I'm planning on going to the library here in a few days, but our library lacks in educational things and focuses more on entertainment reading. (I live in a small town.) I went to do research on another subject and they literally had nothing on the subject. This time I'm researching a different topic and I know for a fact that I probably won't find it there but plan on checking anyway. The topic I'm working on is religion. I'm looking for information that isn't muddled in neo paganism (New world / modern pagan) specifically on matriarchal societies and religions where a female god is the main god. One section of my world development is female driven. It is also hard for me to find content that isn't littered in feminism. I want to create religions in my fantasy without pushing agendas. I more or so want them for conflict development, resolution and to add color. I don't mind pagan religions just no Wicca stuff. (Wicca is too new and too much of a buffet of other religions...) I'm looking for more examples where the religion isn't co male female (example: Roman has multiple gods both genders.) Looking to lean more towards a pure female hierarchy. I am also looking for examples of Female main domineering male lesser gods. Trying to avoid politics. Just trying for an Amazonia approach in an area.
Good luck in trying to find religious literature with no obvious bias. If you have a college or university in your area, they may allow you to use their library to find more scholarly articles on things, though if you're not a student or alumnus, you may have to pay a membership fee. You can also try looking for online books and articles using WordCat, Novanet and Google Scholar. Another and easier method is Wikipedia. Articles on religious topics may not be super accurate, but they can generally give you a general feel for how the religion works and if you want more information, you can always look up some of the books and journals listed under the articles references and sources headings. If you're looking for female led religions, then you might want to check out some Native North American myths. Not exactly female led, but definitely more egalitarian than some other religions.
The only help I can be is to say it is a common belief that prior to farming & domesticating animals, it is thought that almost all worship was of women. Archeological evidence exists & the theory makes sense. Theory in a nutshell- Women were magical in that life sprang forth from them. Then people settled to grow crops. Then they domesticated animals. With the domestication came the realization that a man needs to be involved or no life will spring forth. That's when you guys lost.
Ask your librarian about inter-library loans. In my province, the local library is part of a province-wide library system and a book from any library can be borrowed, not just the ones in the local building. Also, ask the librarian if he/she can help you. They usually love doing that sort of thing.
Thank you for the tip. I'll look into it and see if we have the program out here. I know we have a request a book program but not enough people use it so I often wonder if my requests will be taken into consideration. They literally had nothing in the library on ancient blacksmithing (metallurgy arts) I took a class at the college and wanted to learn more.
If you're looking for information on blacksmithing Rowan Taylor on YouTube is a blacksmith that does historical recreations. His videos can be rather informative.
A reference I use is a book by Robert Graves called The White Goddess www.oldways.org/documents/robertgraves/graves_the_white_goddess.pdf Graves's The White Goddess claims goddess worship as the prototypical religion. It's a very interesting read.
this looks like it would be a really good read on the Amazons based on archaeological evidence -------- The natural question, when you’re faced with a story like this, is: How true is it? In “Amazons,” Mayor—a classicist, based at Stanford, who is by all accounts the world’s leading expert on ancient female fighters—argues that, even if it is not literally true in all its particulars, it is still broadly true. The evidence, she writes, points to the fact that there really were Amazons: in some archaeological digs in Eurasia, as many as thirty-seven per cent of the graves contain the bones and weapons of horsewomen who fought alongside men. (“Arrows, used for hunting and battle, are the most common weapons buried with women, but swords, daggers, spears, armor, shields, and sling stones are also found,” Mayor writes.) These were the women the Greeks encountered on their expeditions around the Black Sea; they inspired similar stories among travelers from ancient Persia, Egypt, China, and other places. In Greece, they were objects of romantic fascination. http://www.newyorker.com/books/joshua-rothman/real-amazons ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Amazons―fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world―were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus of Persia, Alexander the Great, and the Roman general Pompey tangled with Amazons. But just who were these bold barbarian archers on horseback who gloried in fighting, hunting, and sexual freedom? Were Amazons real? In this deeply researched, wide-ranging, and lavishly illustrated book, National Book Award finalist Adrienne Mayor presents the Amazons as they have never been seen before. This is the first comprehensive account of warrior women in myth and history across the ancient world, from the Mediterranean Sea to the Great Wall of China. Mayor tells how amazing new archaeological discoveries of battle-scarred female skeletons buried with their weapons prove that women warriors were not merely figments of the Greek imagination. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B011T7RTNS/?tag=writingfor07a-20
If you want material that doesn't tie itself to feminism, sure. But if you don't want to offend, then it might be better to avoid saying that you "can't stand" certain people. I say this as someone who is in the category that you can't stand.
Not trying to offend just different strokes of thought. I'm more interested in creating a story than injecting a bias or agenda. It's something I have a hard time with when it comes to people and media. I just want to leave the politics at the door. I'm mostly just sick and tired of them and just wanna live life. I guess what just gets to me, is I'm sick of all the contention in the world. I've got enough problems. Hot topics bring contention. That's just my opinion though. I edited the original post so that it takes that out. I wrote it so fast I hadn't thought of its impact. I sometimes can be too blunt. So I do apologize. My intention wasn't to offend.
The Nagovisi (also spelled Negovisi) tribe of Papua New Guinea is matriarchal. Though missionaries have successfully converted much of the tribe to Christianity, their religion is actually built on the two female spirit beings Poreu and Makonai. These sisters-in-law pre date Christian times. There is also a contrasting male culture hero named Orphan. Find the portion of information by searching "religion" in the "chercher dans le texte" box. Pardon, mais le site est Francais. http://www.persee.fr/doc/jso_0300-953x_1978_num_34_60_2974
Thank you so much having such a hard time with this topic. Who knew certain topics were so hard to find information on.
Sure! I knew about this tribe because I studied Anthropology and we spend a good deal of time looking at aboriginal tribes. This one stuck out because most of Papua New Guinea is male dominated. You could probably find an Anthropology book with some great information. In Anthro, I learned a lot about religion, and it wasn't overshadowed by feministic discourse. It could be a fruitful way to find the content you're looking for.
Awesome suggestion. Thanks for sharing your knowledge! I am polishing up a religion I created as a kid. I was changing stuff last night on it and polishing the final base culture details. The idea in the universe is to show multitudes of Gods and Goddesses/ pantheons and even monotheistic cultures and their effects on each other and society as a whole. I want it to be part of what drives the character development. The religion is unrelated to this idea but has a Goddess. I made it a violent and bloody society! I'm stoked to put into action. I took the jilted lover backstory for the Goddess. But I'm hoping to create a unique and well-loved society of women as well. Maybe even a dark society to be its polar opposite. That would be cool.
Thanks for the edit. And for the quite new experience of being someone who is hated simply for something I am. That unleashed some feelings that I will use in my writing. I still find it a little difficult to answer your question. Most scolars in the Nordics (male or female) who look at history with an unbiased view, consider themselves feminist. But I'll send you along a path, and then you can abandon it if your feminist alerts start blinking: I think Freya might fit your needs. From todays popular culture, everyone knows that warriors who die in battle go to Valhalla and fight with Odin. But if you read the Edda a bit more carefully, you will see that Freya used to take half the warriors (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%B3lkvangr): The ninth is Folkvang, where Freyja decrees Who shall have seats in the hall; The half of the dead each day does she choose, And half does Othin have. Freya belongs to the Vanir gods, while Odin is from the Asir. These have probably been separate at some time, and then blended into one belief system. Odin is married to Frigg, and Freya has the brother Frey, but both of those are more distant figures who can easily blend into the background in your story. Freya's husband Od is very much a distant sidekick. Being a godess of love, fertility and war, Freya stands quite confortably on her own feet. You could also follow the back history of Freya to the less well known Thorgeir Holgabrudr, Irpa, Gullveig or Heidr, if the Freya name has too many modern connotations.
New research topic: I have another research question on religion, this time language. Does anyone know where I can find a Hebrew phonetic translator? I need to hear what I'm looking at. I'm doing something really neat with it for fun. I might show you guys when I'm done. It may or may not make the cut into the philosophy side of the story depending on how rough it is. Google has a translate but it leaves it in symbols. I found another site but you have to subscribe to hear the phonetic spelling. https://www.doitinhebrew.com/Translate/default.aspx?kb=US+US&l1=en&l2=iw This has to do with nipping a certain subject in the butt when it comes to fantasy. "Common Langauge" trope. I for one have no issue with it, I think when you are writing a book portraying language can be a difficult thing, and I'm not ambitious enough like some of these other authors to create my own language. So I'm attaching certain languages to certain races in my story. I won't be writing in another language however, I want to perhaps throw in a word or two here or there to show language differences, to give the reader a feeling that the world is diverse. I can show the rest in the manuscript through character actions and emotions through their struggles to understand each other. So I'm looking to hear it in order to phonetically translate it to my work better. Like I said I just want to play with the idea and see if it'll meet my needs. I'm not looking to overcomplicate things. Example: Hebrew for street translates to r'chov I can't even begin to hear what that would sound like in English. So If I can pull out something like Roshuv or something that sounds like it and easy to read that would be a bonus. That was a guess on pronunciation btw don't flog me! Once again I only plan on using this sparingly in the text as a test.
Actually, ChickenFreak and I talked for a bit and I realized my thinking may be too flawed and I need to realize that even if that wasn't a label in ancient times it was still an idea that's been around for a long time. I guess If I can refine my search a bit so that modern feminism and its politics are out as much as possible that would be better. I need the original base religion and society's if anything. As for your writing, I'm sad that I fueled anger but I guess I'm happy that it inspired you to write which is important. As for me and I admitted this to ChickenFreak, I think I'm just tired of the politics and agendas. Looking for unbiased information these days has become so difficult. I'm looking to write something pure in the sense of creative and entertaining.
For some reason, I thought I liked this but I hadn't. I'm going to the library today to see if they have a copy. It looks like it doesn't have an isbn but an asin so I'm doubting it but they have a book request log I can fill in. Wish me luck! Thank you for your insight!
here is a listing of Matrilineal Societies The following list includes societies that have been identified as matrilineal or matrilocal in ethnographic literature. "Matrilineal" means property is passed down through the maternal line on the death of the mother, not that of the father. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_matrilineal_or_matrilocal_societies
Thanks for your help again. I have had a bad day at the library. It seems my small town is collapsing under bankruptcy worse than I thought. Our library is a shell of its former self. I couldn't find textbooks, research nonfiction, or writing books. That last one was a test in the computer system. It would seem my library is more interested in entertainment and comics. So thank you, again anything is good at this point. I'm soooooooo desperate!
It's more complicated than that. We've always understood that it takes both a sausage and a bun to make a hotdog, even animals understand that. And the really ancient religions did have a greater emphasis on women as life givers and that came with a sense of reverence, but we almost always see two gods, one male and one female. It's not so much that humans worshiped women; humans have always protected women because, well, you kinda have to if you're a nomadic tribe. Remember, a lot of your babies die young. Your women are likely either pregnant or nursing for much of their lives, and always have the kids close at hand and that's why you need to keep the dangerous things a long way away. That's how we end up with a female god figure that's about babies and everything that comes with that. Then you have a male god that's the provider/protector figure. And that's typically why almost all cultures have become somewhat patriarchal, even pre-monotheism. Because the male figure is the one that provides and protects and builds society to keep the women safe so they can have babies. While we (in the west) might not see it as such the Islamic concept of keeping women segregated and covered stems from the idea of keeping them safe. And that's been the same deal almost everywhere. The men do the ruling and, lets not forget, the really dangerous fighting, hunting, mining, construction, etc and that means that the women and the children are safe and protected because they don't need to get involved in any of that. This is why matriarchal societies are quite so rare and why purely matriarchal religion is really uncommon too. Because from the earliest we always appreciated that men and women complimented each other. Even if you don't need lots of men to fathers lots of children you do need lots of men to protect lots of women. Women were given due reverence because they had the babies, which has the spark of divinity to it, but it was always understood that the men are playing a critical role that women can't really in that society. You can't really go hunting with a one year old around your neck, not if you want it to stay alive very long. So that's why we get this Isis/Osiris split in the gods; because we've always understood that men and women are ying and yang. To get a bit closer to the question; frankly, good luck finding anything that's not been politicized on this topic. Just about everyone who's claimed that a certain pre-historical society was matriarchal has done so with an agenda. Sometimes that's feminist and sometimes that's anti-Christian but it's almost always coming from the point of view that "Look just how much better everything would be...". It's very telling that almost all the cultures that have been claimed to be female-centered are either pre-literate or left nothing for us to prove one way or the other. I think your best bet will be to look toward Ancient Crete. Of all the ones that have been claimed that one holds the most water to me; an insular island culture without any great dangers (either human or animal) with easily farmed land and lots of coast line to fish. That would give you a culture that could plausibly forget how important male protection is. In that setting, where you might plausibly go generations between barbarian invasions, you might get more into communal child raising and that'd give women more of an opportunity to be providers themselves and slowly lead you to elevate the divine female spirit by giving it some amount of the male provider role too, and thus it'd appear that the male role in society wasn't as valuable. If you get to that point, where the women seemingly don't need much protection, then it makes sense that women would probably rule that society. Of course the ancient Cretans (if they were matriarchal) were conquered by another bunch of Greeks and that was the end of that because, well, it turns out that you kinda do need male protection in the pre-modern era because even if you can't see it coming there's always someone else who's happy to take your stuff and you either beat them or your culture vanishes. Also, I find it hard to see how a female centric culture doesn't become somewhat monstrous; if the women are able to provide for themselves then that kinda relegates men to being slaves; there's nothing left for them to do except the back breaking manual labour.
