How accurate is this statement - "Byzantine upper-class women were among the most liberated of any society preceding the 20th century"?

by Goat_im_Himmel

It's a claim I have come across, and while I don't exactly expect to see an answer which evaluates the claim relative to, you know, literally every other pre-20th century society, I am very interested in what the status of Byzantine upper-class women was in that period that would stand to give credence to that claim.

bitparity

Hardly.

There are laws in the Ecloga in the 8th century (a slimmed down compilation of Justinian's code) concerning women, the regulation of their sexual behavior, and the inequity of some punishments concerning men and women in an adultery situation. A few examples.

  • A married man who commits adultery shall by way of correction be flogged with twelve lashes; and whether rich or poor he shall pay a fine. Ecloga 17.19

  • If a married man consorts with his wife's maidservant and has carnal knowledge of her, the maid shall be taken before the local magistrates and shall be sold into slavery on behalf of the State and the price of her shall inure to the State. Ecloga 17.21

  • The husband who is cognizant of, and condones, his wife's adultery shall be flogged and exiled, and the adulterer and the adulteress shall have their noses slit. Ecloga 17.28

  • If a woman is carnally known and, becoming pregnant, tries to produce miscarriage, she shall be whipped and exiled. Ecloga 17.36

However, few of these laws will be of any surprise to the state of global women's rights in pre-20th century society. Here I'd defer to experts of Chinese or Islamic law for their take on the comparable legal and social positions of women in their society. I remember that the original purpose of limiting wives of Islamic men to 4 was originally to promote social equity on behalf of women, as certain wealthy men would have an excessive number of wives who they would not take care of. By limiting the wives to 4, it maintained a minimal level of support those men had to provide for the women.

However, within the "Roman continuum," I'd like to point out that socially speaking, upper-class LATE REPUBLICAN women seemed to have far more sexual freedom, if not legal freedom. There was a tentative social acceptance of multiple partners among married women, an ability to divorce and remarry, to deploy birth control as needed. In the Byzantine era, none of this was socially tolerated, let alone legally tolerated.