the aristocracy, it is my belief that Horace is using this to

describe the hunt of Cleopatra by Octavian as both noble for the hunter and the prey, as he

describes it as ‘a hawk after gentle doves’. This particular reference is interesting not only

because it is kind in the sense of Cleopatra being a gentle dove, whereas Horace could have

chosen to describe her as something slanderous or insulting. The iconography of a ‘gentle

dove’ has a simplistic nobility and beauty. By doing this, I believe that Horace does not mean

to literally describe Cleopatra as beautiful, but rather that the challenge to authority, the

natural order of Rome being challenged has a simplistic beauty as well to Horace. This is

particularly prevalent as Horace was known to be, as previously mentioned, an enthusiast of

Greek poetry and style (although some of his more political poetry suggests otherwise).

In conclusion, I believe that Horace wrote this ode as a clear statement to Augustus

that his literary freedoms, however much it threatens him, will not be encroached by

Augustus or Maecenas.5 I do not believe that Horace is in actual fact an admirer of Cleopatra

or Mark Antony, rather that they are the examples to which Horace uses to show his anti-

Augustan views on how Augustus would influence his work, if he had his way. By referring

to the slanderous misinformation provided by Octavian in reference to her, Horace is defying

Augustus, but only in a sense that his literary independence will not be decided by them, but

by Horace himself.

Oliver Garbett, 827031@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Augustan Rome (CLH112)

5 Lowrie (2013).

8

Bibliography

Kellman, S. G. (2009) Odes 1.37, the Cleopatra Ode Summary (eNotes)

<http://www.enotes.com/topics/odes-1-37-cleopatra-ode> [accessed 21 April 2015]

Lowrie, M. (2013) ‘Horace and Augustus’, in Stephen Harrison (ed.) The Cambridge

Companion to Horace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 77-90.

Reid, D. Horace Odes 1.37 <http://www.angelfire.com/art/archictecture/articles/devin.htm>

[accessed 20 April 2015]

West, D. (1997) Horace the Complete Odes and Epodes (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

9

What did medieval people think caused the Black Death,

and how did they respond accordingly?

The Black Death has been cited as the greatest human disaster prior to the twentieth century.1

The disease swept across Europe, arriving in the East at Constantinople in 1347, reaching the

far West, Iceland and Greenland, by 1350, then completing virtually full revolution, arriving

in Russia by 1352. Few regions escaped: most lost a quarter to a third of their population,

some as many as half.2 This essay will argue that as medieval medicine did not understand

the pestilence, contemporaries acknowledged three main causes: divine, natural and human.

Firstly, the divine view thought the pestilence was a punishment from God. Secondly,

looking to nature identified causes like planetary movement or miasmas. Thirdly, there was a

belief that this disease was manufactured and caused by poison. Moreover, medieval people

had an understanding of contagion and therefore viewed human transmission as a secondary

cause of the disease. People responded to these perceived causes in three ways: violence,

pursuit of protection or fear, and isolation.

The pestilence was a new and unknown disease,3 described by contemporaries as

‘unheard of’ and ‘unprecedented’.4 It was not until the nineteenth century that we began to

understand the cause of the Black Death. During the Third Pandemic, Alexandre Yersin

became the first person to accurately describe the plague pathogen, later coined Yersinia

pestis. The pathogen was then proved to cause three variants of plague: bubonic, pneumonic

and septicaemic.5 At the dawn of the twentieth century, Paul-Louis Simond identified that the

black rat, Rattus rattus, and rat flea, Xenopsylla cheopis, were the vectors of the plague.

1 John Kelly, The Great Mortality (London and New York: Fourth Estate, 2005), p. 9.

2 David Nicholas, The Evolution of the Medieval World (Essex: Longman, 1992), p. 404-405.

3 Nigel Saul ed. The Oxford Illustrated History of Medieval England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997),

p. 160. 4 Kelly, p. 97.

5 Barney, pp. 172-173.

10

Robert Kock encapsulated the plague as ‘a disease of rats in which men participate’.6 Despite

this, since 1980 some academics have disrupted the previously accepted position by

proposing that the Black Death was not plague.7 They highlight that there is no observation of

rat deaths from the chroniclers. However, this argument is not without fault. The claim that

the Black Death could not have been plague due to the absence of Rattus rattus fails to

consider that Xenopsylla cheopis can survive for six weeks without a host, therefore could

travel in grain or cloth shipments. This illustrates that the deceased host may be hundreds of

miles away from the region of the subsequent outbreaks.8 Furthermore, Wendy Orent stated

that the human flea, Pulex irritans, could carry Yersinia pestis9 and consequently human-to-

human transfer of the plague would be possible. This would make the absence of Rattus

rattus irrelevant. Nevertheless, alternative causes of the Black Death have still been

advocated: anthrax, an Ebola-like illness called haemorrhagic fever, typhus,10

and even an

unknown or an extinct disease.11

In 2001, it was acknowledged that ‘historians are less clear

about what caused the Black Death than they were 30 years ago’.12

In addition, Mike Baillie

added climate change and possible comet strikes to the debate as a potential cause in 2006.

He believes the disease was air-borne and caused by biological pathogens released into the

earth’s atmosphere by comets.13

On the other hand, the view of plague as the disease of the Black Death has received

recent support due to the discovery of Yersinia pestis DNA in several burial sites of medieval

plague victims.14

Despite this, tests on other plague cemeteries proved negative and the

6 Kelly, p. 42.

7 Kelly, p. 113.

8 Kelly, pp. 19-20.

9 Kelly, pp. 35-36.

10 Barney, pp. 172-175.

11 Kelly, p. 296.

12 Daniel Waley and Peter Denley, Later Medieval Europe 1250-1520, 3

rd edn (Harlow, Pearson Education Ltd,

2001), p. 100. 13

Barney, pp. 172-173. 14

Waley and Denley, p. 100.

11

arguments against plague have been published as late as 2011. There is a view the detection

of Yersinia Pestis DNA only verifies that bacillus was present, not that it caused it the Black

Death. ‘Plague Deniers’ would be more convinced if the DNA was found in all victims of the

Black Death and in none of the skeletons from before the outbreak.15

As even modern scholars are in disagreement over the cause of the Black Death

predictably medieval medicine was helpless. In 1350, Montpellier doctor, Simon de Couvain

confessed that ‘the art of Hippocrates was lost’16

and papal physician, Guy de Chauliac,

believed ‘the disease was most humiliating for the physicians, who were unable to render any

assistance’.17

Some Italian chroniclers also express that there was limited faith in medicine;

they alleged that doctors either ran off with your money or made you die quicker.18

As medieval medicine was at a loss, people turned to God. The Black Death was seen

by many to be caused by the fury of God upon an errant people.19

This may seem peculiar to

a modern mind; however, it is important to note the medieval belief that most sickness was

due to sinfulness.20

It was understood in the East that God was inflicting the disease upon

individual sinners, whereas, in Western Christianity, the interpretation was that the pestilence

was imposed on society as a whole to collectively pay for sinfulness.21

People reacted to this

apparent cause in two ways: violence or turning to God for prevention. The first means of

violent act was self-inflicted. The Flagellants referred to as ‘Brotherhood of Flagellants’ or

‘Brethren of the Cross’ were well organised and arose in spring 1349. Their aim was to

imitate Christ’s suffering for thirty-three and a half days, a day for each year of his life, in

order to repent for the sins of the people. In fact, the Flagellants pre-dated the Black Death

15

Barney, pp. 173-174. 16

Samuel K. Cohn Jr. ‘Past & Present’, The Black Death and the Burning of Jews, No. 196 (Aug., 2007), p. 10. 17

Johannes Nohl, The Black Death (London: Unwin Books, 1961), p. 45. 18

Cohn, p. 10. 19

Sean Martin, The Black Death (Harpenden: Pocket Essentials, 2001), pp. 19-22. 20

Nohl, p. 46. 21

Karen Jillings, Scotland’s Black Death (Stroud: Tempus, 2003), pp. 113-114.

12

and were banned in 1262; despite this they reappeared with this crisis.22

They were thought to

be appointed by God; the chroniclers explain that the Flagellants referred to a letter written

by Jesus that had fallen from the sky. This was a violent movement as when they marched,

they whipped their half-naked bodies with a stick that had three tails with large knots and

‘iron spikes as sharp as needles’. This caused participants to become bruised, swollen and

bloody, and the spike was sometimes imbedded in the skin so deeply that it was not easily

removed.23

In spite of initial support from the Church, Pope Clement VI prohibited the

movement in October 1349.24

The second form of violent response prompted by the belief

that the Black Death was caused by God’s punishment of sinfulness25

embodied, attempted

violence towards others. An example of this is that the Scottish thought the Black Death was

‘the horrible vengeance of God… on the English’ and they planned to invade England.26

In

summer 1349, the Scottish, trusting that the Black Death was ‘God’s dreadful judgement’ on

the English gathered forces at Selkirk, although they caught the pestilence before they were

able to massacre the English.27

The use of violence in response to a belief that the Black

Death was a punishment from God was not just seen among Christians. Grenadian physician,

Ibn al-Khatib, was murdered by a Muslim mob for stating that contagion spread the

pestilence; according to Islamic teaching God decided who lived and died in an epidemic.

Christian writers were free to express the idea of contagion;28

however, as in the case of the

ill-fated Scots, religion, and violence sometimes took precedence.

The belief of divine intervention as the cause of the Black Death did not

comprehensively manifest violent reactions; people also reacted by turning to God for

prevention. God had sent the pestilence, consequently God could end it. As Magnus II of

22

Kelly, p. 265. 23

George Deaux, The Black Death 1347 (London: Hamish Hamilton Ltd, 1969), pp. 180-182. 24

Rosemary Horrox (transl. and ed.), The Black Death (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1994), p. 96. 25

Kelly, p. 18. 26

Deaux, pp. 140-141. 27

Jillings, pp. 23-24. 28

Kelly, p. 172.

13

Sweden believed that the disease was due to an angry God he ordered ‘foodless Fridays and

shoeless Sundays.’29

In August 1348, the Bishop of Bath and Wells circulated letters ordering

processions and stations every Friday in each church to beg for God’s protection. He also

granted an indulgence of forty days to anyone denoting alms, fasting, or praying to avert

God’s anger.30

The second medieval explanation for the Black Death was remote or natural causes,

such a bad air or movement of the planets. This is another idea which may immediately

appear strange to modern medicine; however, does it have any parallels with theory put

forward in 2006 by Baillie? Medieval minds adopting the teaching of Roman doctor, Galen,

thought that the plague arose from miasmas or dense clouds of infected air. This view was

embraced by the eminent Paris medical facility, who also accepted the view that the

pestilence was caused by ‘an unusual conjunction of Saturn, Mars and Jupiter’ on 20 March

1345. People responded by again seeking methods of prevention, conversely turning to nature

rather than God. The ‘prince of physicians’, Gentile de Foligno, recommended inhaling herbs

as an antidote.31

Other reactions included burning fragrant woods like juniper, aloe, rosemary

or oak, and in the summer months, using flowers sprinkled with rosewater and vinegar and

when outdoors, carrying a smelling apple or herb. Bonfires were also thought to be effective

and were lit on street-corners. To prevent bad air entering your pores, the advice was to avoid

sex, exercise and baths; diet was also central to balance the four humors.32

Alongside divine and natural causes, the people of the Middle Ages assumed a human

cause and blamed one another. The blame fell upon ‘Others’, people who were seen as

different or foreign; someone who is not like you or is outside of your society. In the Black

Death the primary ‘Other’ was the Jews; however, Catalans, foreign beggars and the poor

29

Kelly, p. 27. 30

Deaux, pp. 118-119. 31

Kelly, pp. 18-25. 32

Kelly, pp. 172-173.

14

were all scapegoats accused of poisoning wells, food and streams.33

In January 1349, Basel

burned their Jewish inhabitants on an island in the Rhine. In Strasbourg, they burned Jews in

local cemetery in an attempt to stop the pestilence, although the Black Death still came.34

On

the other hand, in Barcelona, the Jews were killed for the sin of being Jews, not because they

were suspected of poisoning.35

The blaming of Jews was not a view supported by the Church.

On 26 September 1348, Pope Clement VI stated that Jews were dying like the Christians, so

why would they poison themselves? He also highlighted that the English were dying, where

there were no Jews.36

The final reaction commonly seen during the Black Death was one of fear and

isolation. This was caused by the knowledge that the pestilence was contagious. Medieval

medicine may not have been able to identify the primary cause, however they knew a

secondary cause of infection was to contract it from the dead or the dying. Michele da Piazza

said ‘if anyone so much as spoke with one of them he was infected… and could not avoid

death’ and he explains that fathers abandoned their infected sons.37

The response to the risk

of contamination was to flee; some priests neglected their posts,38

and doctors refused to treat

patients. Guy de Chauliac confessed that he did not flee solely due to fear of disgrace.39

In

Venice, there was such a mass exodus that the authorities issued an ultimatum to absent civic

workers: return or lose their jobs.40

When people were unable or unwilling to flee, they

ensured that the infected or, the potentially infected, were isolated. For instance, in Milan

they reacted by segregating the sick. Additionally, in Venice they impounded all vessels

wishing to enter the city for forty (‘quaranta’ in Italian) days, later coining our word

33

Cohn, pp. 4-9. 34

Kelly, p. 26. 35

Kelly, pp. 252-253. 36

Cohn, p. 14. 37

Kelly, pp. 83-85. 38

Deaux, p. 120. 39

Nohl, p. 47. 40

Kelly, p. 94.

15

quarantine. This shows that people had an understanding of contagion, were fearful of it, and

reacted by distancing the threat.41

In conclusion, this essay has illustrated that the medieval world, quite reasonably

based on their connection between sickness and sin, believed in a divine cause. The first

response was violence; either towards the people that they believed God was punishing, or

self-inflicted to mirror the suffering of Jesus. The next response was to ask God to prevent

the disease through prayer and pious works. The second assumed cause was their

environment, either miasma or planetary movement. In reaction to this cause medieval people

again sort prevention; however they turned to nature instead of God. The third and final

perceived cause was a human one, either deliberately instigating the disease with poison or

involuntarily contaminating others. Each of these saw a different reaction; the deliberate

instigation was met with dreadful violence, whereas the idea of contagion produced a reaction

of fear and isolation, such as fleeing from the infected regions or separating infected from the

healthy.

Stephanie Brown, 523919@swan.ac.uk

Written for Medieval Europe: an introduction (HIH-117)

Bibliography

Blockmans, Wim and Peter Hoppenbrouwers, Introduction to Medieval Europe 300-1550

(Abingdon: Routledge, 2007).

Campbell, Anna Montgomery, The Black Death and Men of Learning (New York: AMS

Press, 1966).

41

Jillings, p.160.

16

Cohn, Jr. Samuel K. ‘Past & Present’ The Black Death and the Burning of Jews, No. 196

(Aug., 2007), pp. 3-36.

Davis, David, E. ‘The Scarcity of Rats and the Black Death: An Ecological History’, The

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 16.3 (Winter, 1986), pp. 455-470.

Deaux, George, The Black Death 1347 (London: Hamish Hamilton Ltd, 1969).

Horrox, Rosemary, (transl. and ed.) The Black Death, (Manchester: Manchester University

Press, 1994).

Jillings, Karen, Scotland’s Black Death (Stroud: Tempus, 2003).

Kelly, John, The Great Mortality (London: Fourth Estate, 2005).

Martin, Sean, The Black Death (Harpenden: Pocket Essentials, 2001).

Nicholas, David, The Evolution of the Medieval World (Essex: Longman, 1992).

Nohl, Johannes, The Black Death (London: Unwin Books, 1961).

Saul, Nigel ed. The Oxford Illustrated History of Medieval England (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 1997).

Sloane, Barney, The Black Death in London (Stroud: The History Press, 2011).

Theilmann, John and Frances Cate, ‘The Problem of Plague Diagnosis in Medieval England’,

The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 37.3, (Winter, 2007), pp. 371-393.

Waley, Daniel and Peter Denley, Later Medieval Europe 1250-1520, 3rd

edn (Harlow,

Pearson Education Ltd, 2001).

17

The Last Act

Immortality is something that for millennia humans strived to achieve. With every invention,

there is hope that it could lead to endless and ageless life, except for one man. In the modern

world, he is insignificant; he lives a dull and basic life for he feels there is nothing to live for.

No one needs him to travel to the underworld; they do not need him to rescue them from

Nessos, the evil Centaur. They do, however, need him to clean out stables. He moves through

the days as a shadow in the background: immaterial and forgotten, for he is known only in

myths. Heracles used to be his name. Now turned into myths and legend, presumed to be

dead, he quietly roams the streets of Swansea never forgetting but always forgotten.

Morbidly he thinks about the ease with which humans can take their own lives, it is

not difficult for them; stop breathing, bleed out, fall a great distance. Any of these would

swiftly end their lives. Heracles had tried all of these and many more in desperation to escape

the mundane everyday life, finally to be free of this world and transverse the world beneath.

He was not old, yet he acted it. He allowed the knowledge of his age, over two

thousand, shape his movement. Many saw him as a crippled old man, just waiting for death,

when he was actually the prime age of thirty-five, physically, not mentally.

While sleeping in his depressed state of mind he dreams about his glory days. When

all of Rome and Greece loved him so much that he featured in nearly everything, from art to

literature. Miserable in his endless life he eats his hours away (nothing really changes)

consumed by the ease to consume more he would go for days where he would just eat.

Nevertheless, it would be incorrect to think he was morbidly obese; apparently, a demi-god

cannot get fat. As he eats and eats, shovelling the food into his mouth two hands at a time, a

thought strikes him. It surprises him, as he has not needed to think in almost five hundred

years. He thinks, forcing the cogs in his brain to start moving again, the strain very evident on

18

his face. Suddenly the thought becomes clear: “d-d-d-danger.” He immediately jumps up in

anticipation for the attack; nothing comes.

A high-pitched deafening scream suddenly irradiates around Heracles.

“DANGERRR!” He recognises the voice; it has been a long time since he has heard it but it

was good to remember her. It is the scream of Athena, goddess of war, half-sister to Heracles.

He had forgotten about her. She continues to say “There’s danger, Heracles, little brother,

you are needed once more. Quick, you must hurry; there is not much time. You will find the

danger where knowledge reaches minds; where books cover walls. Go now, I will see you

soon.” As quickly as the voice came it disappeared, Heracles was alone once again.

Heracles was never the smartest person around but he always knew how to help. It

takes a few painful minutes for Heracles to figure out where the danger is but luckily, he has

picked up a thing or two in his never-ending life. He rushes gallantly towards Swansea

University; once on campus he does not stop to catch his breath. He continues rushing past all

the young students unaware of the danger that surrounds them. They are blurs,

unrecognisable, he moves at an inhuman speed. Finally, he reaches the library and storms

inside. He stands in the centre not knowing which direction to go until he hears the voice

again, a voice that makes him feel at home. “Go to the west-wing, down two floors”. He

smiles knowing that she is watching him, knowing he is not alone. Within seconds he is

downstairs finding himself in the Latin and Ancient Greek section of the giant library (what

are the chances). He searches with fervour for the danger, not knowing what he is looking

for. He hopes that Athena will help again but she says nothing. He keeps searching, getting

more and more impatient.

A simple box of average size, ironically, under Sophocles’ Women of Trachis, the

play which depicts Heracles’ death. He slowly bends down, reaching his right hand toward

the golden clasp that is holding the lid shut. He pulls open the clasp; with a small click the

19

box opens. What is revealed makes Heracles’ heart sink; modern technology has never been

his strong point but he knows he is looking at a bomb. He looks around him and pulls a

switch sounding an alarm to evacuate the building. Five minutes remaining on the clock. Not

enough time to get help. Not enough time to do anything. He is frozen, for the first time in his

long life he is defeated. He cannot beat the bomb and he knows there is no chance that the

building has been fully evacuated. He looks at the timer seeing the last ten seconds of his life

ticking by, realising that this could be his end. He throws himself onto the bomb hoping that

his body would shield the blast, minimising its damage. The timer reaches zero.

The burning pages of Women of Trachis fall slowly to the ground landing in ashes of

what once has been. There is nothing but silence.

Justification

I came up with The Last Act myth while reading Euripides’ Heracles; in this tragedy

Euripides challenges the traditional recount of Heracles and his labours. He does this by

changing the cause for Heracles to embark on his labours. Traditionally, Heracles embarks on

his labours after he killed his wife and children, not before as Euripides does. In Heracles,

Heracles is on his final labour, going to the underworld, but when he returns he is driven mad

and he kills his wife and children. This made me consider what happened after Heracles is

poisoned by the cloak, sent to him by Deianeira in Sophocles’ Women of Trachis.

Traditionally he becomes immortal and allowed into Olympus. He then marries Hebe, Hera’s

daughter. I wanted to explore what would happen if Heracles was granted immortality but

Hera refused to let him live in Olympus and was not allowed to marry Hebe. Like Euripides I

challenged the traditional representation of the great hero.

The Last Act is set in the modern world because the idea of immortality is something

strived for in modern medicine. Making a modern invention destroy immortality represents

20

the impossibility of immortality and shows how modern civilisation is destroying itself. This

is similar to Deianeira, in Women of Trachis, because she tries to use a love potion on

Heracles to make him love her but this results in his death, as it was actually a poison. There

is a theme of striving for the impossible, which will cause the inevitable: death. The Last Act

is a suitable myth because it ends in death similar to both Heracles and The Women of

Trachis and the traditional myth of Heracles as seen in Apollodorus’ The Library of Greek

Mythology.1

The Last Act is a Heracles myth because of the characterisation of Heracles. This can

be seen in the traditional aspect of Heracles’ large appetite which is shown in many Greek

plays, most prominently in Aristophanes’ Frogs’ and also in Euripedes’ Alcestis: ‘tell those

whose job it is to lay on plenty of food’. (L.548) Also, in Alcestis, Heracles is not shown as

the most aware. Not realising that they were mourning the loss of Alcestis, he has to be told

directly, “it’s Admetus’ wife who has died.” (L.822) This can be seen in The Last Act with

his difficulty in understanding basic modern technology, but when it matters he knows what

he has to do which can also be seen in Alcestis (L.840) with him going to get Alcestis from

Death and return her to Admetus.

In addition, Athena often helps Heracles during his labours.2 This is seen in The Last

Act, as Athena warns Heracles about the danger in the library. She helps him with what he

was unable to do himself, to die. It is their final act together. The Last Acts ends with an

image of Women of Trachis burning: this is to link the original death of Heracles with him

burning at the pyre, which is what is left in the audience minds in Women of Trachis as

Heracles is carried off stage (L.1264). This confirms to the reader that Heracles has died in

The Last Act.

1 Apollodorus, II.7.7.

2 Apollodorus, II.5.6.

21

There is also the continuing threat of Hera throughout Heracles life that continues in

The Last Act. Hera is never directly referenced as trying to take Heracles life. The audience

only know that she is mad at Zeus for having a child with Alcmene: ‘Zeus [...] made me an

object of hatred to Hera’ (L.1264). Hera placing the bomb that would kill Heracles is her

final revenge on Zeus but without realising, she helps Heracles. This can be seen as her

finally accepting Heracles and allowing him to go to Olympus and marry Hebe. It could also

be that she successfully finds a way to end Heracles’ life, making her triumphant in her

hatred for him.

There are many aspects within The Last Act which correspond to writers in the ancient

world. This makes it a fitting myth, in keeping with what the ancient audience would have

understood while adapted to entertain a modern audience and maintaining an element of

realism to the story.

Eugenia Gower, 823406@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Of Gods and Heroes – Greek Mythology (CLC101)

Bibliography

Heracles and Other Plays, Heracles, Euripides, trans. Robin Waterfield, Oxford World’s

Classics, 2008.

Electra and Other Plays, Women of Trachis, Sophocles, trans. David Raeburn, Penguin

Classics, 2008.

The Library of Greek Mythology, Apollodorus, trans. Robin Hard. Oxford World’s Classics,

2008.

22

How important was farming

(socially, economically, politically, and culturally) for a Greek polis?

For almost all Greek poleis farming and agriculture were the economic base, as well as the

main economic activities, for all citizens. It has been estimated that in the fifth to third

centuries BC up to 90 per cent of citizens in a polis would have been involved in agriculture.1

As such farming was central to the social, cultural and political structure of the polis, and all

of these aspects were intertwined entities.2 Access to land was critical to physical, social and

political survival for most people in the ancient world, and commerce and agriculture were

vital to a functioning polis.3 4 It is impossible to think of the economy of the Greek polis

without also thinking of the social aspects, and the same for the political and cultural aspects.

Farming was an intrinsic activity for almost all Greeks, whatever their status or social

standing, and all would have been involved in some way, whether it was farming their own

land, having slaves farm their land, or even leasing their land to others.

Due to the Mediterranean climate, there were a number of crops that grew particularly

well throughout Greece and therefore formed the base of the average diet. These included

grains, which were a crucial staple of the Mediterranean diet, olives, vines for wine, and other

crops that would have been grown to support income as well as for diversity in food. These

included nuts, such as almonds and walnuts, figs, beans, and lentils.5 As well as crops, many

farmers would increase their use of the land by grazing animals such as goats and sheep,

1 S. Pomeroy, S. Burstein, I. Donlan and J. Roberts. (1998) Ancient Greece: A Political, Social and Cultural

History. New York: Oxford University Press, 4. 2 M. Austin and P. Vidal-Naquet. (1977) Economic and Social History of Ancient Greece. Berkeley and Los

Angeles: University of California Press, 8. 3 Money, Labour and Land: Approaches to the economies of Ancient Greece, (2002) ed. By Paul Cartledge,

Edward E. Cohen and Lin Foxhall (Routledge: London) 210. 4 Pomeroy, Burstein, Donlan and Roberts (1998) 285.

5 R. J. Hopper. (1979) Trade and Industry in Classical Greece. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 60. Aineias

the Tactician, How to Survive under Siege, trans. D. Whitehead (Cambridge, MA: Bristol Classical Press, 2002)

29.4-7.

23

especially if they had steep hilly plots that they could not afford to terrace.6 Agriculture was

intensive and all members of the family, alongside slaves if they were considered cost

effective, would have been involved; additionally, so would hire workers if the landowner

had enough land to justify this. As well as being intensive, farming was an incredibly risky

venture, especially with the temperamental weather patterns in the Mediterranean. There are

many examples of failed crops due to lack of rainfall or other mitigating circumstances, and

poleis would try to combat famine by storing extra crops, importing crops in years of bad

harvests or finding ways of extra income in order to buy the crops needed to survive another

year. In addition to agriculture, pasture of animals was also integral to the polis. Sacrifice was

an intrinsic part of the polis life both socially and culturally, and the animals had to be reared

in order to appease the Gods. Goats and sheep were the most commonly sacrificed as they

were the dominant livestock due to the less arable nature of the land in a lot of the Greek

countryside. The animals would have then been sold to citizens, in an attempt to appease the

gods and to add some variety to the diet of many citizens, as meat was not something that

would have been wasted.7

Farming and trade were intrinsically linked in the ancient world, and there were

various ways a farmer could go about trading excess crops, especially grain. The ‘diversity of

natural resources in the ancient world made trade a necessity’: no polis had everything they

needed and therefore trade was the easiest way to ensure they could survive.8 One method

would be trade in the market place of the main centre of the polis, between neighbours. This

could have been done through bartering for crops that were needed, or exchanging for coins,

something which many poleis established in the sixth to fifth centuries B.C.9 This type of

trade was important socially, for establishing a sense of community between neighbours, also

6 T. Van Andel and C. Runnels. (1987) Beyond the Acropolis: A Rural Greek Past. Stanford, CA; Stanford

University Press, 104. 7 M. Jameson, 'Sacrifice and animal husbandry in Classical Greece', Pastoral Economies in Classical Antiquity,

Cambridge Philological Society, Vol. 14. (1988, 87-119) 87-88. 8 Pomeroy, Burstein, Donland and Roberts (1998) 242.

9 A. Andrewes. (1967) Greek Society. London: Penguin, 139-142.

24

economically, by bringing in extra income that could be invested back into the land or saved

to prepare for times when harvests were not as bountiful.10 Another way farmers could trade

was by selling their crops to merchants who would then export these crops, searching for

places that perhaps had bad harvests, but also that had a commodity that could be transported

back, so as not to waste a return trip. Most poleis at some point would have to import grain,

especially due to bad harvest, but for the most part were not dependent on grain imports,

apart from a select few states such as Athens.11 Demosthenes states that the Athenians

imported 400,000 medimnoi of grain a year from the Black Sea region alone, but Sicily and

Egypt were also large suppliers.12 Farming was important for Greek poleis as it helped, via

trade, to build relations politically with other states. Inscriptions, such as the one from Cyrene

dating from around 330 B.C., show how they enforced political alliances by directly

exporting excess crops across the Greek world. Their export of crops, that may or may not

have been given for free, totalled over 800,000 medimnoi of grain, which Rhodes and

Osborne estimate being worth roughly 400-700 talents.13

For Greeks the ideal was a life as a free landowner able to provide for themselves and

their family. Even early sources such as Homer and Hesiod understood that agriculture was

central to a civilised life, and later sources such as Aristotle and Xenophon placed farmers

and agriculture above artisans and crafts in their importance to the polis.14 In fact, Xenophon

went so far as to praise agriculture as the mother of all sciences, arts and civilisation.15 In

Homer, land is used in every form, for agriculture; including for vegetables, grains, and

produce-bearing trees, as well as for pasture, a criterion on which Homer used to establish

10

Aineias, How to Survive under Siege, 29.4-7. 11

Hopper (1979), 48. 12

Demosthenes, Against Leptines, trans. C.A Vince and J. H. Vince (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press, 1926) 20.31-32. 13

P. J. Rhodes and R. Osborne (2003) Greek Historical Inscriptions: 404-323 BC. Oxford: Oxford University

Press, Inscription 95. 14

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977), 11-12. 15

Xenophon, Oeconomicus, trans. E. C Marchant (Loeb, Vol 168. 1923) 5.1-20.

25

wealth.16 As such farming was a tradition for Greeks, a tradition that had been passed down

through the years and as such was fundamental to the success of the polis. Most poleis were

started as small farms and villages that eventually decided it would be mutually beneficial if

they established a defensible territory and social centre. This is called synoecism – which

literally means ‘settling together’. Although many inhabitants of the polis would have to walk

to the town, it provided security, community and access to trade and goods. These is even

written about by Homer, as Austin and Vidal-Naquet tell us, and are shown to be primitive

forms of the polis known in the Classical period.17

Farming became a status symbol for many states, an activity at which they were so

good that it became synonymous with their name, or was used as a symbol to recognise the

state. One such example is that of Metapontum, a colony in the South of Italy that was known

for its fertile land. It used an ear of corn on its coinage as a way of showing that they were

proud of their grain production and exports. In this way farming was as much a part of their

culture, as it was important to the people of Metapontum as a defining feature of their polis.18

Metapontum was set up for agriculture, shown through the layout of the city itself,

discovered through aerial photographs. It has been estimated that Metapontum had

approximately 700 farms within an area of 6,500 ha. Although it cannot be assured that all of

these were inhabited at the same time, there is still a high proportion of habitation that is not

centralized to the main town of the polis.19 Another way that Metapontum showed that

farming was important economically, but also culturally, to the polis was by sending a

‘golden harvest’ to Delphi, which probably came in the form of a golden ear of grain; the

16

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977), 41. 17

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977), 40-41. 18

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977), 63. 19

S. Isager and J. E. Skydsgaard. (1995) Ancient Greek Agriculture: An Introduction. Florence, KY: Routledge,

69-71.

26

city’s emblem.20 This was a very public declaration, and would have been done to show other

states that they were accomplished and proud of their agrarian heritage.

Culturally, religion was another way that poleis showed that farming was important to

them. The Greeks had many gods and goddesses that were related to farming. They would

hold festivals, make sacrifices and build temples to these gods and goddesses to ensure that

they were pleased and therefore would provide a good harvest. Demeter, goddess of fertility

and cereal crops, and Dionysus, god of wine, were two of the most important deities

worshipped with regards to agriculture. Demeter was particularly worshipped in Eleusis in

Attica; the Athenians claimed that she had revealed to them the secret of agriculture there,

and that they had graciously shared it. To them, this agricultural tradition was of great

cultural importance and was a proud symbol for their polis. The worship of Dionysus was

much wilder, as one might expect from the god of wine, but it is hard to say to what extent he

was worshipped within the polis. Dionysus was seen as a god who sent women mad and who

was worshipped by the ‘maenads’. His lack of a polis may have helped reinforce the ‘wild’

nature of the god.21 Another important goddess in regards to agriculture is Persephone. She

was the daughter of Demeter and goddess of the grain but her importance came in the way

she was used to explain the seasons. It is said that Hades kidnapped and married her and after

eating a pomegranate from the underworld, she was required to stay for a third of the year,

explaining to Greek farmers the seasons in which nothing grew.22 The women of a poleis

commemorated this with a festival called the Thesmophoria, which was female only and

dedicated to Demeter and Persephone. It was a mandatory event for married women, proving

to be very culturally and socially important.23 Festivals, as Aristotle tells us, usually occurred

after the harvest as this coincided best with the agrarian calendar in terms of leisure time.

20

Strabo, The Geography of Strabo, Ed. H. L. Jones. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1924) 6.264

and Metapontum, Lucania (Italy) http://www.willamette.edu/cla/classics/resources/hfma/coininfo/019.html

[08/11/2013]. 21

A. Andrewes. (1967) 256-257. 22

W. Burkert, Greek Religion (1985). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 159-160. 23

W. Burkert, (1985) 242-243.

27

These festivals would have used animals and food grown during the season as sacrifices and

offerings, as well as during processions, whilst also celebrating the harvest as a community.

Socially, they were incredibly important for the people and helped to keep the tradition of

farming alive within a community. 24

For farming to take place, a polis had to ensure that there was enough land to go

around and distribution of land varied from state to state. At some point, it is thought that

most states would have divided up the land equally between citizens. Ownership of land was

often the foundation of a citizen’s rights, although this was often reversed in that being a

citizen became justification to a claim of land ownership.25 However, over time, through

inheritance and marriage, land plots would have been divided, decreased and spread out. A

man may own one plot of land that he inherited from his father, and another in a completely

different area of the polis due to the dowry he received when he married. There were both

benefits and problems with this concept to a landowner. If their land was spread over the

poleis, they had a better chance of a successful harvest, and by growing different crops

harvesting these would not be a problem. However, if a man’s land was constantly divided

for inheritance and dowry, he risked his plot becoming so small that he could not support

himself or his family and therefore would be reduced to poverty.26 However, it was possible

to rent land from people or establishments that had a surplus. One example we have of this is

an inscription of a lease for the land of a temple in Arkesine, on the island of Amorgos. It

details all the conditions a tenant must fulfil in order to ensure that the land is kept in a good

condition, and also that they get the most out of the land.27 For some farmers, this would have

been a better solution, a way of ensuring that they had enough land to remain self-sufficient.

Land ownership and leasing was economically important but also culturally, as shown

24

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, translated by H. Rackham. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1934)

Vol. 19, 1160a. 25

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977) 24-25. 26

Austin and Vidal-Naquet (1977) 58. 27

Rhodes and Osborne (2003) Inscription 59.

28

through this example. The rent given to the temple would have gone straight back into the

state and/or the temple itself.28

Those who had extra land, however, may not always have leased it out and many

would have preferred to buy slaves to work the land for them. Land ownership had the

greatest value politically, socially, and as a status symbol. In many states the majority of the

land was controlled by the rich and influential. Slavery was a large part of agriculture and

was used over almost all of the ancient world as a cheap workforce.29 Although some Greek

workers would have hired themselves out for work, most free citizens avoided this due to the

connotations of slavery that accompanied this work; for them it was an ‘obligation to

maintain an independence of occupation … and at all costs to avoid seeming to work in a

“slavish” way for another’.30 Weinemann mentions that despite many influential Greeks

having slaves, they were ‘hostile to those who traded in them’, and Herodotus tells us how

many slaves were kidnapped freedmen. He mentions especially the cases of eunuchs, who

were often kidnapped as young, attractive boys and castrated before being sold to non-

Greeks.31 Xenophon, in particular, believed that slaves were important for agriculture and that

agriculture was important to men who aspired to greatness:

So if you are going to be a good farmer, you must make your workers co-

operative and willing to obey you; and when you lead men against an enemy

you must try to achieve this too, by giving rewards to those who behave as

brave men should, and punishing those who lack discipline.32

28

N. Papazarkadas. (2011) Sacred and Public Land in Ancient Athens. New York: Oxford University Press, 11-

12. 29

T. Wiedemann. (1980) Greek and Roman Slavery. Florence, KY: Routledge, 7. 30

Money, Labour and Land, 100. 31

T. Wiedemann (1980) 102 and Herodotus, The Histories, trans. By R. Waterfield. (New York; Oxford

University Press, 1998) 8.104-106. 32

Xenophon, 5.

29

In this way, Xenophon helps us understand how slaves played a role in the importance of

farming to a Greek polis. Farming was a way a man could learn how to be a leader and

successfully take control if he wished his endeavours to succeed. Since there was little time to

train for war, farming was a way that citizens could combine their training with their

livelihood, and this enabled the polis to ensure that it was ready for warfare, and remain a

significant political power.

Sparta is an example of a polis that successfully used slaves as their primary

workforce, but also embodied this concept, and therefore not only excelled at agriculture, but

also at warfare.33 The Spartan state was built on farming, and without it, it would not have

become the state we know it as. In the eighth century B.C., the Spartans enslaved their

neighbours in Messenia and took their land, re-branding them ‘helots’: serf like workers who

were bound to the land and forced to pay a quota of their produce to their Spartan masters.34

Since coinage and most forms of economic activity were banned in Sparta, this was

practically the only way they could ensure they had enough food to ensure self-sufficiency.

This use of helots to farm, which supported the state, meant that the Spartans could spend

their time training and ensuring they were in peak physical condition, ready for war at any

moment. However, Cartledge tells us that the very existence of Sparta ‘was constantly

menaced by the helots’, and that Sparta’s stability was undermined by the helots and ‘shot

through with aggressive competitiveness and constant, sometimes unbearable tension at all

levels’.35 Helots were both a blessing and a curse for Sparta, providing a workforce that

would take the agricultural and economic problems away but that also required constant

supervision and subduing if they were to avoid rebellion, something that had problems with

in the fifth century B.C. especially. For the polis of Sparta as a whole, helots were important

33

Xenophon, 5. 34

T. J. Figueria, 'Mess Contributions and Subsistence at Sparta', Transaction of the American Philological

Society Vol. 114 (1984), 87-109 (87) and SPARTA.

http://www.portergaud.edu/academic/faculty/mcarver/cmcarver/spar.html (10/11/2013). 35

P. Cartledge. (1987) Agesilaos and the Crisis of Sparta. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 13-

18.

30

to farming, which in turn was important socially, politically, culturally and economically to

the survival of Sparta as a military state with significant power in the Greek world.

In conclusion, farming was important to the Greek polis is a number of ways. Politically, it

helped increase foreign relations through trade, and helped enforce alliances through this

trade. Farming also helped provide for the state as a whole; leasing land from the state and

paying taxes ensured that the polis could grow, with the money being used for festivals,

buildings and the military. This in turn helped to increase the sense of polis community.

Socially, farming increased the sense of community and farmer-citizens would have been

willing to die to preserve their freedom and ‘ancestral earth’.36 Furthermore, without farming

and the original inhabitants of a polis’ territory, the polis would never have come into being.

It was only through social agreement that it would be mutually beneficial to form a centre to

a territory that the polis truly came into being, and farming was instrumental in this.

Culturally, farming was influence by religion, and vice versa as religion incorporated the

agrarian calendar, made use of sacrifices grown by citizens of the polis, and celebrated that

which grew in Greece with patron gods and goddesses of grain and wine, two of Greece’s

largest grown crops. Most importantly, farming was economically essential to a polis.

Without farming, the polis would never have been able to sustain itself. Self-sufficiency was

the aim of every polis, and provided a common aim, but it was the economic factors of

farming that truly helped it to thrive and flourish, as well as uniting a polis in a common goal.

Laura Bailey, 741291@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Greek City States (CLH264)

36

Pomeroy, Burstein, Donlan and Roberts (1998) 4.

31

Bibliography

Secondary sources

Andrewes, A. (1967) Greek Society. London: Penguin Books Ltd.

Austin, M. M. and P. Vidal-Naquet. (1977) Economic and Social History of Ancient Greece.

Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Burkert, W. Greek Religion (1985). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Cartledge, P. (1987) Agesilaos and the Crisis of Sparta. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins

University Press.

Cartledge, P., E. E Cohen and L. Foxhall eds. Money, Labour and Land: Approaches to the

economies of Ancient Greece, (2002) (Routledge: London).

Figueria, T. J. ‘Mess Contributions and Subsistence at Sparta’, Transaction of the American

Philological Society. Vol. 114 (1984), 87-109.

Hopper, R. J. (1979) Trade and Industry in Classical Greece. London: Thames and Hudson

Ltd.

Isager, S. and J. E. Skydsgaard. (1995) Ancient Greek Agriculture: An Introduction. Florence,

KY: Routledge.

Jameson, M. H. ‘Sacrifice and animal husbandry in Classical Greece’, Pastoral Economies in

Classical Antiquity, Cambridge Philological Society, Vol. 14. (1988), 87-119.

Papazarkadas, N. (2011) Sacred and Public Land in Ancient Athens. New York: Oxford

University Press.

Pomeroy, S. B, S. M Burstein, I. W. Donlan and J. T. Roberts. (1998) Ancient Greece: A

Political, Social and Cultural History. New York: Oxford University Press.

Rhodes, P. J. and R. Osborne. (2003) Greek Historical Inscriptions: 404-323 BC. Oxford:

Oxford University Press.

Van Andel, T. H. and C. Runnels. (1987) Beyond the Acropolis: A Rural Greek Past.

Stanford, CA; Stanford University Press.

32

Wiedemann, T. (1980) Greek and Roman Slavery. Florence, KY: Routledge.

Metpontum, Lucania (Italy).

<http://www.willamette.edu/cla/classics/resources/hfma/coininfo/019.html>

(08/11/2013).

SPARTA. <http://www.portergaud.edu/academic/faculty/mcarver/cmcarver/spar.html>

(10/11/2013).

Primary sources

Aineias the Tactician, How to Survive under Siege, trans. D. Whitehead (Cambridge, MA:

Bristol Classical Press, 2002).

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, translated by H. Rackham. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press, 1934) Vol. 19.

Demosthenes, Against Leptines, trans. C.A Vince and J. H. Vince (Cambridge, MA: Harvard

University Press, 1926).

Herodotus, The Histories, trans. By R. Waterfield. (New York; Oxford University Press,

1998).

Strabo, The Geography of Strabo, Ed. H. L. Jones. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press, 1924).

Xenophon, Oeconomicus, trans. E. C Marchant (Loeb Classical Library, Vol 168. 1923).

33

What was the league of German girls?

After Hitler came to power, he highlighted the importance of the youth outside the

classroom.1 By 1930, the Nazis attempted to organise girls in the Third Reich by the section

of the Hitler Youth: the League of German Girls, Bund deutscher Mädchen.2 The BdM was

seen as the third educational organization in society. Dagmar Reese suggests that its purpose

was to educate female German youth in the ideals of the National Socialist.3 However,

memoirs from previous BdM members show that the purpose of the league was to give young

girls opportunities in different organised indoor and outdoor activities that took up most of

their waking hours, and also offer opportunities in job training. In contrast, due to the war,

the purpose of the BdM changed to prepare girls for their future roles as mothers and

housewives. In 1938, Belief and Beauty Society – Glaube und Schӧnheit – was established

for women aged eighteen to twenty-one because the programme for the BdM was not suitable

for the older girls in order to educate them to be mothers.

German girls entered the Hitler Youth from the age of ten because according to

Balder von Schirach, this marked the end of childhood.4 They spent the first four years in the

Young Girls, Jungmädel, after which they moved on to the League of German Girls proper,

Bund deutscher Mädchen. Again, girls were involved in this league for four years and finally

they joined another BdM body called Faith and Beauty.5

All the groups were under direct

control of von Schirach who was also in charge of the Hitler Youth.6 After 1933, membership

1 Matthew Stibble, Women in the Third Reich (London: Arnold, 2003), p. 110.

2 Jill Stephenson, Women in Nazi society (London: Croom Helm, 1975), p. 3.

3 Dagmar Reese, translated by William Templer, Growing up female in Nazi Germany, (Ann Arbor: University

of Michigan Press, 2006), p. 21. 4 Reese, p. 22.

5 Ute Frevert, translated by Stuart McKinnon-Evans in association with Terry Bond and Barbara Norden,

Women in German history: From bourgeois emancipation to sexual liberation (Published: Oxford: Berg, 1988),

p. 243. 6 Chris Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Early Years (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/history.html> [accessed 12 December 2013].

34

of the BdM was voluntary. The number of girls joining the group grew rapidly, especially

when comparing it the number of boys entering the HJ.7

‘The BdM, directed, educated, steered and prepared girls away from certain

occupations and encouraged them in others’.8 Anson Rabinbach and Sander Gilman claim

that the BdM prepared young girls for their future roles as mothers and wives.9 Chris

Crawford suggests that this was done by involving the girls in programmes and activities that

were for the good of the people, which included collecting for the Winter Relief or helping

with the harvest.10 The young girls were also taught skills in bed-making whilst expected to

remain honourably pure, clean and serious.11 In contrast, Uta Frevert suggests that no BdM

group referred to settling down in a home. Frevert goes as far to claim that little attention was

paid to Hitler’s statement that one day all girls would grow up to be mothers and care for

their husband.12 Instead, the BdM offered girls distinct training courses and conferences that

taught them how to hold position of responsibility.13 Therefore the BdM taught girls how to

look after themselves as well as preparing them for domestic and motherly tasks. However,

preparation for motherhood was low on the list of priorities for the league.14

Dr. Jutta Rüdiger was the highest leader of the BdM who was the national speaker of

the group from 1937 to 1945. Von Schirach allowed Rüdiger and the other leaders of the

BdM to control their own group without interfering,15 but offering advice when needed.

Rüdiger stated in an interview what the purpose of the BdM was to her and other BdM

leaders. The league gave girls a number of opportunities that were not available to them

previously, such as teaching them to look after themselves whilst openly advertising jobs and

7 Stibble, p. 113.

8 Frevert, p. 241.

9 ‘Educating the Race,’ The Third Reich sourcebook, ed. by Anson Rabinbach and Sander Gilman (Berkeley), p.

245. 10

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Years 1932 until 1945. 11

Richard Grunberger, A Social History of the Third Reich (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1971), p. 278. 12

Frevert, p. 245. 13

Ibid. p. 243. 14

Stibble, p. 116. 15

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Early Years.

35

job training to help them in the future.16 ‘We in the League were determined that every girl

should be able to stand on her own feet, whether she was married or not’.17 This statement is

useful because it shows that the BdM was not all about teaching the young girls about their

future as mothers and wives but it gave them other opportunities and skills, therefore direct

reference to home and family life in the education of girls had little significance. This source

is also useful because it shows that the leaders of the BdM, including Rüdiger, educated the

German girls in their own interest and that of the country. Conversely, the problem that lies

within this source is its clarity, regarding when Rüdiger stated this. If it was before 1936, this

was what the BdM offered German girls, however, if Rüdiger announced this after 1936

when the HJ announced that the BdM would change its format, it shows that the leaders had a

different perspective on what the role of women should be and did not agree with the Nazi

ideologies.

Frau Ursula Meyer-Semlies, an ordinary German woman, recalled her childhood and

youth in Germany during the Third Reich in two books. The purpose of her memoir was to

capture her memories in the BdM and to show that there was a diversity of different women’s

experiences.18 The memoir is useful because it shows that the BdM was not all about teaching

German girls how to be a perfect housewife and mother, but there was more to it. ‘We sang a

lot… a lot of folk songs’.19 It is also useful because it shows that the BdM was not always

used to indoctrinate the youth into the Nazi ideas and beliefs. ‘And really not so much about

National Socialisms’.20 This makes one question whether the Nazi party knew exactly what

was going on in the BdM, if they supported it, or whether they were content that despite some

of the activities, it was preparing girls to accept rules, develop a sense of national identity and

belonging to a uniformed organisation.

16

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Early Years. 17

Johannes Steinhoff, Peter Pechel, Dennis Showalter, Voices from the Third Reich: an oral history, 1st Da

Capo Press ed. (New York: Da Capo Press, 1994), pp. 19–20. 18

Alison Owing, Frauen: German Women Recall the Third Reich (London: Penguin, 1995), p. 57. 19

Owing, p. 57. 20

Ibid.

36

The BdM offered German girls a number of opportunities in a variety of activities,

summer camps, and sports. Matthew Stibble proposes that the BdM gave the German girls an

opportunity to take part in out-of-school activities.21 When weather permitted, the Jungmädel

and the BdM girls participated in ball games, running, camping, bicycle rides, sport

competitions, and hiking trips to visit major rivers in Germany and the countryside. The

hiking trips sometimes included overnight stays in youth hostels and hotels.22 The BdM also

offered girls a chance to attend summer camps, which Crawford claims gave girls the

opportunity to spend time with friends away from their family, from school and to meet

others their own age with similar interests. Camp also gave girls the chance to participate in

new things and to see new places.23 Geoff Layton proposes that the league offered

opportunities that were not previously heard of during the Third Reich, especially for poorer

families.24 During the Third Reich and before, it was also unheard of for young girls to attend

trips and holidays without their parents for an extended period of time.25 The idea of sports,

camping, hiking, singing and music excited a number of girls, especially those from poorer

backgrounds. Therefore, the BdM gave German girls new opportunities and a number of

activities and sports that they could participate in.

Ute Frevert proposes that the BdM also provided the youth an opportunity of escape

from the restrictions and responsibilities that characterized female socialisation, giving them

a short duration of freedom.26 Stibble argues that the youth groups before 1939 were a way in

which the young people could express themselves freely, in ways that had not been open in

previous generations.27

21

Stibble, p. 114. 22

Frevert, pp. 244–245. 23

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Peacetime activities (2011)

http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/peacetime.html [accessed 13 December 2013]. 24

Geoff Layton, Germany: The Third Reich 1933-45 (London: Hodder education, 2005), p. 65. 25

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Years 1932 until 1945 (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/history.html> [accessed 12 December 2013]. 26

Frevert, p. 244. 27

Stibble, p. 116.

37

Renate Finckh, a BdM member from the age of ten onwards, recalls why she joined

the league in an interview in an edited book by Charles Schüddekopf ‘Im Gespräch mit Heike

Mundzeck,’ Schüddekopf, Der alltägliche Faschismus. Frauen im Dritten Reich.28 The

purpose of this interview was that Finckh wanted to tell her own story of how the evil Nazi

party inspired her so deeply to join. Finckh claims she joined because she felt lonely and

wanted to feel part of something. ‘At home no one really had time for me’.29 This source is

useful because it shows what the BdM could offer the girls that joined new friendship and a

sense of purpose and belonging.30 ‘I finally found an emotional home, a safe refuge, and

shortly thereafter also a space in which I was valued’.31 Gerda Zorn also claims while writing

about her years in the BdM that she joined the league for the need of friendship. This

statement is useful because it suggests that Gerda Zorn joined the BdM because she wanted

to feel the excitement and to enjoy the friendship and the activities that the BdM offered. She

did not join because she agreed with the regime’s ideologies and beliefs.32

Each BdM group in different towns and cities had to meet at least twice a week in two

types of meetings. One meeting was called Heimatabend, social evening. This was held at a

local community centre or in a room of the local National-Socialist Party building on a

Saturday afternoon or evening, which was led by a group leader, who was an older girl. It

was largely up to the group leader what the duration of the meeting entailed; most of the

groups sang and participated in the arts and crafts. In contrast, there was also a required

curriculum of political lessons.33 The girls participated in memorizing information about

Hitler and all the verses of the Deutschland and Horst Wessel Song, an outline map of

28

Claudia Koonz, Mothers in the fatherland: women, the family, and Nazi politics (New York: St.Martin's

Press, 1987), pp. 194-95. 29

Koonz, pp. 194-195. 30

Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich in Power (London: Penguin, 2006), p. 275. 31

Koonz, pp. 194–195. 32

Ibid. p. 194. 33

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Years 1932 until 1945

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/history.html> [accessed 12 December 2013].

38

Germany and the importance and details of the Treaty of Versailles.34 Layton proposes that

the BdM as well as the other youth organizations emphasised on political indoctrination,

highlighting the life and achievements of Hitler and German loyalty.35

Ruth Reibnagel states in a memoir what exactly the social evenings were. The

purpose of this source is to give her side of the story, what she experienced and can

remember, which details the BdM teaching the girls about the ideologies and beliefs of the

Nazis – It was not all about fun, games and participating in different activities. It is evident

from Reibnagel’s memoir that the BdM did have a political purpose. Reibnagel states

‘During our meetings, two or three of the older girls who were leaders taught us about the

ideals and beliefs of national socialism’.36 The political lessons also highlighted Germany’s

success.37 A memoir is useful to a historian because it is first-hand information. Historical

monographs and photographs can only provide so much information, whereas memoirs

extend that information.38 The evidence provided in this memoir supports the BdM as a

league that indoctrinated the German girls into the Nazis success whilst highlighting the

importance of Germany.

However, many girls did not pay attention when the social evenings turned to politics.

Crawford argues that a number of members believed that these lessons were dull but

something they had to sit through,39 highlighting that the BdM was not a completely effective

way of indoctrinating the youth into the regimes beliefs. Ursula Dickreuther, also a former

member of the BdM claims, ‘Of course we also had to go through some political lessons, but

34

Grunberger, p. 278. 35

Layton, p. 63. 36

Ruth Reibnagel, translated by Chris Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Jungmädel (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/narratives.html> [accessed 16 December 2013]. 37

Reibnagel, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Jungmädel. 38

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel (2011) <http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/narratives.html> [accessed

16 December 2013]. 39

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Years 1932 until 1945.

39

we just suffered through those. I never actually felt indoctrinated,’40 supporting the BdM as

an organisation that offered social activities, as opposed to Nazi indoctrination.

The second meeting involved sports, which were separate from the social evenings,

taking place in the afternoon, normally on a Wednesday and were under the observation of

local leaders. Girls took part in gymnastic, athletics (which included track and field), and they

played games.41 Crawford suggests that physical training did not play an important role in the

BdM when comparing it to the male HJ. However, regular sports were still part of the

programme.42

Reese argues that in 1936, the structure of the BdM changed due to the Hitler Youth

Law, which stated that the BdM should educate and shape the German youth, physically and

mentally with the ideologies of Nazi party.43 Girls were to be taught domestic science,

domestic economics, and caring for their children whilst serving the nation and their

community.44 Hitler stated at a speech at the youth rally in Berlin on May 1st

1936 that the

BdM should educate German girls into strong and brave women. ‘And you in the BdM

educate the girls – make them for me into strong brave women’. The Reich Youth leader also

claimed that the purpose of the BdM was to change and develop girls into champions of the

Nazis worldview.45 Consequently, due to the Hitler Youth Law, towards the end of the 1930s,

a number of feminine activities were added to the BdM programme. However, Arno Klӧnne

argues that the organization for women, which taught the skills of a housewife and a devoted

mother and wife, did not change its structure and teachings until the end of 1930s.46

40

Ursula Dickreuther, translated by Chris Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The League of German Girls

(2011) <http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/narratives.html> [accessed 16 December 2013]. 41

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Years 1932 until 1945. 42

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel:Peacetime activities. 43

Reese, p. 36. 44

Ibid. p. 37. 45

Ibid. p. 41. 46

Ibid. p. 4.

40

In contrast, Crawford proposes that due to the war, the programme for the BdM

changed once again.47 Also, by March 1939, membership of the HJ groups became

compulsory, which included the BdM.48 Reese also argues that during the war, the meaning

of the HJ disappeared.49 A schedule about the wartime work of the Hitler Youth was

established, giving the members of the HJ and BdM ideas of what they could do to help the

war. When the local BdM groups met, they spent their hours writing letters to soldiers,

making care packages, knitting wool gloves, ear warmers, and socks for the soldiers at the

front. They also made straw slippers for the wounded troops. The German girls welcomed

soldiers home from the front, or soldiers that were going off to war, with hot coffee or fresh

sandwiches.50 Helga Brachmann, a former member of the BdM, recalls her memories in the

BdM in 1938. The fact that she is writing about her experience in the BdM in 1938 gives us

an estimate date of when she joined. The purpose of her memoir was that she wanted to

explain to the younger generation who had not experienced the war what the BdM was and

why she joined. Brachmann proposes that she and other girls in her group performed old folk

songs to wounded soldiers during the war.51 Historians can use this source to compare it to

other BdM memoirs before the war to witness the evolution of the league’s role. However,

the limitation of this source is that it does not state exactly when it was written and does not

go into great detail about the activities during the war. During the war, The BdM changed

their activities to helping the soldiers at the front or who came home wounded.

In 1937, there was discussion over what should be done with German girls between

the ages of eighteen and twenty-one. Therefore Faith and Beauty that established on January

19th

1938 under the leadership of Dr. Rüdiger. Reese claims that Faith and Beauty replaced

47

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Wartime Activities < http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/wartime.html>

[accessed 13 December 2013]. 48

Stibble, p. 114. 49

Reese, p. 40. 50

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Wartime Activities. 51

Helga Brachmann, translated by Chris Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Why We Need Oral History (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/narratives.html> [accessed 16 December 2013].

41

the traditional service in the BdM. Reese strengthens her argument by stating that the

creations of the groups were established in order to take the needs of women into greater

account.52 Günter Kaufmann’s speech about Faith and Beauty suggests why the group was

established and what it included. However, the weakness with Kaufmann’s speech is that it

does not give a date. Kaufmann states that the educational programme that is applied to the

young girls in the BdM organisation cannot be applied to older girls, aged seventeen to

twenty-one. The BdM is only appropriate for girls age ten to eighteen.53 ‘The camping trips

and campsites cannot accommodate the goals that have been set by the new BdM programme

for girls in this age group: Faith and Beauty’.54 Crawford argues that Faith and Beauty was

established because the National Socialist believed that the older girls should be given an

opportunity to continue or begin their unique talents and interests, while furthering their

educations accordingly that would lead to a strong and healthy lifestyle for themselves and

their families.55

There were three categories in the society. The first was sports activities such as

gymnastics, in order to guarantee a healthy body and pure mind.56 ‘Personal life skills’ was

the second category, which included home duties such as cooking, sewing and choosing the

correct furniture. Crawford claims that personal life skills taught young women the basic

skills and information for their future roles as housewives and mothers. The third group

concentrated on education, which included arts, music and politics. The league also paid

attention to fashion and how women were expected to dress.57 However, the society also

placed a high significance on job training by helping girls find professions that were suitable

52

Reese, p. 38. 53

‘Educating the Race,’ pp. 262–263. 54

Ibid. 55

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Belief and Beauty Society (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/gands.html> [access 22 December 2013]. 56

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Belief and Beauty Society. 57

Richard Grunberger, A Social History of the Third Reich, p. 278.

42

for them.58 Faith and Beauty included a variety of activities that would help shape young

German women into their future roles as mothers.

To conclude, the National Socialist Party established the BdM in order to educate German

girls in their future roles as mothers and housewives by offering them practical and domestic

skills. However, memoirs from former members of the BdM and previous BdM leader

Rüdiger show that the purpose of the BdM was to give girls an opportunity that was not

previously heard of in a variety of activities, summer camps and sports. The BdM also

offered girls job training and job skills because former BdM leaders believed that women

should be able to look after themselves. However, in 1936, the Hitler Youth Law stated that

the BdM should educate the girls into the Nazi beliefs. Therefore feminine activities were

added to the BdM programme. Also in 1938, Belief and Beauty Society was established for

older German girls because the Nazis believed that the activities in the BdM were not

acceptable for the roles of the older girls, who were being prepared for their future roles as

mothers and housewives.

Bronwen Swain, 708972@swansea.ac.uk

Written for The Practice of History (HIH237)

Bibliography

Crawford, Chris, Bund Deutscher Mädel (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/narratives.html>

Crawford, Chris, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Peacetime activities (2011)

http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/peacetime.html

58

Crawford, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Belief and Beauty Society.

43

Crawford, Chris, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Early Years (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/history.html>

Crawford, Chris, Bund Deutscher Mädel: The Belief and Beauty Society (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/gands.html>

Crawford, Chris, Bund Deutscher Mädel: Wartime Activities (2011)

<http://www.bdmhistory.com/research/wartime.html>

Evans, Richard J., The Third Reich in Power (London: Penguin, 2006)

Frevert, Ute, translated by Stuart McKinnon-Evans in association with Terry Bond and

Barbara Norden, Women in German history: from bourgeois emancipation to sexual

liberation (Published: Oxford: Berg, 1988)

Grunberger, Richard, A Social History of the Third Reich (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson,

1971)

Koonz, Claudia, Mothers in the fatherland: women, the family, and Nazi politics (New York:

St.Martin’s Press, 1987)

Layton, Geoff, Germany: The Third Reich 1933-45 (London: Hodder education, 2005)

Owing, Alison, Frauen: German Women Recall the Third Reich (London: Penguin, 1995)

Rabinbach, Anson and Sander Gilman, eds, The Third Reich sourcebook (Berkeley)

Reese, Dagmar, translated by William Templer, Growing up female in Nazi Germany, (Ann

Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2006)

Steinhoff, Johannes, Peter Pechel and Dennis Showalter, Voices from the Third Reich: an

oral history, 1st Da Capo Press ed. (New York: Da Capo Press, 1994)

Stephenson, Jill, Women in Nazi society (London: Croom Helm, 1975)

Stibble, Matthew, Women in the Third Reich (London: Arnold, 2003)

44

How useful is Domesday Book as a source

for the impact of the Norman Conquest upon England?

William I, nearing the end of his reign, found himself in a difficult position. Despite having

conquered England and successfully settled there with an abundance of the Norman elite, a

great deal of his conquered land was subject to dispute.1 According to Robert Fitz Nigel,

Domesday was ‘in order that every man be content with his own rights and not encroach

unpunishment on those of others’.2 Whether Domesday was commissioned primarily out of

fear of invasion or to settle disputes that had raged since the Norman Invasion of England in

1066, what is clear is that the resulting documents of the Domesday Inquisitions provide an

abundant source of data on land holdings, farming capacity, relationships between tenants

and disputes over land holdings.3 What use, however, are these Domesday documents in

understanding the impact of the Norman Conquest upon England?

This essay will argue that Domesday Book as a source encompasses its wider context,

that of the Domesday Inquisition process and as a result the documents that were borne of

that process, namely Great Domesday, Little Domesday, Exon Domesday as well as the

Jurors compilations in Ely and Cambridgeshire. Through these documents, the uses of

Domesday Book in gaining and understanding the impact of the Norman Conquest in

England will be explored in terms of taxation, disputes of land holdings, manipulation of

evidence regarding holdings as well as its value as a source for prosopography. Domesday

Book will be considered in terms of how historians have used it, what their application

reveals as well as where appropriate issues in historiographical debate and at times the

limitations the source presents.

1 Robin Fleming, Domesday Book and the law: Society and legal custom in early medieval England,

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) p. 1. 2 Fleming, p. 3.

3 Fleming, pp. 3–5.

45

If the process of Domesday is to be understood in terms of usefulness as a source for

the impact of the Norman Conquest in England, first an understanding as to why the process

was commissioned must be established. This question has been raised and debated by a

plethora of academics, and the question of whether Domesday was intended as a Geld Book

or record for taxation is one of the key theories put to the test. David Roffe has argued that

the Domesday Inquisition was a process commissioned entirely without the end aim of

producing Domesday Book, a point that has been debated thoroughly by his contemporaries

including J. C. Holt.4 Amongst his controversial proposition on the writing of Domesday

Book, Roffe presents a sound argument as to how far Domesday Book can be regarded as a

geld document. Rather than aimed at producing a definitive reference for taxation, the

Domesday Inquisition was an administrative tool that measured productivity of the land

along with the tax earning potential of said land. Between the Domesday Inquisition and the

composition of Domesday Book, a considerable abbreviation of the information occurs. Exon

Domesday reveals a formula for recoding volumes of land in the structure: ‘X hides of land

with room for X ploughs’.5 The corresponding record in Great Domesday simply states,

‘Land for X ploughs’.6 In displaying how Great Domesday abbreviates Exon Domesday,

Roffe illustrates the Inquisition process and composition of Great Domesday as separate

events and reveals how impractical Great Domesday would be if solely intended as a geld. V.

H. Galbraith has also argued that there is more to Domesday than a collection of information

and composition of documents. Rather, Exon Domesday and the subsequent abbreviations

found in Great Domesday reveal careful digestion and precise ordering of the information

collected.7 What is clear from this evidence is that the Domesday process was not simply

asking questions and writing down the answers. The Domesday process cannot simply be

4 David Roffe, ‘Domesday: The inquest and the book’, in Domesday Book, ed. by Elizabeth Hallam & David

Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) p. 30. 5 Ibid.

6 Ibid.

7 V. H. Galbraith, The Making of Domesday Book, (London: Oxford University Press, 1961) p. 111.

46

seen as the collecting of information and composing of a document to refer to for tax

purposes. There is a tax element, in that the king and his tenants develop a record of tax

potential for the land, but, this as much opens the door for mitigation regarding tax from a

tenants perspective much as it informs William the Conqueror the potential the lands of

England have for producing returns through tax. Domesday, in the form of the Inquisition

and books, offers a source that is useful in revealing dialogue between the king and the

tenants occupying land within England.8

The content and organisation of Domesday Book offers an insight into the Normans

as conquerors and settlers within England. Analysis of land holdings recorded in Great

Domesday by K. Keats has revealed an aspect of the social nature of the Normans as settlers.

Keats established that prior to 1066, Néel de Sant-Sauveur had fallen out of favour with

William I; however, records in Great Domesday clearly show former men of Néel’s to be

tenants of Baldwin de Muelles in England. This evidence reveals a socially progressive side

to the Normans as invaders and settlers in that disposed members, in this case Néel, can be

excluded from new settlement and their subordinates may be enabled and permitted to enter

into new loyalties in the form of tenancy under new lords.9 It is possible to see here, using

Domesday Book as a source, that the Norman Conquest in England had profound effects, not

only for the English whose territory the Normans acquired, but also affected the fate of

Normans who had fallen out of favour with William I prior to the Conquest by providing a

new dimension of social exclusion, and as such, a new form of punishment.

Great Domesday and its related documents offers, in many instances, a unique access

to information regarding land holdings and the problems the Norman Conquest developed in

this area. An entry regarding Westminster Abbey reveals that land in Upper Tooting was held

by Swein in the time of Edward, but by the time of William, was held by the Abbey. The

8 Roffe, pp. 30–31.

9 K. S. B. Keats, ‘Portrait of a people; Norman Barons revisited’, in Domesday Book, ed. by Elizabeth Hallam &

David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) p. 134.

47

entry contains a greater deal of information also, revealing that the Earl of Waltheof had

taken the land and mortgaged it to Æthelnoth who had in turn gifted it to Westminster

Abbey.10

Cases such as this one in Domesday Book offer a unique insight into the complexity

and upheaval that Norman Conquest had on land holdings in England dating back as far as

the regency of Edward the Confessor. The entry also reveals levels of detail regarding claims

to land that the estates that were claiming them, themselves, failed to record.11

Without

Domesday, a large proportion of evidence regarding the challenges to land as a result of the

Norman Conquest simply would not exist.12

In this sense, Domesday is an essentially useful

document in understanding the impact of the Norman Conquest in England regarding terms

of claims and challenges to land holdings.

Domesday Book can also be useful in understanding the uneasy period of land

acquisition and colonisation that faced the Normans after Hastings in 1066. Some cases

brought to the Domesday Inquisition are solely questions of rights to land holdings between

Norman settlers themselves, and as such, are disputes regarding land holdings that are at most

twenty years old. In one case, Bertran de Verdun had fallen victim to invasion of his lands in

Suffolk by Geoffrey de Mandeville while he was away in France on behalf of William I.13

Another case reveals concern not only for land, but also livestock on lands. William Specke

suffered theft of his men’s horses from William de Warenne.14

From these entries in

Domesday Book, the document is useful for gaining an understanding of how the Normans

behaved in post-conquest England as well as revealing a way in which the disputes were

handled in terms of law. It is possible to see Norman settlers laying claim to lands they had

gained in the Conquest and also that the borders of these lands were in many cases being

challenged and threatened by other Tenants-in-Chief.

10

Fleming, p. 55. 11

Ibid. p. 57. 12

Ibid. 13

Fleming, p. 68. 14

Fleming, p. 68.

48

The information contained within Domesday Book, however, can be as much a source

for manipulation of evidence as it can be regarded a unique source. Stephen Baxter has

argued that the jurors’ names from Ely and Cambridgeshire can be found to be those of loyal

supporters of magnates within the counties, particularly the Abbott of Ely and Picot the

Sheriff.15

In addition to these counties, a significant area of historical research has centred on

the Church of Worcester’s fee entry for Domesday. Baxter has argued that compared to the

wider text, the Church of Worcester’s fee entry differs significantly in formula for displaying

holdings as well as in the vocabulary used.16

Peter Sawyer, another prominent historian who

has written extensively on Domesday, has stated that the Worcester Domesday is consistent

in every entry apart from that for the Church of Worcester.17

Elements in how the church’s

entry differs centre around its emphasis on how tenants behaved in the time of Edward and

that the current tenants behave in the same manner. Baxter argues that the difference in

emphasis is significant as it reveals an attempt in the fees of the Church of Worcester to make

an example for the present day.18

Baxter’s example is from the case of the Sheriff Cyneweard

and he argues this entry in Domesday is directed toward Urse d’Abetot, who succeeds

Cyneweard, in an attempt to set the Bishop’s expectations for behaviour.19

Despite this, there

is significant evidence to argue that even if this were true in Ely and Cambridgeshire, it

certainly was not commonplace. Baxter has pointed to evidence in the Anglo-Saxon

Chronicle that commissioners were selected to work in counties where they had no or little

ties. Furthermore magnates rarely held all their lands in one county, which in turn would

make manipulation of jurors almost impossible.20

From this it is possible to see that although

the Domesday process had been designed to prevent the manipulation of evidence, in some

15

Stephen Baxter, ‘The Representation of Lordship and Land Tenure in Domesday Book’, in Domesday Book,

ed. by Elizabeth Hallam & David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) pp. 82–84. 16

Baxter, p. 83. 17

Ibid. 18

Ibid. pp. 85–86. 19

Ibid. p. 86. 20

Ibid. p. 30.

49

cases it was possible for magnates to yield an uncomfortable degree of influence over the

recording of land that held their interests. It is evident that Domesday Book can be useful in

understanding the issues that arose in post-conquest England, also revealing the degree to

which recordings in Domesday Book were not only of interest to the king but also those who

were being assessed, who in some cases, went above and beyond to protect their assets.

Domesday Book is a treasure trove of information simply with its incredible list of

names of people and their position relayed by the listing of their relationship to the Tenant-in-

Chief. The ordering of Domesday Book names from the king to Tenant-in-Chief, to Under

Tenant and so on down to numbers of slaves in snapshots from three periods of time; in the

reign of Edward, in the reign of Harold and now in the reign of William.21

Great Domesday

presents a challenge in that, frequently, only personal names were recorded. However, by

combining information from Great Domesday with related documents that are less

abbreviated such as Exon Domesday and Inquisito Eliensis, a greater level of detail can be

found about individuals or groups of society.22

From these sources it is possible to follow the

successes or failures of some families, familial origin for the higher status tenants as well as

to assess the degree of social mobility possible for different levels of society. Keats has

argued that this approach could further be extended to include sources such as charters and

pipe rolls which could be used to gain an understanding of tenurial relationships between

Tenants-in-Chief and their own tenants, as well as the Tenants-in-Chief relationship with

greater magnates or the king.23

From this, it can be seen that Domesday Book in conjunction

with other primary sources relating to those named potentially could be an effective source

for a prosopographical approach. Holt has however highlighted a potential limitation with

regards to using Great Domesday in isolation for this purpose. Originally a response to

Roffe’s theory on dating Great Domesday, Holt has highlighted a potential problem in using

21

Keats, p. 122. 22

Ibid. p. 123. 23

Ibid. pp. 123–124.

50

Domesday Book to research specific people at a specific period of time. Holt argued that in

some cases information is not always entirely accurate, such as in the case of Geoffrey Fitz

Peter who had been using the title Earl of Essex before it was officially bestowed upon him.24

As such, it is possible to see that although Domesday Book can be useful as a source in

understanding the impact the Norman Conquest in England had on family, it is not a source

without its limitations or risks. Even with this in mind however, Domesday does present a

unique and abundant source of information regarding who people where and where people

were, socially as well as geographically.

In conclusion, it has been argued that in many cases Domesday Book can be a useful source

in understanding the impact the Norman Conquest had on England. Domesday Book

however, has to be appreciated in its broader sense. It is not simply one binding of folios, it is

a collection of documents sometimes repeating themselves, sometimes abbreviating and

refining the information. What is evident is that these unique documents can be used to gain

an understanding of the impact the Norman Conquest in England had on administrative

approaches to taxation, the development of a legal system to deal with land holding disputes,

the level of importance the Domesday process was to significant magnates and institutions as

well as being a vast potential source for prosopographical research in post-conquered

England. Domesday does begin to shine a light onto the concerns of the Normans in England

and the sheer massive extent to which they were willing and able to go in addressing those

concerns.

Dale Cutlan, 780626@swansea.ac.uk

Written for War and Society in the Anglo-Norman World (HIH252)

24

J. C. Holt, ‘1086’, in Domesday Studies: Novocentenary Conference, Royal Historical Society and Institute of

British Geographers 1986, ed. by J. C. Holt (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1990), p. 24.

51

Bibliography

Baxter, Stephen, ‘The Representation of Lordship and Land Tenure in Domesday Book’, in

Domesday Book, ed. by Elizabeth Hallam & David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus

Publishing, 2001) pp. 73–102.

Fleming, Robin, Domesday Book and the law: Society and legal custom in early medieval

England, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

Galbraith, V. H, Domesday Book; Its Place in Administrative History, (London: Oxford

University Press, 1974).

——— The Making of Domesday Book, (London: Oxford University Press, 1961).

Hallam, Elizabeth M, Domesday Book Through Nine Centuries, Reprint Edition, (London:

Thames & Hudson, 1986).

Holt, J. C, ‘Domesday Studies 2000’, in Domesday Book, in Domesday Book, ed. by

Elizabeth Hallam & David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) pp. 19–

24.

——— ‘1086’, in Domesday Studies: Novocentenary Conference, Royal Historical Society

and Institute of British Geographers 1986, ed. by J. C. Holt (Woodbridge: Boydell,

1990), pp. 41–64.

Keats, K. S. B, ‘Portrait of a people; Norman Barons revisited’, in Domesday Book, ed. by

Elizabeth Hallam & David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) pp. 121–

140.

Roffe, David, ‘Domesday: The inquest and the book’, in Domesday Book, ed. by Elizabeth

Hallam & David Bates, (Gloucestershire: Tempus Publishing, 2001) pp. 25–36.

52

How important was it for Alexander to be recognised as pharaoh

and what did it involve?

When Alexander the Great1 invaded Egypt in 332BC he conquered the entire country in six

months without fighting a single battle.2 He defeated the Persians, an age-old enemy of the

Egyptian state and became pharaoh, seemingly seamlessly. This conversion to Egyptian

religion and pharaoh was a key part of his success in Egypt, and across the rest of his empire.

The accession was multi-faceted and included trips to Memphis, Heliopolis and famously, the

Zeus-Ammon oracle at Siwa. Alexander’s visits to these sites, his adoption of Nectanebo II

as father and use of the Egyptian hostility towards Persia, show at the least, a surface-deep

understanding of Egyptian culture and tradition, as well as a knowledge of how to use this to

gain a strong political stance in Egypt. He was also successful later in Persia and parts of

Asia, which may not have been possible had it been for his triumph in and mind-set after

leaving Egypt. Alexander’s accession to the office of pharaoh was the first step in a mix of

cultures, which eventually led to the thriving, cosmopolitan city of Alexandria in Hellenistic

times.3 He set the precedent for the Ptolemaic period, when Greek and Macedonian cultures

were successfully merged with the native traditions apparent in Egypt.4

Egyptian kingship had been consistent over the thousands of years since the

Predynastic period5 and although aspects had changed including depictions, wealth and

dependency on different parts of society, the basics were still the same.6 However, belief in

the sincerity of kingship was declining. The true religious belief no longer lay behind

1 In this article, the terms “Alexander” or “Alexander the Great” will refer to Alexander III of Macedon, son of

Philip II. 2 Cassell, J.M. (1980) 90.

3 Stanwick, P.E. (2002) 2; Baines, J.R. (1995) 3.

4 Manning J.G. (2010) 78.

5 Baines, J.R. (1995) 3.

6 Kemp, B.J. (2006) 20; Baines, J.R. (1995).

53

pharaohs, and this was mostly due to their foreign nature.7 This meant any foreign pharaoh

had to try much harder to prove his legitimacy. Pharaohs also became much more reliant on

institutions and individuals, such as temples and priests, due to their increased wealth and

power, than they had been in the thousands of years prior. For the general population, the

legitimate king was essential to the running of daily life; he was the only person8 who could

act as an intermediary to the gods,9 who needed him for continued sustenance and ma’at on

earth. In return, the gods confirmed him as the legitimate ruler10

and provided a safe and

stable Egypt. This symbiotic relationship was the basis for all life in the world. The king was

a manifestation of all the gods on Earth,11

while he ruled he was a semi-divine being carrying

out their work.

In contrast, Macedonian kings were not divine and theoretically, did not have

autocratic power. They had many advisors and often worked in a “semi-democratic” way,

discussing issues before making decisions.12

Civil war was common in Macedonia due to the

instability after a king died; accession was not necessarily based on the individual who was

“next in line” but who was politically the strongest candidate. Despite not being considered

divine, mythology surrounding the fathers of kings was common,13

although generally

limited to being considered mythology. Very few kings strongly believed they had divine

parentage,14

although it seems that Alexander truly believed he was the son of Zeus-Ammon,

even before his visit to the oracle.15

This visit to Siwa was one of the most famous aspects of the legitimisation of

Alexander’s rule, although for the majority of the Egyptian population, was not vital for him

7 Höbl, G. (2001) 77. Baines, J.R. (1995) 4; 42.

8 Except for elected priests who could act on his behalf, who in realistic terms, undertook most of the pharaoh’s

religious activities. 9 Höbl, G. (2001) 77.

10 Baines, J.R (1995) 4.

11Baines, J.R. (1995) 5.

12 Chanitos, A. (2011) 185.

13 Chanitos, A. (2011) 184.

14 Cassell, J.M. (1980) 91.

15 Chanitos, A. (2011) 185.

54

becoming accepted as pharaoh. Confirmation by an oracle was a tradition of New Kingdom16

pharaohs but this practice had disappeared by the Late Period.17

For the Egyptian people, the

most important aspect of a pharaoh’s work was the maintenance and sustenance of the gods,

and in turn the continuation of ma’at.18

The king needed to offer to the gods and take part in

rituals.19

On his arrival in Egypt, Alexander went to Memphis, where he was traditionally

coronated and made offerings to gods including Ptah and the Apis bull, as pharaoh.20

This

confirmed him as pharaoh in the eyes of Egyptians, as he was filling roles only a pharaoh

could do. The ideological factors are also interesting to note; Memphis was the city linked

with the first unification of Egypt,21

which would have echoed in Alexander’s coronation. He

would have played on the tradition hostility Egyptians felt towards Persians, and had himself

depicted as re-unifier of the state after foreign invasion.22

The gods he offers to also help to

tie this into his legitimisation- both have strong links to Memphis.23

Both are also considered

some of the ‘original’ members of the Egyptian pantheon,24

reinforcing the image of

alexander as a native pharaoh. Additionally, Apis’ links with the Late Period and Greek

world25

provide the perfect bridge between Alexander’s ancestry and newly conquered land;

a god which both his troops from home and the native population can relate to.26

Alexander’s

links to the Late Period, Nectanebo II27

particularly, were specifically important to his

legitimisation and will be detailed later.

16

Alexander’s consultation of Zeus-Ammon at Siwa promoted a re-instigation of this tradition and a new trend

of emulation of the New Kingdom (Höbl, G. (2001) 78.). 17

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 295; 301. 18

Baines, J.R. (1995) 10. 19

Baines, J.R. (1995) 4. 20

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 295; Fakhry, A. (1973) 85; Höbl G. (2001) 9; Cassell, J.M. (1980) 90. 21

Höbl, G. (2001) 78. 22

In literature and mythology, the expulsion of the Persians by Alexander the Great soon became equated with

the unification and expulsion of the Hyksos in the New Kingdom (Höbl, G. (2001) 81.). 23

Ptah is the patron god of the Memphite area (Wilkinson (2003) 123-4.) and Apis has been linked with both

Ptah and Memphis from the earliest dynasties (Wilkinson (2003) 170.). 24

Höbl, G. (2001) 78; Wilkinson, R.H. (2003) 25

He becomes much more prominent during the twenty-second dynasty, when more detail about the sacred

bulls is recorded. 26

Wilkinson, R.H. (2003) 172. 27

Höbl, G. (2001) 78; Manning (2010) 73.

55

Art and architecture were also key aspects of Alexander’s reign- he built extensively28

and depicted himself across temples, specifically in Lower Egypt. Some of his many building

projects include the restoration of the House of 1000 Years in the Amun temple at Luxor; a

boat shrine in the Luxor temple; renovation of a sanctuary in the festival temple of Thutmose

III at Karnak; the Isis temple in Alexandria; the temples to Amun-Re and Horus at the

Bahariya Oasis.29

Many of his projects were also continuations of the work started in the

Thirtieth Dynasty, either from the reign of Nectanebo in a bid to prove legitimacy or those

started by the Persians and finished by Alexander, to wipe them from history. Three of the

afore mentioned projects are notable for other reasons. The first being the Isis temple in

Alexandria, and the links she had with the Greek pantheon. This shows an understanding

from Alexander, or at least his advisors of the assimilation of Hellenistic culture in Egypt and

the requirement to encourage this for Egypt, and specifically Alexandria to be fully

functional, as it was, in later years. Secondly, the House of 1000 Years at Luxor is important

due to its function- it was dedicated to the royal ka30

and therefore the ancestors of the king.

Nectanebo II was often shown as Alexander’s father, to depict a clean succession and by

restoring the House of 1000 Years Alexander reminded everyone of his “native” lineage.

Finally, in depictions at Thutmose III’s sanctuary in Karnak, Alexander is depicted as a

parallel to Thutmose, the ‘great warrior pharaoh’. He was seen as a “new Thutmose”31

in

these images which leads us to assume equations were made between the empire Thutmose

achieved in the Eighteenth Dynasty and the empire Egypt joined under Alexander.

These depictions are commonplace in temples across Lower Egypt, especially at

Luxor and Karnak- in Luxor alone he is shown as pharaoh over fifty times.32

They also show

28

Although interestingly, there are no buildings or inscriptions belonging to Alexander at Siwa (Fakhry, A.

(1974) 88.). 29

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 295; Höbl, G. (2001) 85. 30

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 295. 31

Höbl, G. (2001) 85. 32

Lorber, C.C. (2011, 295-6.

56

him taking part in the Opet festival33

although it is incredibly unlikely that he ever did, as

well as offering to the gods and completing rituals. This is mostly propaganda; it is unlikely

Alexander undertook even half of these activities in the six months he spent in Egypt and he

died on campaign before he could return.34

However, this did not affect the perception of

Alexander as pharaoh, as Egyptian belief directed that anything recorded happened and

would continue to happen in the future.35

These depictions of Alexander undertaking rituals,

participating in festivals and offering to the gods meant that in the Egyptians’ eyes, he was

doing this and would be for his entire time as pharaoh.

Among these depictions are often inscriptions, captioning the images with

descriptions and titles of the pharaoh, including some traditional ones, such as sA ra, nTr

Hor, “protector of Egypt” and other epithets legitimising his rule. “Protector of Egypt” is a

key part of his Horus name,36

which further reinforces the image he had depicted himself as

the legitimate king, i.e. Horus on earth.37

This echoes Nectanebo’s five-fold titulary,38

further

reinforcing the idea of Alexander’s native Egyptian lineage as well as drawing a parallel

between the two’s battles with the Persians.39

In terms of Alexander’s lineage, he is considered to have three “fathers”, Philip II,

Zeus-Ammon and Nectanebo II.40

Of course, Philip II was his true father and this is often

important in his conquest of the empire and his ability to rule over the Macedonians to start

with. Without Philip II’s fatherhood and guidance, of course Alexander would never have

been king nor would there have been the smooth transition experienced between Philip and

33

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 296. 34

Bosworth, A.B. (1988) 172. 35

Robbins, G (1997) 19; Smith, W.S. (1958) 15. 36

Höbl, G. (2001) 79. 37

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 197. 38

Höbl, G. (2001) 79. 39

It is alluded to in the Alexander Romance that Nectanebo had failed against the Persians so that Alexander, his

son could defeat them (Höbl, G. (2001) 78.). 40

Chugg, A. (2002) 13; Höbl, G. (2001) 78; Manning (2010) 73.

57

Alexander’s reigns, a fairly rare phenomenon in Macedonia.41

During his time as pharaoh,

Nectanebo was also shown as his father, to reinforce the image of a smooth transition

between native pharaohs and wiping the hostile Persians from history. In addition, Olympias

had suggested numerous times his divine father, Zeus,42

had visited her in the guise of Philip

II, linking Alexander by blood to Heracles and Perseus.43

This visit, as mentioned earlier, is one of the most famous aspects of the

legitimisation of Alexander’s reign, and has immortalised the name of Siwa in history

records.44

Alexander visited Siwa early in 331BC, a timing which has led many to question

his motives.45

When at Siwa, Alexander asked the oracle questions in relation to his lineage,

future and the death of his father.46

In response, the god confirmed Alexander as the son of

Zeus-Ammon and the legitimate king of Egypt.47

The response to questions surrounding his

father’s death have gone unknown but it is suspected that Alexander asked in an attempt to

clear Olympias’ name, and he planned to reveal the answers on his return to Macedonia.48

This aspect of Alexander as pharaoh is particularly interesting, as he did not need divine

legitimisation of this type to be accepted into Egyptian society.49

Additionally, he did not

need divine lineage to be considered a King in Greek or Macedonian terms, although divinity

always surrounded the fathers of Macedonian kings, it was never considered more than

41

Bosworth, A.B. (1988) 25-6. 42

Chanitos, A. (2011) 184. 43

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 200. 44

Fakhry, A. (1973) 84. 45

At this time, Persia was not defeated and many would assume Alexander’s priorities would lie with mustering

his troops and organising the next stage of his conquest (Fakhry, A. (1973) 86.). Explanations for this come

from various ancient authors, including Callinsthenes, who suggests Alexander wanted to equate himself with

Heracles and Perseus, both of whom had consulted Zeus-Ammon (Fakhry, A. (1973) 87) and Arrianus, who

suggests that simply Alexander was closer to Siwa after founding Alexandria (Cassell, J.M. (1980) 90; Fakhry,

A. (1973) 84.), and took the chance to visit while he could (Fakhry, A. (1973) 87.). 46

Höbl, G. (2001) 10; Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 200. 47

Höbl, G. (2001) 11. 48

Alexander questioned the oracle in complete privacy in the sanctuary and it is pure speculation that he asked

these questions (Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 201.). 49

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 199-200.

58

mythology and Alexander would have been almost unique in having a belief in his own

divine nature,50

leaving him open to criticism from his homeland.

However, the links Zeus-Ammon has across Alexander’s empire at this stage are

interesting. Zeus-Ammon formed the link between Egypt and Greece that Alexander needed-

the god had undisputable force and power in both countries51

and formed the best link to

Macedonia within all of Egyptian mythology.52

Legitimisation by this god in particular

formed the link and filled both religious features of Macedonian kingship in the form of a

myth surrounding the king’s father, and that of Egypt, by confirming legitimacy and divine

lineage, in a more serious manner.53

It is also interesting to note how Alexander may have asked the oracle about his

conquest, or the future of his ever-expanding empire, especially when we consider that he did

not consult an oracle before leaving Macedonia.54

However, it may be that Alexander

adopted the answers the oracle at Gordium gave to Philip before his invasion.55

Alexander’s

behaviour on campaign has raised comments over the importance placed on Zeus-Ammon-

specifically sacrifices. Sacrifices during campaign are often described by Alexander’s

contemporaries but only as being ‘customary’. There are a handful of sacrifices which seem

to be of utmost importance which are specifically referred to; these sacrifices with the most

detail and which seem to differ from the norm are always to Zeus or Zeus-Ammon, and seem

to be on the instruction of the latter.56

This was common practice in Greek warfare, but a new

phenomenon for Egyptian gods to instruct specific sacrifices during campaigns. These

aspects of the campaign certainly add weight to the arguments presented above, concerning

50

Cassell, J.M. (1980) 91; Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 199. 51

Temples to Amun had sprung up all over Greece from around the fifth century BC (Fakhry, A. (1973) 85, 87;

Höbl, G. (2001) 10.) and the aspect of myths surrounding lineage was an important feature in Macedonian

kings. 52

Lorber C.C. (2011) 295; Fakhry, A. (1973) 85; Höbl, G. (2001) 78. 53

Höbl, G. (2001) 78. 54

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 202. 55

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 213. 56

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 208; Arrian 6.19.4; Plut. Alexander 34.1.

59

the Egyptian nature of Alexander’s campaign.57

These sacrifices are a direct link to his

kingship in Egypt and his status there as divine. Does this suggest that Alexander was on

campaign in Persia on behalf of Zeus-Ammon and Egypt, opposed to Macedonia?58

These aspects combined in the early 330s to develop Alexander’s pharaonic image

across Egypt. The impact this had is not strictly measurable but we can see success later in

Alexander’s campaign, which although is not directly because of his time in Egypt, would

have been much different without it. Before visiting Siwa, Alexander had an unprecedented

belief in his own divinity, which was exaggerated during his time in Egypt through elevation

to pharaoh and confirmation as the son of Zeus-Ammon. Alexander was almost immediately

accepted into Egypt by the Egyptians- it would seem this long, drawn out legitimisation,

specifically his trip to the oracle at Siwa was aimed at a different audience, either his

contemporaries or the population back in Greece and Macedonia, where kings were not as

easily accepted.

Alexander’s status as divine also gave him new confidence and although the goal for

him was to always conquer the entire world, it was during his time in Egypt, or shortly after,

that he adopted the title “King of Asia”.59

Did his success in Egypt mean he could continue

into the Near East? It is without doubt that Alexander was successful, within thirteen years he

managed to disseminate the Greek language, culture and political structure from Anatolia,

south to Egypt and from Syria into Central Asia, and although his empire did not survive

intact, without its creation in the first place the Hellenistic Kingdoms which flourished from

it would never have developed over the next 300 years.60

Alexander’s kingship is also

specifically important in Ptolemy I’s succession, when he adopts many features used before

57

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) 212-3. 58

Lorber C.C. (2011) 296. 59

Cassell, J.M. (1980) 90; Keenan, J.G. (2004) 13. 60

Cassell, J.M. (1980) 91.

60

him.61

The six months Alexander and his troops spent in Egypt were valuable, not only for

him to establish himself as pharaoh and divine (as the two were different, he was pharaoh and

divine in Egypt, yet only divine in the Greek world), but also for the morale and health of his

troops. When we look at the importance of Alexander being recognised pharaoh within

Egypt, we see that it mattered a great deal to the Egyptian people, they had previously been

treated badly by foreign rulers,62

but it was also important on a much wider scale, for the

Greek people of Alexander’s homeland and his own understanding of the native traditions of

a land and the important role they play in conquest.

Charlotte Morgan, 655298@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Alexandria: Multicultural Metropolis of the Ancient World (CLE-334)

Bibliography

Baines, J.R. (1995) “Kingship, definition of culture and legitimisation” in Ancient Egyptian

Kingship O’Connor, D.B. and D.P. Silverman (eds.) Brill: Leiden 3-49.

Bosworth, A.B. (1988) Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great Cambridge

University Press: Cambridge.

Cassell, J.M. (1980) Sunrise of power, Ancient Egypt and Alexander and the World of

Hellenism Edgell Communications: London.

Chanitos, A. (2011) “The Ithyphallic hymn for Demetrios Poliorketes and Hellenistic

Religious Mentality” in More than men, less than gods, studies on the royal cult and

imperial worship, proceedings of the International Colloquium organised by the Belgian

61

Lorber, C.C. (2011) 293; Höbl, G. (2001) 81. 62

Keenan, J.G. (2004) 12.

61

School at Athens Issif, P.P., A.S. Chankowski and C.C. Lorber (eds.) Peeters: Paris 157-

197.

Chugg, A. (2002) “The Sarcophagus of Alexander the Great? Greece and Rome 49, 1 (April).

Fahkry, A. (1973) Siwa Oasis The American University in Cairo Press: Cairo.

Fakhry, A. (1974) The Oases of Egypt: volume II Bahriyah and Farafra Oases The American

University in Cairo Press: Cairo.

Fredricksmeyer, E.A. (1991) “Alexander, Zeus Ammon and the Conquest of Asia”

Transactions of the American Philological Association 121 199-214.

Höbl, G. (2001) A history of the Ptolemaic Empire Routledge: London.

Keenan, J.G. (2004) “Before the Ptolemies” in Egypt from Alexander to the Copts: An

Archaeological and Historical Guide Bagnall, R.S. and W.Rathbone (eds.) British

Museum Press: London 11-13.

Kemp, B.J. (2006) Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilisation Routledge: London.

Lorber, C.C. (2011) “Theos aigiochos: the aegis in Ptolemaic portraits of divine rulers” in

More than men, less than gods, studies on the royal cult and imperial worship,

proceedings of the International Colloquium organised by the Belgian School at Athens

Issif, P.P., A.S. Chankowski and C.C. Lorber (eds.) Peeters: Paris 293-357.

Manning, J.G. (2010) The Last Pharaohs: Egypt under the Ptolemies, 305-30 BC Princeton

University Press: Oxford.

Robbins, G. (1997) The Art of Ancient Egypt British Museum Press: London.

Smith, W.S. (1958) The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt Penguin: London.

62

Stanwick, P.E. (2002) Portraits of the Ptolemies: Greek kings as Egyptian pharaohs

University of Texas Press: Austin.

Wilkinson, R.H. (2003) The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt Thames and

Hudson: London.

63

Masculine iconography of 18th

dynasty royal women

and its influence on the perception of their role as queen

The role and significance of queenship during the New Kingdom is arguably the most

prominent throughout ancient Egyptian history, exemplified particularly by the queens of the

18th

dynasty. This essay will focus on the iconographic representations of two queens of the

18th

dynasty – queens Tiye and Nefertiti – portraying traditionally masculine iconography

(and more importantly, the symbolism behind the iconography) to the female form.1 The

main focus of study for the masculine iconographic representation of Tiye are the sphinx

depictions of the queen, as can be seen in Sedeinga and most prominently in the symbolic

form of trampling the enemy, found on Tiye’s throne in the reliefs of the tomb of Kheruef

(TT192). The focus of Nefertiti’s masculine iconography will be the scenes of ‘smiting the

enemy’ (MFA Boston 63.260), a topos of ancient Egyptian kingship. These representations,

and the symbolism they hold, will be analysed in order to better understand the role of the

queen during this period.

Queen Tiye is arguably one of the most influential characters of the 18th

dynasty,

especially regarding queenship. Of the royal women of the 18th

dynasty, Tiye was the first

queen to be depicted as a female sphinx, trampling the enemies of Egypt.2 Before the

depictions of Tiye in the form of a sphinx, Hatshepsut is portrayed in a similar fashion.

Hatshepsut, however, is not depicted as female sphinx, but during her reign as pharaoh,

1 Queens Tiye and Nefertiti are not the only examples of queens depicted with masculine iconography during

the 18th dynasty. For example, Hatshepsut depicted herself in the masculine form during her reign as pharaoh, a

title that was solely male, no matter the gender of the occupant. See: Roehrig, C. H. (Ed.). (2005). Hatshepsut:

From queen to pharaoh; Smilgin, A. (2012). Sandstone sphinxes of Queen Hatshepsut from Deir el-Bahari:

preliminary remarks. Polish Archeology in the Mediterranean 21 (research 2009), 255–260; Robins, G. (1999).

The names of Hatshepsut as king. JEA 85, 103–112; Cooney, K. (2014). The woman who would be king:

Hatshepsut’s rise to power in ancient Egypt; David, A. (2010). Hatshepsut and the image of kingship: ink bik.

GM 224, 27–33. 2 Schoske (1982), 170; Morkot (1986), 1.

64

shedding no light on the masculine iconography and symbolism of queenship (as could be

interpreted from the depictions).3

The best attested examples in which queen Tiye is seen in the masculine iconographic

form of a female sphinx come from firstly, her temple at Sedeinga, Nubia,4 and secondly

from the side panel of her throne in the tomb of Kheruef (TT192).5

In the first example, queen Tiye can be seen twice in the form of a sphinx, wearing

the tall, flat-topped crown (which will later be associated with the queen Nefertiti), which

flank two emblems of the goddess Hathor, with which Tiye was associated.6 The crown of

Tiye in this depiction has led to debate regarding its iconography and to which deity it is most

associated. For example, in a similar depiction,7 queen Tiye wears a similar flat-topped

crown, which has floral iconography, reminiscent of the goddess Anukis.8 Similarly, Tiye

shares an association with Hathor, as does Nefertiti. The most compelling evidence for the

iconography of Tiye’s crown comes from Benkowski.9 She theorises that at Sedeinga, Tiye

is represented as Tefnut in the form of a sphinx. Furthermore, the location of the temple in

Nubia, along with stories of Tefnut, who flees to Nubia as a lioness, gives evidence to this

theory. The crown’s association with Tefnut portrays the hostile aspects of Tefnut, while the

representation of the queen of a sphinx portrays an aggressive character.10 Again, further

evidence to suggest the crown’s association comes from the tomb of Apy during the reign of

Akhenaten. Here, the king makes offerings of the Aten’s cartouche while being flanked by

3 Zinn (2015), 46; Carney (2002), 33; Schoske (1982), 170.

4 Benkowski (2011), 79; Schoske (1982), 188. See appendix, figure 1.1.

5 Carney (2002), 33-4; Morkot (1986), 1. See appendix, figure 1.2.

6 Schoske (2008), 188.

7 See appendix, figure 1.3.

8 Johnson (2010-2011), 19–21. Tiye is identified by the cartouche that she holds, reading Nebmaatre, the

praenomen of her husband Amenhotep III. 9 Benkowski (2011), 80.

10 Ibid.

65

Shu. Nefertiti also makes offerings next to a squatting figure, whose crown silhouette

matches that of Nefertiti, representing Tefnut.11

The second representation of queen Tiye in the form of a sphinx trampling the

enemies of Egypt – seen in the tomb of Kheruef – as previously stated, is the first example of

a queen being depicted in this traditionally kingly role. It is in this example that female

captives (Asiatics and Nubians)12 can be seen under the feet of the queen.13 Other examples

can be seen from the tombs of Surer, Khaemet and Anen,14 in which Tiye is depicted standing

on a prostrate enemy.15 Images of royal figures trampling the enemies of Egypt are

traditionally reserved for the king only, but the military aspect of these images is

demonstrative of the queen taking the role of kingship, restoring the concept of ma’at by

destroying the foreign enemies of Egypt (chaos).16

Representations of queen Tiye in the masculine form of a sphinx start the trend of

powerful female queens in iconographic representations. Tiye, as female sphinx, takes on the

traditional role of the king. It is through this iconography that the power of the queen is

elevated substantially, paralleling her with the king. The masculine iconography is used to

demonstrate the power that the queen held in both political and religious contexts, a motif

which is incorporated later into both the iconography and the roles of the queen Nefertiti.

The motif of smiting the enemy is one that can be traced back to the Naqada III

Period, during the reign of Narmer, the unifier of Upper and Lower Egypt.17 Over the span of

3000 years, the scene of smiting the enemy has been quoted at least ninety times, thus

making it one of the longest lasting iconographical motifs of ancient Egypt.18 The motif is

11

Ibid.; Dodson (2009), 116; Morkot (1986), 3. 12

Carney (2002), 33-4. 13

Ibid.; Morkot (1986), 1. 14

Morkot (1986), 1. 15

Carney (2002), 33–4; Morkot (1986), 2. 16

Carney (2002), 32. 17

Luiselli (2011), 15. 18

Ibid. 17.

66

indigenous to Egypt and considered to be rooted to the iconography of the Predynastic

Period.19 It is from this period onwards that Egypt develops a sense of self, referring to the

foreign neighbours of the country as a ‘collective other.’20 The ‘collective other,’ to the

Egyptians, presented a threat to the nation who viewed these peoples as the equivalent of

wild animals.21 Both the Narmer Palette and an ivory sandal label of the slightly later king,

Den, 22 clearly depict the action of smiting the enemy. In both instances we see the king stood

above the defeated foreign enemy, holding their hair with his left hand and wielding a mace

with the right. It is this image of xenophobia and royal dominion over foreign lands (or in the

concept of ma’at, chaos) that becomes a topos of Egyptian kingship until the Roman Period.

During the Amarna period, there is a significant evolution in the role of the royal

family, especially the queen, during scenes of smiting the enemy. This change in queenship is

most notable in the representation of the queen, Nefertiti, acting in the masculine,

traditionally kingly role of smiting the enemy.23 One of the only examples of this

phenomenon can be seen on a talatat block from Hermopolis, in the Museum of Fine Arts,

Boston (63.260).24

In this scene, Nefertiti, who is identifiable by her distinct, blue, flat-topped crown and

female dress can be seen in the position of smiting the enemy.25 To further evidence the

character in the smiting scene as Nefertiti, the barge poles of the ship are topped with her

19

Wilkinson (2000), 29. 20

Ibid. 21

Ibid. 22

See appendix, figures 2.1 and 2.2 respectively. 23

Zinn (2015), 46; Dodson (2009), 37; Ertman (2006), 61; Troy (2003) 100–101; Carney (2002), 34; Morkot

(1986), 2; Schoske (1982), 170–1; Cooney (1965), 84. Dodson notes that Nefertiti appears in the pose of smiting

the enemy before she is elevated to the role of kingship as Neferneferuaten. Although the purpose of this essay

is not to explore the theories of Nefertiti’s actual kingship, or, a possible co-regency between Akhenaten and

Nefertiti, these issues are still important to the overall understanding of the role Nefertiti held during the

Amarna period with regards to kingship and queenship. See: Dodson (2009), 27–52; Van de Perre, A. (2013),

Nefertiti’s last documented reference (for now). In F. Seyfried (Ed.), In the light of Amarna: 100 years of the

Nefertiti discovery. 195–197. 24

See appendix, figures 2.3. and 2.4. For as complete a contextualization of the scene as possible (including the

surrounding talatat block which form a larger scene), see Cooney (1965), 82–86. 25

Cooney (1965), 84.

67

head, again wearing the distinctive crown, signifying that the boat belongs to Nefertiti.26

Under the rays of the Aten, she holds in the left hand the hair of a female enemy. In the right

hand, she wields the xpS scimitar.27

The second example in which Nefertiti is seen smiting the enemy can be seen on a

talatat block from Luxor Temple.28 The block depicts a construction of four shrines on a ship

on which there are four depictions of the queen. Two of the images depict the queen under

the rays of the Aten in the pose of smiting the enemy, one wearing the tall, blue, flat-topped

crown (younger variant),29 the other wearing the tripartite wig, double feather crown and sun

disk on a modius (traditional variant).30 The other two shrine scenes depict the queen, again,

under the rays of the Aten, as a sphinx with a female head wearing the tripartite wig, double

feather crown and sun disk on a modius, trampling the enemies of Egypt.31 It is important to

acknowledge that these scenes of queen Nefertiti, both on the boat’s cabin (Boston talatat)

and on the four shrines (Luxor Temple talatat), are seen nowhere else other than through

examples of kings or gods.32 This is demonstrative of one of the two symbols of military

power and order that is incorporated by 18th

dynasty queens, the other being that of the

sphinx trampling the enemies of Egypt.33 These scenes of Nefertiti smiting the enemy give

evidence to the rise in female power during the 18th

dynasty, particularly regarding political

affairs,34 but also in the cultic sphere. Cooney suggests that the scenes depicted in the Boston

talatat portray Nefertiti as holding equal power to Akhenaten,35 which, when considering the

multitude of religious and political roles Nefertiti played during the Amarna period, is not a

26

Ibid. 27

Zinn (2015), 44. 28

See appendix, figure 1.5. 29

Zinn (2015), 45; Schoske (1982), 171; Tawfik (1975), 162. 30

Ibid. 31

Of the two depictions of Nefertiti as a sphinx trampling the enemies of Egypt, one is fragmentary. However,

from what can still be seen, and the dual image nature of the whole scene, it can be ascertained that the fourth

image is again Nefertiti in the form of a trampling sphinx. 32

Tawfik (1975). 162. 33

Carney (2002), 33. 34

Cooney (1986), 84. 35

Ibid.

68

theory which could be disputed.36 Nefertiti, as sole actor in the aforementioned scenes of

smiting the enemy, takes the king’s role, leading to theories of co-regency and the possibility

of a sole rule.37 The motif of smiting the enemy is representative of the domination of Egypt

over all foreign enemies by the ruler.38 Nefertiti conveys the message here that she is the

supreme ruler of the Two Lands, an unprecedented feat to be carried out by a woman.

The iconography behind the blue, tall, flat-topped crown of Nefertiti is another

important feature of the masculine iconography she incorporates into her image. The so-

called platform crown is restricted solely to the iconography of both queen Tiye and queen

Nefertiti (as is the khat headdress).39 Aldred has suggested that the distinctive crown of

Nefertiti is associated with representations of the goddess Tefnut in the form of a sphinx.40

Furthermore, Benkowski attributes the iconography of the crown as a derivative of the crown

worn by queen Tiye in depictions as a female sphinx,41 utilising the symbolism to enforce a

more authoritative role as queen.42 It is this crown that Nefertiti is seen wearing in both

examples of her smiting the enemy (Boston and Luxor Temple talatats).43 Both the colour and

surface of Nefertiti’s crown seems to derive from the xprS crown of the king, thus instating a

parallel between the political and cultural actions carried out by the king, which are not

associated traditionally with queenship.44 From the reign on Amenhotep III onwards, there is

new duality in the ideology of queenship, from which the queen is equated with the king, if

not depicted in a more prominent form.45

36

See: Assmann, J. (2013). A new state theology – the religion of light. In F. Seyfried (Ed.). In the light of

Amarna: 100 years of the Nefertiti discovery; Hornung, E. (2001). (trans. David Lorton). Akhenaten and the

religion of light; Assmann, J. (1995). Egyptian solar religion in the New Kingdom: Re, Amun and crisis of

polytheism; Aldred, C. (1973). Akhenaten and Nefertiti. 37

Carney (2002), 34 & fn.46 for discussions on the theories. 38

Ertman (2006), 61. 39

Roth (2004), 3. 40

Benkowski (2011), 79. 41

Ibid. 80. 42

Ibid. See the earlier explanation of the iconographic symbolism of queen Tiye’s crown. 43

Ibid. 44

Ibid. 45

Morkot (1986), 2.

69

The incorporation of kingship iconography into the crown of Nefertiti is one that

elevates the status of the queen during this period. Combined with the scenes of smiting the

enemy, we see that Nefertiti is acquiring attributes of, and, taking an active role in aspects of

kingship, which, before this period were unknown. The elements of kingship that entered into

the repertoire of Nefertiti’s iconography suggest her presentation as queen-consort.46

Of the multitude of iconographic symbolisms behind the motif of smiting the enemy,

those of religion and cult play an integral role in understanding the role of queen Nefertiti.

Queens played an important role in both cult and ritual activities. Typically (in the few

representations that there are), the queen acted in a supportive role, following behind the king

but, during the New Kingdom, Nefertiti is involved as the sole actor of the smiting of the

enemy motif.47 Due to fundamental changes in kingship and queenship ideology during this

period, there is an increase in the political and cultic activity of its queens, through which

Nefertiti is almost co-equal to Akhenaten.48

The symbolism of smiting the enemy – the king uniting Upper and Lower Egypt and

holding dominion over the enemies of Egypt – has a religious component. The smiting of the

enemy scene invokes Assmann’s theory of cultural memory in which Nefertiti, acting out the

role of the king, recreates a mythical past.49 By doing so, the ideology of queenship is entered

into a realm, which before this period is solely a male domain. In effect, Nefertiti is

manipulating the way in which the Egyptian view their own past, although such scenes of

queens carrying out the role of smiting the enemy is almost non-existential post Akhenaten’s

reign. Nefertiti’s participation in the smiting of the enemy includes her in the mythical and

46

Troy (2003), 100. 47

Roth (2009), 6. 48

Ibid. 4. 49

Zinn (2015), 47.

70

everlasting concept of the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt – creating order and

upholding the concept of ma’at.50

The iconography of Nefertiti’s crown also holds significant symbolism regarding the

cultic and religious sphere. Within the newly established religious cult of the Amarna period,

Nefertiti, Akhenaten and Aten form the divine triad, whereas before this period, the divine

triad consisted of Tefnut, Shu and Atum.51 Here parallels are drawn between the triads.

Nefertiti is equated to Tefnut, Akhenaten to Shu and the Aten to Atum. It is through

Nefertiti’s crown symbolism (combining both the xprS crown of the king with the crown of

Tiye, symbolic of the goddess Tefnut), that we see the masculine iconography’s influence

over the divine sphere in which Nefertiti is encapsulated. It is through the changing role of

the queen in the theological concepts of the Amarna period, which provides one of the

clearest indications of the active masculine role that was attributed to queenship.52 It could be

argued that without her tall, blue, flat-topped crown, the iconography of Nefertiti would hold

a significant amount less symbolism, especially with regards to her masculine portrayal.

Again, Nefertiti’s association with the crown of Tiye could exemplify a form of cultural

memory in which she, Nefertiti, uses the memory of Tiye and the masculine power she held,

in order to further her role of masculine power and association with the divine. It has even

been suggested that during scenes of smiting the enemy, Nefertiti plays the role of a queen-

goddess.53

It is interesting to note that post Akhenaten’s reign, the prominence of the role of the

powerful queen seems to diminish. Royal women are no longer depicted in a military way,

especially not in the scenes of smiting the enemy.54 Examples of royal women of the New

Kingdom, post Akhenaten’s reign include Ankhesenamun standing behind Tutankhamun and

50

Ibid. 48. 51

Benkowksi (2011), 80. 52

Schoske (1982), 171. 53

Tawfik (1975), 163. 54

Carney (2002), 35.

71

Nefertari standing behind Ramesses II as they, the kings, respectively smite the enemy.55

Similar examples in which the queen is seen smiting the enemy come from the Ptolemaic

Period as well as from Meroitic culture,56 a position held by sacred kingship.57 It must be

remembered that the motif of smiting the enemy is not ultimately Egyptian, and can be seen

at the Lion Temple of Naga, on which the Kandake Amanitore is seen in the position of

smiting the enemy.58 According to the culture of Moroë however,59 depictions of the queen

smiting the enemy are not surprising.60

When considering the role of queenship, the ideology of kingship must be taken into

consideration. Queenship is parallel to kingship and, from this period onwards, queens are

regarded as unequal equals to their male counterpart, the king.61 From the Old Kingdom

onwards, queens were assimilated with the royal symbolism of kingship – incorporating the

cartouche and uraeus, for example.62 The scene in which Nefertiti smites the enemy is one

that is shocking, not because she is female but, because she is seen in a military image, which

until this point was reserved solely for the king, invoking the concept of female rulership.63

One of the epithets of Neferneferuaten is ‘effective for her husband,’ which is

demonstrated clearly in the depictions of Nefertiti smiting the enemy,64 in which she is seen

carrying out the actions which are associated with the king. It is interesting to note that

55

Ibid. 56

Zinn (2015), 45; Morkot (1986), 6. 57

Schoske (1982), 171. 58

Ibid. 4. See appendix figure 2.6. 59

The iconography of the Kandake from the Meroitic culture shows that the queen, much like the king plays an

equally masculine role. The best examples come from the king Natakamani and Kandake Amanitore, where

Amanitore is seen holding the heads of a bunch of enemies, while holding a sword in the other hand, ready to

strike. Wildung (2008), 200. 60

Schoske (1982), 171. 61

Morkot (1986) 5. 62

Carney (2002), 37. 63

Ibid. 38. 64

Dodson (2009), 37.

72

Nefertiti appears in the smiting the enemy scenes before she is elevated to king as

Neferneferuaten.65

The concept of divine kingship was an androgynous concept in which both a male and

female model was needed. The inclusion of a female in kingly representation was a common

occurrence, highlighting the aspect of duality which was imperative to the ancient Egyptian

mind-set.66 Reiterating the male and female aspects of kingship/queenship, it was necessary

that there was an active incorporation of the female in order to include the authority

associated with kingship.67 The explicitly kingly role of upholding ma’at can also be seen

through the queens of the 18th

dynasty. Dated to the reign of Amenhotep III, in the tomb of

Kheruef, a relief depicts the king, Hathor and queen Tiye in which an inscription regarding

Tiye reads ‘she is in the company of your majesty, like Ma’at accompanies Re.’68 From this

example, it can be seen that queen Tiye is parallel to Ma’at, taking part in the kingly role of

maintaining the order of Egypt. Duality, a fundamental aspect of Egyptian thought is also

seen from the examples of Nefertiti.

The Boston talatat relief depicts the boat of the queen as being equal to the king’s

boat.69 This is demonstrative of the power of the queen during this period as an equal of the

king. The representations of the female in the masculine form reiterates the power that that

masculine has when applied to the role of queenship.

Queens of the 18th

dynasty held an authoritative role in which the masculine

iconography which was attributed to them, played a pivotal part in their representation, as

seen most clearly from the examples of queens Tiye and Nefertiti. Queen Tiye is seen most

prominently in the form of a sphinx,70 trampling the enemies of Egypt, a motif that is solely

65

Ibid. 116. 66

Troy (2003), 93. 67

Troy (2002), 2. 68

Ibid. 21. 69

Arnold (1996), 85. 70

See appendix, figure 1.2.

73

attributed to the king. Nefertiti, also seen in the form of a trampling sphinx,71 replicates this

same iconography and symbolism. The masculine iconography that Nefertiti incorporates

into her image however, is far more prominent than that of Tiye. Her use of the smiting the

enemy motif is one which further solidifies her position as a powerful queen, by using the

traditionally masculine iconography; Nefertiti elevates the position of queenship that she

holds. The symbolism behind the iconography of the scene has a multitude of levels, all of

which influence the perception of the queen and the role that is held by her. It can be

concluded that the role of queenship for both Tiye and Nefertiti is influenced heavily by their

incorporation of masculine, royal iconography into their own depictions.

Appendix

Figure 1.1. Lepsius, Abt III, Band 5, Bl. 82. Tiye depicted twice as sphinx at Sedeinga.

71

See appendix, figure 2.5.

74

Figure 1.2. Epigraphic Survey, The tomb of Kheruef, 32. fig. 9. Tiye as a female sphinx

trampling the enemies of Egypt. Panel on the side of Tiye’s throne in TT192.

Figure 1.3. MMA 26.7.1342. Carved plaque from a

bracelet. Depicts queen Tiye.

Figure 2.1. BM EA35714. Plaster cast of the Narmer

Palette.

75

Figure 2.2. BM EA55586. Ivory sandal label of king Den.

Figure 2.3. MFA Boston 63.260. Close-up of the scene of

Nefertiti smiting the enemy.

Figure 2.4. MFA Boston 63.260. Talatat: River scene with royal barges and tow boats.

76

Figure 2.5. Tawfik (1975), 165, fig. 1. Talatat block from Luxor Temple depicting Nefertiti

smiting the enemy.

Figure 2.6. Schoske (1982), 4. Kandake Amanitore smiting the enemy. Naga Pylon, Lion

Temple.

Jed Rual, 708264@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Ancient Egyptian Queens (CLE342)

77

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79

To what extent did British success in Europe during the Seven Years War

depend on the strength of the Fiscal-Military State?

Britain’s financial position during the Seven Years’ War in Europe can largely be attributed

to the strength of the Fiscal-Military State. Economic might was successfully translated into

military prowess as Britain was able to raise war funds from taxation, borrowed money on

low interest rates, and manage its military spending through a competent administration

geared towards the fiscal responsibilities of warfare. To further illustrate Britain’s monetary

might, it will be necessary throughout this essay to conduct a comparative evaluation of both

Britain and France’s economic institutions which will reveal weaknesses in France’s ability

to remain significant competitors throughout the war. To this end, victory in Europe relied

heavily on subsidies from Britain and guaranteed Prussia the capability to outlast their

enemies in Europe. James C. Riley has highlighted France’s financial misfortunes and their

inability to provide its European allies with the necessary funds to wage war effectively on a

long-term basis. However, in his Master’s Thesis, Jeremy Lands wrote that Britain’s debt was

at record setting levels before the outbreak of the Seven Year’s War, and entering another

conflict with France would only further damage the British economy. Yet the level of debt

did not have a substantial effect on the manner in which Britain waged war. This essay

locates itself within the theoretical framework of a Fiscal-Military State, as John Brewer

pointed out in his 1989 book Sinews of Power. The majority of sources used in this essay

derive from secondary work from British and French perspectives, including unpublished and

published postgraduate material. Additionally, primary sources in this essay include a

collection of private papers and memoirs as well as governmental information from the

National Archives. The appendix will give reference to statistics and trends which aim to

80

further illustrate my argument. The mechanisms of the Fiscal-Military State need to be

further explored in order to understand its economic implications in Europe.

Military success in Europe was backed by economic power at home; thus, Britain

relied on an efficient administrative structure that was devoted to organising the fiscal needs

of warfare. France’s inability to provide subsidies to its European allies can largely be

accredited to the mismanagement of their war funds. These shortcomings were a result of

internal corruption and poor supervision of spending. Large amounts of money went missing

due to bureaucratic corruption through its system of taxation meant that there were many rich

individuals, to the detriment of the state’s financial needs. There was little coordination

between governmental departments and those who held power were deemed as incompetent

planners. This is further illustrated in the later years of the war when French administrators

failed to note their expenditures with any real concern. Only in 1763 did military officials

begin to calculate its debts to contractors from 1754 to 1757. This made repayments a

disastrous issue to cope with and plagued France with financial struggles. By this point,

repayment charges had consumed sixty per cent of the monarchy’s annual revenue. James B.

Collins stated that one of the fundamental reasons behind France’s staggering 1.5 million

levre in national debt during the Seven Years’ War was a result of how the government

handled their expenditures. Britain on the other hand experienced complete control over its

military spending, though the expansion of its administrative departments. Documents from

the National Archives shed light on the size and growth of Britain’s full-time fiscal

bureaucracy which had increased substantially as a result of the Seven Years’ War. Between

1755 and 1763, the number of employees rose from 6484 to 7478. These government bodies

dealt with the Treasury and Exchequer as well as all trade income. So, these figures stand as a

testament to Britain’s commitment to the fiscal responsibilities of war.

81

The fundamental task of the Treasury’s in France and Britain was to find ways to raise

funds; this was especially the case during wartime. Taxation rose in both countries and

accounted for a large proportion of military spending, becoming the largest actors in the

economy. Under the Fiscal-Military regime, Britain became the most heavily taxed state in

Europe, causing many to forecast devastating results on the poor who could not cope with

these rises. In London, the price of an average jug of ale increased by sixteen per cent during

the Seven Years’ War. However, the military demand for skilled workers and soldiers acted

like a sponge, soaking up all unemployment rates effectively, therefore family incomes were

larger as more were at work, which meant they could cope with tax increases during wartime.

Conversely, measures were introduced in France to raise money from temporary taxation

through Vingtième. This was a form of taxation collected by the government from the people

regardless of rank, making up five per cent of the governments income. The first proposal

ended in failure as it saw serious clashes between the crown and the sovereign courts. The

vast majority of judges were against the suggested high rates of taxation as they were deemed

too much of a burden on the general public. However, the second proposal was passed, but

failed to bring in the desired funds for the war effort. Appendix A further illustrates the

desperate state of French finances in 1759. While Matthew Darly’s satirical print is based on

British opinion, it does a remarkable job at presenting an accurate perception of French

financial struggles. To this end, statistics from an unpublished paper presented at the Fifth

Annual Appalachian Spring Conference in World History and Economics reveals that Britain

from 1752 to 1760 increased its military spending from governmental funds from sixty-two to

eighty-eight per cent. Appendix B reveals the increase in spending from previous wars in

comparison with the Seven Years War for Britain. France on the other hand posted only

forty-one to a staggering thirty per cent in roughly the same years. Therefore, it is accurate to

82

say that Britain was able to shoulder substantially more military responsibility as a result of

its rise in taxation compared with France.

Warfare after 1688 had increased in size and frequency, armies and navies were

deployed for longer periods of time and required maintenance on an even larger scale than

before. As a result, taxation and trade revenue could not be entirely relied on to fund the war

effort. Thus the British state became the largest borrower in the economy. Their debt was

managed through long term loans with low interest rates, whereas the French state often

unwisely utilised short term annuities which had high interest rates, meaning debt was

accumulated sooner and at a much higher rate. Britain utilised bonds, annuities, a lottery

system and aggressive advertising for loan subscriptions from ordinary citizens which would

cover any expenditures the nation collated through interest on borrowed money. Additionally,

rates of borrowing remained steady at 3.5 per cent at the height of the war, thus cash flow was

never a problem. The stability of such favourable interest rates in Britain can be traced to the

confidence instilled into lenders by the guaranteed repayments to government creditors. This

played a significant part in Brittan’s ability to borrow funds for subsidising its allies in

Europe. This was certainly not the case for France during the period, where lenders were

suspicious of subscribing loans, given the King’s history of bankruptcy and careless spending

from previous wars on the continent. Consequently, lenders demanded higher rates of

interest, rising from 50 to 100 per cent during the war, ultimately causing financial instability

in France.

France and Britain maintained similar borrowing rates, standing at roughly forty per

cent. Yet France devoted a lower proportion of its annual revenues to servicing charges than

Britain did. For France, the figure stands at thirty-nine per cent, while for Britain the number

is substantially higher, sitting at forty-eight per cent. Furthermore, with a high and secure

return offered, savings were deflected away from private credit markets and onto loans of the

83

state. This wartime experience is further illustrated by a letter in 1759 from Hoare’s, a bank

heavily involved in the mortgage market to its customers: ‘The uncommon supply of millions

and millions granted and now raised [to pay for the Seven Years’ War]’. The financial

infrastructure under the British Fiscal-Military State was particularly effective at tapping into

public credit this laid the groundwork for the capital market and set the tone for Britain as an

economic powerhouse during the Seven Years’ War.

The success or failure of trade dictated in part the financial support that both France

and Britain committed to their European allies in central Germany. The Eighteenth century

French trade market was the most dynamic sector in the country, nevertheless it witnessed

considerable decline during the Seven Years War. These deficiencies were a result of two

successful British maritime strategies: The Royal Navy and its superior strategy of

blockading French ports, and privateering on French trade ultimately damaged its commerce.

Appendix C further illustrates a graphic view of France’s trade sensitivity during the Seven

Years War. Thomas M. Doerflinger and Robert Louis Sein have estimated that French trade

income witnessed an eighty to ninety per cent reduction. Thus the economy in France during

this time took a devastating blow. The net flow of specie and bullion, the cost of credit, and

the price of basic goods available to the consumer were all vital features of a successful

economic structure. France, in this respect, failed to accumulate wealth as a result of their

inability to produce their own stock of bullion and specie through their curtailing trade. This

ultimately affected the manner in which their economic engine worked. Riley claims that

foreign lenders had expanded their investments in French securities which as a result

enlarged the capital inflow. However, this could not counter the lack of bullion and specie

leaving France to pay for the war in Europe. Consequently, French money stock shrank

significantly. This in part, explains why France experienced financial troubles during the war,

and were unable to meet the subsidy demands of their European allies.

84

Under the Fiscal-Military State, William Pitt remained dominant in financially

outlasting his European enemies, namely in France. His military policy of winning in

Germany by a strategy of attrition came from his ability to provide the necessary funds for

war. As Newcastle had commented in a letter, ‘The goodness of the peace will depend on our

being able to hold the war longer than France’. Furthermore, Schuman and Schweizer have

put forward that the British strategy changed in Europe as it realised that the ‘currency of

victory consisted not merely in troops, nor ships, nor weapons, nor even decisive victories,

but also, perhaps above all, in currency itself’. With efficient funds at hand, the British were

able to purchase all the above commodities. Thus, military strength was measured in

economic weight. This grand strategy was adopted by Frederick after 1757 and would ensure

victory under the support of the British Fiscal-Military State. Arthur R. Rodgers claimed

however that Prussia’s possession of Saxony gave Frederick the ability to supply his armies.

Saxony was far more fertile than his native lands, providing his armies with the provisions

needed whilst on campaign. While this may be true, when Frederick did conquer Saxony,

Mecklenburg and other neighbouring principalities, he was only able to raise his overall war

funds an extra forty-eight million Thaler, bringing only little economic fortune to his war

effort. The financial state of the Prussian Staatsschatz, the special fund for wartime activities,

further illustrates how funds from Saxony only played a small part in economically

supporting Fredrick’s armies. This source of funds amounted to merely 17.3 million Thaler

which ran dry by 1758 after only two years of use. Moreover, with Prussia facing enemies

whose population totalled around 70 million; it became imperative to the European offensive

that a steady flow of British subsidy be supplied to fight the war on a long-term basis. The

evidence is conclusive, Britain’s annual injection of £670,000 from 1758 through to the

campaigns of 1761 as a result of the Westminster Convention proved to be decisive in

Prussia’s ability to remain dominant in Europe despite the odds.

85

Britain was able to garner support from several European avenues. Soldiers from

Hesse-Cassel and Hanover consumed a large sum of subsidy money. Newcastle had

estimated that by the end of 1757, £300,000 in subsidies had been provided for Hesse-Cassel.

In 1759, Frederick had presented Parliament in Britain with a request for £398,697 to cover

the expenses of 29,829 Hanoverians, 6,092 from Wolfenbuttel, 842 from Saxe-Gotha and

1,243 from Buckeburg. This was approved and followed an addition of £59,646 for Hesse

and £500,000 more in subsidies for Prince Ferdinand’s army. Later in the same year,

Parliament added a bulk sum to the European theatre, injecting £279,834 for 19,012 Hessian

troops, and £60,000 in gratuities for the landgrave. Between April and May of 1759, £1.2

million was earmarked for the German theatre of war. In 1760, in addition to the £1 million

vote credit, the German credit consumed thirty per cent of the British budget in 1761. Fred

Anderson remarked that the amount of money given in support of Prussia’s military activities

reached new levels that vastly outstripped any Britain had ever made. Overall British

expenditure on the German theatre came to £19,469,677, spanning over six campaigns from

1757 to 1762, which significantly improved Prussia’s chances of sustaining victory in

Europe. Such high levels of support point to one defining conclusion: That the strategy of

attrition against a numerically superior enemy could achieve victory for the Anglo-Prussian

alliance.

Britain’s monetary might can be put into context when compared with France’s

financial struggles in Europe. Just after setbacks in Rossbach, treasury officials in Austria,

Russia, Sweden, Cologne, the Palatinate, Wurttemburg, Bavaria, Saxony, Denmark and

Genoa had all requested subsidies and arrears totalling more than forty million livres,

equalling £2 million at the beginning of 1758. The Second Treaty of Versailles had agreed

that £1.5 million in annual subsidies be received by Austria for the duration of the war, an

amount France struggled to provide. Cardinal De Bernis noted the dire situation in a letter

86

complaining to his envoy, ‘I do not know what means you have to find us an extra hundred

million a year’. Ninety per cent of thirty-two million levres was allocated to Austrian

campaigns. In most cases, money that was coming into the French war budget had already

been spent before it had been received, as Bernis stated ‘of the seventy million we have just

obtained, twenty millions are already spent.’ It was quickly realised by Austrian officials that

their financial needs were not going to be met. Furthermore, Kaunitz found that taxes were

rising, burdening the poor in Austria further. By the time measures were drawn up to curve

money issues it was too late. By 1759, the State Bank in Vienna had witnessed a severe rising

debt which amounted to £33.5 million by the end of the war in 1763. While Frederick noted

that he was dually outmatched by his opponents, he was able to remain dominant on the

battlefield against them, as he puts it, ‘These people with their overwhelmingly superior

forces, who throw themselves against us from the four corners of the globe . . . how is it

possible that with their depth of resources, forces and troops, they have been able to

accomplish so little?’ This failure by Frederick’s enemies can partly be attributed to France’s

inability to fund a substantial amount of wartime activities in central Europe. While Britain

and Prussia also had an increase in debt as a result of the war, Austria’s debt affected their

ability to remain competitive on the battlefield against Prussian military aggression while

Britain was able to maintain a strategy of long term warfare through the Fiscal-Military State.

Military victory during the Seven Years’ War was not only a question of finance,

manpower and superior strategy, but also the health of the armed forces. The strength of the

British Fiscal-Military state was not only determined by an advanced economies’ ability to

buy troops but to maintain them while they were serving. Britain’s up-keep of solders was

defined by the success of its foreign private armies, mainly deriving from German regions of

Europe. Erica Charters has championed the notion that Britain had failed to care for the

upkeep of its armies in Europe and is aimed towards the characteristics of the British Fiscal-

87

Military State. While there may be truth to Charter’s theory, it must be noted that these

military setbacks affected France far more than Britain in Europe, given the economic issues

facing France throughout the war, compared with the stable Fiscal-Military State where cash

flow and replacement troops were not an issue. This was certainly the case with the 25,000

sick French troops accumulated in Soubouse. French commanders made a fatal mistake: They

made cutbacks on costs and assumed that their armies could live from provisions provided by

the local German states they were stationed in. This was a widespread misconception that

leading to a poorly maintained army. Thus Charter’s theory is better suited against a weaker

state where the implications are far more devastating.

Prussian success in Europe was fundamentally linked to the Fiscal-Military State in

Britain. Britain had maintained fiscal responsibility through their methods of taxation,

borrowing large amounts of money on low interest rates and a capable administration to

manage their military spending. Triumph in these three areas brought victory to Frederick in

Europe against numerical superior foes through a strategy of attrition by providing a lifeline

to resources and manpower, thus guaranteeing economic stability to Prussia. France in

comparison, suffered economic turmoil due to the old regimes’ out-dated and feeble

economic strategies which failed to support their allies in Europe and brought military failure

to their campaigns on the continent. Overall, the success of the Fiscal-Military State in Britain

helped achieve victory in Europe, and most certainly could not have been done without.

Andre Chavez, 551524@swansea.ac.uk

Written for The Great War for Empire II, 1754-1764: Europe (HIH-3306)

88

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Uwin Hyman, 1989).

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Society, 1998).

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92

A public space of varying suffering:

Public lavatory provision in Victorian Bury-St-Edmunds1

Barbara Penner asserts that Victorian women faced a world of unmentionable suffering due

to non-existent female public lavatory provision: exemplified by the failed proposal tabled at

St Pancras Vestry to build a female public lavatory on Camden High Street, London in 1900.

She notes, having read the Vestry’s minutes against the grain, published in the St. Pancras

Gazette, a subtle, but ultimately overpowering, sexism that pervades the council’s decision

making process.2 This essay will use an original case study of Bury-St-Edmunds Town

Council’s meeting minutes that proposed the building of female and male public lavatories in

the town. By following Penner’s lead of reading against the grain it will be found that the

exclusion of women from public space evident in London was also prevalent in Bury-St-

Edmunds, indicating the closeness of provincial and metropolitan attitudes. In seeking to go

further than Penner it will be asserted that people with limited mobility were also excluded,

whilst placing public lavatories in out of the way locations allowed users the ability to

subvert the authorities’ design of space.

Penner bases her theory on, among others, the feminist geographer Doreen Massey,

and believes the creation of urban public space that didn’t provide lavatories for women

perpetuated Victorian patriarchy by excluding women.3 Massey asserts that organisation of

space is integral to producing, and not just the result of, social relations and that women’s

mobility challenges patriarchy.4 The late nineteenth century saw an increasing standardisation

and organisation of space through the development of town planning, which in turn created a

1 This is a play on the article title Barbara Penner, ‘A world of unmentionable suffering: women’s public

conveniences in Victorian London’, Journal of Design History, 14.1 (2001), 35-51. 2 Penner, pp. 35-6, 40.

3 Penner, p. 36.

4 Doreen Massey, Space, Place and Gender (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999), p. 4, 11.

93

knowable and, thus, governable space.5 Penner along with Maureen Flanagan, who in her

work on the same St Pancras lavatories proposal unwaveringly concurs with Penner, use the

growth in Victorian society’s organisation of space as evidence of the exclusion of women

from public space.6 By embracing these assertions, and following Penner’s methodology, it

will observed that proposals for building a female public lavatory in Bury-St-Edmunds were

met with apathy across the Town Council which sought to exclude women from its public

space. The discussion of proposals for a public lavatory in the provincial urban centre of

Bury-St-Edmunds breaks with the overwhelming bias of public lavatory historiography on

London as the focus of study.7 In 1888 Bury-St-Edmunds, with a population of 16,255,

officially became the county town of West Suffolk and with it the council took greater

control over the development of infrastructure. Its growing civic importance saw it take a

local lead in improving sanitation and providing a better welcome to the town’s visitors.8 It

was against this backdrop, along with concerns over how other residentially and

commercially similar towns were sanitarily developing, that Bury-St-Edmunds looked to

construct a public lavatory in 1899.9

The shortened minutes of the Bury-St-Edmunds Town Council meetings are reported

in The Bury and Norwich Post from June to October 1899. An Editorial dated 19 December

1899 indicates the editor’s view that preference lay with a dispersed system of urinals and not

5 Patrick Joyce, ‘Maps, blood and the city: the governance of the social in nineteenth century Britain’, in The

Social Question: New Bearings in History and Social Sciences, ed. by Patrick Joyce (London: Routledge, 2002),

99-115 (pp. 99-104). 6 Maureen Flanagan, ‘Private needs, and public spaces: public toilet provision in the Anglo-Atlantic patriarchal

city: London, Dublin, Toronto and Chicago’, Urban History, 41.2 (2014), 265-290 (pp. 266, 271). 7 Throughout my research I could find no academic writing on Victorian public lavatories outside London. For

good examples of writing on London aside from Penner and Flanagan see: Lee Jackson, Dirty Old London: The

Victorian Fight Against Filth (Padstow: T J International, 2014) and Lynne Walker, ‘Vistas of pleasure: women

consumers of urban space in the west end of London 1850-1900’, in Women in Victorian Art World, ed. by

Clarissa Campbell Orr (Manchester: Manchester University press, 1995). 8 Frank Meeres, A History of Bury St Edmunds, (Andover: Phillimore & Co. ltd., 2010), pp. 141-142.

9 The Bury and Norwich Post, 19.09.1899, p. 6. This article reports the findings of inquiries made to other towns

residentially and commercially similar to Bury-St-Edmunds on their provision and state of public lavatories.

Towns included Shrewsbury, Yarmouth and York.

94

in support of a costly centrally located lavatory.10 However, with the availability of only

shortened minutes it is important to bear in mind that, in the trimming-down process,

arguments against the proposal may have been favoured. Either way the building a female

and male lavatory was stalled, moved to-and-from committee stage and eventually shelved.

The public lavatory question first came to the full Town Council at its 13 June 1899 meeting

in the form of a proposal by the town surveyor for lavatories to be placed in the Town Hall’s

cellars.11 The proposal had already been accepted by the Council’s Sanitary Committee.

Deputy Mayor, Alderman J. G. Oliver, attempted to stifle discussion on the matter by

interrupting its proposer, and chair of the Sanitary Committee, Councillor Walpole, asserting

that his failure to find a seconder for the proposal meant the council should move to its next

business.12 It was thus at the full Town Council meeting that opposition to the proposal first

became apparent. The attempt to stifle discussion on a point of order indicates the

mechanistic nature by which the proposals could be dismissed and the disguising of

disagreement under a veil of procedure. It, furthermore, attempts to prevent the Council from

having to hear the rationale and social consequences for such facilities. Helen Meller asserts

that the professional men responsible for the provision of urban facilities rarely considered

questions about urban planning schemes outside of design and cost, therefore a dismissal on

procedure was not unexpected.13 Discussions over the proposal then developed more

gendered reasons for disapproval, and suggest the extent to which the male town planners

believed they knew, without consultation, the needs of women in the spaces they were

planning.14 Mayor, Alderman J. Floyd, criticised the proposal as he failed to see the need for

10

The Bury and Norwich Post, 19.12.1899, p. 5. 11

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6. 12

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6. 13

Helen Meller, ‘Gender, citizenship and the making of the modern environment’, in Women and the Making of

Built Space in England, 1870-1950, ed. by Elizabeth Darling and Lesley Whitworth (Aldershot: Ashgate

publishing limited, 2007) 13-30, (p. 17). 14

Meller, p. 20.

95

a female lavatory.15 The historiography of Victorian separate spheres has presented a reason

for this perceived lack of need, as the domestic women belonged in the private sphere, whilst

the man occupied the public sphere, and so women didn’t use the public space.16 However,

more recent historiographical developments, especially of the later Victorian period, have

broken down these rigid gender boundaries suggesting that female movement in the public

sphere was heightened greatly by increased individualism and middle class liberalism.17 The

Mayor, therefore, opposed the proposal through reliance on his personal, and possibly

outdated, judgement of female needs. It is significant that attendees at Bury-St-Edmunds

Town Council’s meetings were entirely male, which prevented the consideration of a female

view and a challenge to patriarchy.18 In both the decision making process, and the preferred

decision of the Mayor, patriarchal control was perpetuated.

Concerns over cost formed the next centre of opposition. The Deputy Mayor, again on

13 June 1899, was reported to be the most vociferous in disapproval, suggesting that as far as

the ladies lavatory was concerned it was ‘entirely a wasteful expenditure’.19 The removal of

justification for a female lavatory on account of expenditure fits with Meller’s assertion of

cost being an overriding factor. This may suggest, like the criticism of the Mayor, a presumed

understanding of female needs and assumed low usage of the lavatory. A very real concern at

the time, evidenced by the meetings discussions, was how ratepayers would react to the

proposal. Councillor Owen Clark, however, offers a conclusion on this by indicating his

correspondence with ratepayers, of all classes, showed they were in favour.20 Furthermore, as

15

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6. 16

Barbara Welter, ‘The cult of true womanhood: 1820-1860’, American Quarterly, 18.2 (1966), 151-174. 17

Jane Hamlett and Sarah Wiggins, ‘Introduction: Victorian women in Britain and the United States: new

perspectives’, Women’s History Review, 18,5 (2009), 705-717; Amanda Vickery, ‘Golden age to separate

spheres? A review of the categories and chronology of English women’s history’, The Historical Journal, 36.2

(1993), 383-414. 18

Coverage of Bury Town Council’s meetings proposals for a public lavatory featured in The Bury and Norwich

Post from 13 June 1899 and ran until 19 September 1899. 19

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6. 20

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6.

96

early as 1878 a letter to The Bury and Norwich Post editor, by an A. E. Tollady, contains

details of a petition of 268 ratepayers handed to the Town Council in support for public

urinals in Bury-St-Edmunds, indicating a longstanding ratepayer acceptance of the need for

this facility.21 A further September 1899 letter, again from Tollady, expands ratepayer support

to that of lavatories, and indicates a new petition in support had begun.22 Wasteful

expenditure on a male only facility was not a concern of Deputy Mayor, Alderman Oliver,

who had agreed at a 9 July 1891 meeting to the construction of a male lavatory at the town’s

Corn Exchange which would open for just three hours in the week at a cost of £300. The cost

of the proposed Town Hall lavatories was estimated at £589 7s. 6d: £280 for the female

lavatory and £260 for the male.23 Thus the Deputy Mayor’s criticism of wasteful expenditure

cannot be levelled against the possibility of low lavatory use or the possibility of the

ratepayer not accepting the proposals. Instead it lies more specifically in the idea that the

provision of a female lavatory was itself wasteful.

A further Town Council meeting on 11 July 1899 saw a proposal, by Councillor D.

Paine, to use the Corn Exchange as the public lavatory. However, with this proposal came the

removal of the idea for a female lavatory.24 In an attempt to enshrine the principle of a female

lavatory Councillor Jaggard proposed a motion that one must be provided. The motion was

defeated by 10 votes to 15 and effectively terminated this idea whilst also indicating a wider

disapproval than just the Mayor and Deputy Mayor, whose opposition the paper focused on.25

It suggests the Town Council as a whole did not wish to provide a female lavatory and its

desire to preserve patriarchal order. Lynne Walker acknowledges the extent to which

Victorian middle-class women taking on greater public roles were restricted to areas close to

21

The Bury and Norwich Post, Letter to Editor, 30/04/1871, p. 8. 22

The Bury and Norwich Post, Letter to editor, 26/09/1899, p. 8. 23

The Bury and Norwich Post, 21.07.1891, p. 7, and The Bury and Norwich Post, 20/06/1899, p. 6. 24

The Bury and Norwich Post, 18.07.1899, p. 6. 25

The Bury and Norwich Post, 18.07.1899, p. 6.

97

home or ladies clubs in Mayfair.26 The restriction of public activities to places that provided

lavatories indicates that the failure to provide lavatories excluded these middle-class women

from public space and consequently from the public. The failed proposals to build a female

lavatory in the provincial urban centre of Bury-St-Edmunds and lack of understanding about

the needs of women displayed by Town Council members in many ways correlates with the

exclusionary patriarchal order Penner describes in London, hence demonstrating the

similarity of provincial and metropolitan attitudes.

Penner overemphasises gendered exclusion and the long term effects of public space

design. Public lavatories were spaces synonymous with filth and pollution and were

consistently concealed from the public eye throughout the Victorian era.27 The desire to

conceal female lavatories also centred on recreating the private within the public sphere in

order to maintain female’s pure and virginal qualities.28 Penner acknowledges attempts to

conceal the female lavatory on Camden High Street, but she relates it only to the patriarchal

hold on ensuring women’s purity.29 Concealing public lavatories during the Victorian era

often meant placing them underground. The male lavatory built in Bury-St-Edmund’s Corn

Exchange in 1891, despite strong objections from Councillor Stutter on the grounds of

convenience and ventilation, was concealed underground.30 In placing it underground

Councillors Oliver and J. Gough asserted that the lavatory would be out of the way.31

Furthermore, the 1899 proposal for the public lavatory at the Town Hall were to have them in

26

Lynne Walker, ‘Home and away: the feminist remapping of public and private space’, in The Unknown City:

Contesting Architecture and Social Space, ed. by Ian Borden, Joe Kerr and Jane Rendell, (Cambridge:

Massachusetts Institution of Technology, 2001), 297-315 (p. 301). 27

Ruth Barcan, ‘Dirty spaces: separation, concealment and shame’, in Public Restrooms and Politics of Sharing,

ed. by Harvey Moltoch and Laura Noren (New York: New York University Press, 2010), 25-43 (pp. 25, 34). 28

Terry Koogan, ‘Sex separation: the cure all for Victorian social anxiety’, in Public Restrooms and Politics of

Sharing, ed. by Harvey Moltoch and Laura Noren (New York: New York University Press, 2010), 145-165 (pp.

160-63). 29

Penner, p. 46. 30

The Bury and Norwich Post , 21.07.1891, p. 7. 31

The Bury and Norwich Post , 21.07.1891, p. 7.

98

its cellars.32 Placing lavatories underground meant access was often via steep steps. During

construction of a public lavatory in Exeter, December 1900, the county surveyor advised that

a nine inch step would be used, and that this was of no concern.33 A series of often steep steps

posed problems for those with limited mobility. Although contemporary attitudes to

disabilities were to confine it indoors the construction of facilities that were not accessible to

those with disabilities in general perpetuated segregation and worked against social

tolerance.34 By using Penner’s theoretical stand point it can be observed that the design of the

public lavatories in Bury-St-Edmunds would also exclude people with limited mobility from

public space, confirming Anne Borsay’s assertions that those with disabilities in Victorian

Britain were consistently excluded from citizenship.35 Therefore, by looking beyond Penner’s

over reliance on the explanatory power of patriarchy, other forms of exclusion in public space

were perpetuated. Tucking public lavatories out of the way not only excluded people with

limited mobility from public space, as well as women, but also altered the long-term

exclusionary prospects of the male only public lavatories.

Penner as a design and architectural historian focuses on the exclusionary effects of

the public lavatories’ design, or lack of design for a female lavatory, and perpetuates a view

that only the design process makes space and shapes the spaces’ social relations. She misses

an understanding of how people, through their use of space were also spaces makers.36

Furthermore, Massey, Penner’s theoretical base, recognises that not only does the

32

The Bury and Norwich Post , 18.07.1899, p. 6. 33

Trewman's Exeter Flying Post, 01.12.1900. 34

David Serlin, ‘Pissing without pity: disability, gender and the public toilet’, in Public Restrooms and Politics

of Sharing, ed. by Harvey Moltoch and Laura Noren (New York: New York University Press, 2010), 167-85 (p.

168). 35

Anne Borsay, Disability and Social Policy in Britain since 1750 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005) pp.

1, 22. 36

Elizabeth Darling and Lesley Whitworth, ‘Introduction: making space and re-making history’, in Women and

the Making of Built Space in England, 1870-1950, ed. by Elizabeth Darling and Lesley Whitworth (Aldershot:

Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2007), 1-11 (pp. 3-4); Anne Anderson and Elizabeth Darling, ‘The hill sisters:

cultural philanthropy and the embellishment of lives in late nineteenth century England’, in Women and the

Making of Built Space in England, 1870-1950, ed. by Elizabeth Darling and Lesley Whitworth (Aldershot:

Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2007), 32-48 (p. 34).

99

organisation of space affect social relations, but that social relations are inherently dynamic

and that a spaces’ meaning cannot ever be fixed.37 Andy Croll and his study of the provincial

urban centre of Merthyr Tydfil, agrees that despite public spaces being designed by civic

elites, they were overwhelmingly populated by the non-elite. He also suggests that control of

space by the civic elites could only occur through what they could observe and keep

surveillance on.38 Victorian society could only govern and police what was knowable to it.

Public lavatories are, though, what the Victorians sought to hide most and know as little as

possible about.

Although the initial site for the proposed public lavatory in Bury-St-Edmunds was in

the Town Hall, a central location very much in the public gaze, it was precisely this that the

Mayor levelled criticism against. He asserted that owing to the narrow residential streets

flanking the Town Hall they ought to consider the enjoyment of the resident’s outlook and re-

site the lavatory.39 Both the Mayor, and Deputy Mayor, as residents on these streets were thus

outlookers.40 The proposed lavatory in the cellar of the town hall would not involve any

architectural change to the hall itself and so it can only be presumed that it was the lavatory

users, or the very idea of a public lavatory, that the Mayor wanted to conceal. Furthermore,

there was discussion to place a public lavatory on Woolhall Street, as an alternative to the

Town Hall or the Corn Exchange, Councillor C. F. Felton suggested this was a good location

as it was a less prominent site.41 By following Croll’s idea that drunkards on backstreets

could subvert civic codes, which they could not do in main streets as their misdeeds could be

37

Massey, pp. 2, 4. 38

Andy Croll, Civilising the Urban: Popular Culture and Public Space in Merthyr c. 1870-1914 (Cardiff:

University of Wales Press, 2000) pp. 9, 63-64. 39

The Bury and Norwich Post, 18.07.1899, p. 6. 40

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899, p. 6. 41

The Bury and Norwich Post, 18.07.1899, p. 6.

100

observed by the respectable, placing public lavatories in less prominent backstreets might

allow the gendered division of lavatories to be subverted.42

Bury-St-Edmunds saw poorer people living close to the social elites resulting in the

proximity of these backstreets, such as Woolhall Street, to main streets in which subversion

could take place.43 Subversion of the authorised use of public lavatory space could come

from crime, an example of which was the report of a theft within a male public lavatory in

Leeds that two men and two women were convicted for.44 The participation in this crime by

women demonstrates their usage of male public lavatories and subversion of the authorities’

designated use of the space. Usurping authorities’ control on space could occur because the

authorities could not observe, know and thus control public lavatories as they were habitually

sited in less prominent locations. Ultimately, as Croll questions the binary of middle class

control over the working classes’ use of space, so should Penner’s binary of male control

over women’s use of public lavatories be questioned. As public lavatories were hidden away

and the spaces’ meaning constantly evolving by occurrences within it, so the perseverance of

patriarchy cannot lie only with the failure to provide a public lavatory for women.

The evidence from the provincial urban centre of Bury-St-Edmunds demonstrates

another attempt by a Town Council to not provide female public lavatories. By using

Penner’s methodology, it can be understood that the male patriarchy sought to perpetuate its

control. However, Penner, by using only a gendered spectrum, fails to recognise the same

prohibitive effects of public lavatories on other members of society, namely those with

limited mobility. Thus failing to recognise that the patriarchy did not just exclude females,

but also excluded those with limited mobility. Furthermore, by omitting part of Massey’s

theoretical standpoint and focusing on the design phase Penner removes female agency in the

42

Croll, pp. 81-3. 43

Meeres, p. 151. 44

The Leeds Mercury, 09.12.1982.

101

development of social relations. The unobservable and hence ungovernable spaces that

lavatories occupied meant the designs for space could be subverted, substantially reducing

the patriarchy’s power. The overarching need to keep the public lavatory out of sight in Bury-

St-Edmunds undermines the wish to not provide a female public lavatory. Suffering from

exclusion then was not static and restricted only to women, but varied due to use of public

space and to more than just its female users. Exclusion was thus not an all-consuming world

of suffering, but one limited only public spaces.

Andrew Morel-du-Boil, 801969@swansea.ac.uk

Written for Directed Reading in History (HI-M80)

Bibliography

Primary Sources

The Bury and Norwich Post, 30.04.1878.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 21.07.1891.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 13.06.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 20.06.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 11.07.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 18.07.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 12.09.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 19.09.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 26.09.1899.

The Bury and Norwich Post, 19.12.1899.

The Leeds Mercury, 09.12.1892.

Trewman’s Exeter Flying Post, 01.12.1900.

102

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(Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2000).

Darling, Elizabeth and Lesley Whitworth, Women and the Making of Built Space in England, 1870-

1950, (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2007).

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patriarchal city: London, Dublin, Toronto and Chicago’, Urban History, 41.2 (2014), 265-

290.

Hamlett, Jane and Sarah Wiggins, ‘Introduction: Victorian women in Britain and the United States:

new perspectives’, Women’s History Review, 18,5 (2009), 705-717.

Jackson, Lee, Dirty Old London: The Victorian Fight against Filth (Padstow: T J International,

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Joyce, Patrick, ‘Maps, blood and the city: the governance of the social in nineteenth century Britain’,

in The Social Question: New Bearings in History and Social Sciences, ed. by Patrick Joyce

(London: Routledge, 2002), 99-115.

Massey, Doreen, Space, Place and Gender (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999).

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Moltoch, Harvey and Laura Noren, ed., Public Restrooms and Politics of Sharing, (New York: New

York University Press, 2010).

Penner, Barbara, ‘A world of unmentionable suffering: a women’s public conveniences in Victorian

London’, Journal of Design History, 14.1 (2001), 35-51.

Vickery, Amanda, ‘Golden age to separate spheres? A review of the categories and chronology of

English women’s history’, The Historical Journal, 36.2 (1993), 383-414.

103

Walker, Lynne, ‘Home and away: the feminist remapping of public and private space’, in The

Unknown City: Contesting Architecture and Social Space, ed. by Ian Borden, Joe Kerr and

Jane Rendell, (Cambridge: Massachusetts Institution of Technology, 2001), 297-315.

Walker, Lynne , ‘Vistas of pleasure: women consumers of urban space in the west end of London

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104

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An editorial team of History and Classics students proofread, edit, and format Gorffennol. The team

currently comprises of the following students:

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Eugenia Gower (second year Classical Civilization)

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ISSUE 3