Mesopotamian Society Analysis

Patriarchal societies were built by Mesopotamia and Egypt and they gave power over both public and private affairs to men. The men dictated the roles of each family member and the work that was performed within the household. The men also arranged the marriages of their children. Furthermore, the men of both Mesopotamia and Egypt dominated public life. Women were considered to be inferior; whereas, men ruled as kings and pharaohs. A public affair, such as politics, was not a role that women had the opportunity to take. Mesopotamian and Egyptian women lived strictly under a male family member; most often it was their father or husband. On the other hand, Hammurabi’s law did allow women to have protection against any irrational behavior from …show more content…
Mesopotamian society would never view a woman as being an independent individual and only by being the daughter of her father or the wife of her husband. There were some cases where women who were considered to be royal or had rich and powerful families, did enjoy personal autonomy. The women of Mesopotamia did not have the opportunity to inherit their husband’s estate if there were male recipients who were eligible. Women did have jobs selling items they had created and even work as tavern keepers, although it was rare and most often women did not work outside of the house. The Code of Hammurabi’s 18th-century introduction did allow women to own property and initiate divorce in certain circumstances. Ironically, the code also viewed women as …show more content…
Mesopotamia was often faced with unpredictable floods and droughts, and this often affected their harvest and livelihoods. Consequently, the Mesopotamian’s main religious concern within the earliest times was the influence of nature and the desire to appease the gods who controlled it. Egypt fell along the Nile and provided Egyptians’ with water, food, transport and trade. Unlike Mesopotamia, the floods were able to be predicted and most of the time they were controllable. Egypt had a religious structure that revealed a more optimistic view of life than that in Mesopotamia. The Egyptians’ had luxuriously furnished tombs and grand funerals. Unlike the Mesopotamians, the Egyptians’ did not write in cuneiform, they wrote in pictorial hieroglyphics. Egyptian’s left pyramids and tombs as a mark of their belief in perpetual life. This is the difference between Mesopotamians, who did not leave grand structural design. Instead, they chose to write down extravagant myths that showed concern with the quality of life before instead of after