HIS 103 Final Paper Comparison of ancient Rome and ancient Egypt (5000BCE-ca. 1600CE)

HIS 103 Week 3

Final Project Preparation Template

Damian Farray

Prof Lawrence Vellucci

Ancient Egypt, Ancient Rome Gender Roles, Ideals, & Relationships Social & Economic Structures Religious & Ethical Beliefs The ancient Egyptian and ancient Roman civilizations were different in many ways; however, they still shared a lot of similarities.

Gender Roles, Ideal, & Relationships

In ancient Egypt Men were and women were treated as equals, while in ancient Rome men were superior to women. In both civilizations’ men held positions of authority, they were politicians or generals and were considered to be the head of the household. Women in ancient Egypt were the equals of men in every aspect except occupations, but Egyptian women still exercised considerable power and independence. On the other hand, in Rome women were not regarded as a man’s equal. They received only a basic education and were under the authority of their father before marriage.

"Men fought, ran the government, and managed the farm; women cooked, sewed, and managed the house." (Edwards, A., & O'Neill, 2005 p. 38).

Social & Economic Structures

Ancient Egypt’s social construct consisted of three classes, the upper, middle, and lower. The upper class consisted of the wealthy and royalty, the middle class consisted of merchants and landowners, and the lower class consisted of unskilled laborers. In the Roman republic patricians and plebians made up the social classes, while the working population consisted of slaves. In Rome, a wealthy man would normally own 500 slaves, and once bought these slaves were bound until death. On the other hand, in Egypt, individuals could choose to sell themselves or their children into slavery as a form of bonded labor.

“The lowest class is the slaves. These people had no rights or freedom within Rome. Most slaves were captured in battle and sent to Rome to be sold.” (McGill, S. A. (2017 p.2).

Religious & Ethical Beliefs

Both ancient Rome and Egypt had polytheistic cultures, which means that they had multiple gods. In both civilizations worship of the god was a mandatory duty much like obeying the law. The Egyptian gods also held some intrinsic value, for example the god Osiris was the mythic founder of the Egyptian empire. Romans worshipped the sky god Jupiter, the sun god apollo, and the war god Mars. Egyptians believed in the afterlife and thought of death as just a temporary interruption while Romans believed in the underworld and the fields of Elysium. “The ancient Romans believed that it was very important that their loved ones have a proper burial for if they did not, they would be denied entrance into the underworld and spend eternity in a purgatory-like existence.” (Rose, H. 1922 p.21).

Annotated Bibliography

Carruthers, W. (2011). The rise and fall of ancient egypt? egyptology's never-ending story. Antiquity, 85(330), 1444-1447.

This article is scholarly because it was written by an expert in the specific field, Toby Wilkinson. Wilkinson is an Egyptologist and academic, he is the vice chancellor of Fiji National University in Suva, Fiji. He was awarded the 2011 Hessell-Tiltman prize. This article is peer reviewed and was published by The Wall street Journal and although newspapers are not scholarly, the Wall street Journal has a worldwide reputation for thoroughness. The focus of the rise and fall of ancient Egypt was to explain what led to the demise of ancient Egypt and how it affects the civilization today. Wilkinson compares Egypt to European societies and explains why Egypt was inferior in comparison to western civilizations. Using this article, I will compare the demise of Ancient Egypt to the demise of Rome. Specifically, I will use this source to explain exactly why the Egyptian lasted so long and the challenges it faced.

David Hood. (1993). Women and Politics in Ancient Rome Richard A. Bauman. The History Teacher, 27(1), 83–84. https://doi-org.proxy-library.ashford.edu/10.2307/494334

This book traces the development of women’s political influence from the middle years of the Roman Republic (331 B.C.) through the reign of the Emperor Nero. The author states that he has two audiences in mind, the specialist and the non-specialist. He presents the information chronologically and gives the reader a inside look at the painfully slow development of Women’s political influence in ancient Rome. I will use this source to compare the gender role’s as well as social impact of women from ancient Rome and ancient Egypt.

Edwards, A., & O'Neill, P. (2005). The Social and Political Position of Woman in Ancient Egypt. PMLA, 120(3), 843-857.

The Author was one of the first Egyptologists in the USA, more specifically at the University of Chicago, and probably the first woman in America to write about the subject of women in ancient Egypt. This text gives the reader an inside look on gender roles in ancient Egypt and the difficulties women faced. This source will be used to compare gender roles between women of ancient Egypt and women from ancient Rome.

McGill, S. A. (2017). Ancient Roman Government. Ancient Roman Government, 1–2.

This text covers ancient Roman society, and its government. The author gives us a look at how Rome changed over twelve centuries and why its government changed so much. Reading this will give the reader a better understanding of Roman culture. It starts at the beginning when Rome was a single city governed by a King and progresses to the monarchy being overthrown and Rome becoming a republic. This source will be used to compare ancient Rome’s social and political climate to ancient Egypt’s.

Monson, A. (2007). Rule and Revenue in Egypt and Rome: Political Stability and Fiscal Institutions. Historical Social Research / Historische Sozialforschung, 32(4 (122)), 252-274. Retrieved March 21, 2021.

This paper investigates what determines fiscal institutions and the burden of taxation using a case study from ancient history. It evaluates the model of taxation in the Roman republic, according to which rulers high discount rates in periods of political instability encourage them to adopt a more predatory fiscal regime. Egypt’s transition from a Hellenistic kingdom to a Roman province under the principate provides an analogous case for which there are better data.