Men have held power since humanity’s dawn, and at every turn women have been pushed to the margins, forced into a second‑class existence. These 10 horrible realities lay bare the grim daily experiences that defined female life across centuries.
10 horrible realities of female oppression
10 Newborn Girls Were Regularly Left To Die
In ancient Athens it was a distressing norm for parents to abandon newborn daughters in the wilderness, a practice recorded as “exposing” the infant. A Greek author lamented, “Everyone raises a son even if he is poor, but exposes a daughter even if he is rich.”
Rome mirrored this cruelty, especially among the indigent. A surviving letter from a low‑status Roman husband to his wife reads, “A daughter is too burdensome, and we simply lack the money; if you bear a girl, we must kill her.”
Even in Egypt—renowned for comparatively progressive women’s rights—poverty drove similar tragedies. An Egyptian husband wrote, “If the baby arrives before I return, let a boy live; if it is a girl, expose it.”
9 Men Wouldn’t Touch Menstruating Women
The Roman scholar Pliny the Elder claimed that a menstruating woman could sour milk and even cause a swarm of bees to die merely by looking at them. He believed the very presence of a woman in that state was toxic.
Egyptian customs isolated menstruating women in separate buildings that men were forbidden to enter. Similarly, ancient Israelite law declared everything a menstruating woman touched as unclean, and Hawaiian tradition imposed the death penalty on any man who entered a menstrual hut.
In Papua New Guinea, the belief was taken to an extreme: touching a menstruating woman was thought to blacken his blood, dull his mind, and lead to a slow death.
8 Losing Your Virginity Was A Death Sentence
In Athens, a father could legally sell an unmarried daughter into slavery if she was discovered to have had sexual relations. Among the Samoans, a bride’s virginity was publicly verified by the chief who would rupture her hymen before witnesses to prove purity.
Rome imposed a terrifying fate on priestesses of Vesta: losing virginity before age thirty meant being buried alive. In ancient Israel, any woman who lost her virginity before marriage faced the death penalty by stoning, regardless of her status.
7 Men Were Expected To Be Sexual Predators
Roman law regarded slaves as property, and sexual activity with a slave was expected as part of the owner’s rights. Trouble only arose if a slave belonged to another master and the owner failed to ask permission; such an act was deemed property damage, not rape.
Women in certain occupations—actresses, waitresses, prostitutes—could never press rape charges. A notorious case saw a gang‑raped actress denied the right to sue because the assault was ruled “in accordance with a well‑established tradition at a staged event.”
Even Saint Augustine, considered progressive for his era, suggested that some women might derive pleasure from rape, reflecting the pervasive misogyny of the Middle Ages.
6 Brides Were Often Kidnapped
In parts of China, bride kidnapping persisted into the 1940s; Japan’s last recorded case occurred in 1959, and 19th‑century Ireland saw widespread bride‑stealing. Biblical narratives also recount mass abductions of women as war spoils.
Roman mythic origin stories even celebrate the practice: Romulus allegedly told the abducted Sabine women that they should be grateful to be “lucky enough to live in honorable wedlock.”
5 Women Were Forced To Kill Their Babies
Across many societies, mothers of deformed infants were compelled to end their lives. Roman law explicitly ordered that “a dreadfully deformed child shall be quickly killed.”
In practice, Roman mothers could either suffocate the infant or abandon it. Archaeologists uncovered a mass grave of roughly one hundred infant skeletons in the sewers of ancient Ashkelon, Israel, underscoring the scale of the tragedy.
Scholars estimate that one in four Roman infants did not survive past their first year, a grim testament to the era’s harsh attitudes toward disability.
4 Women Were Barely Allowed To Talk
In ancient Greece and Rome, women were barred from leaving the house without a male escort, and during social gatherings they were expected to retreat to their chambers, forbidden from speaking or dining with men.
Denmark’s “shrew’s fiddle” was a wooden contraption shaped like a violin that imprisoned quarrelsome women, binding their hands and faces while they were paraded through streets as a public warning.
England’s “scold’s bridle” was an even harsher metal mask equipped with sharp teeth and a bell, forcing any outspoken woman to endure ridicule and humiliation.
3 Adulterers Were Tortured
In Roman society, a husband could legally kill his wife if he caught her committing adultery. Early American Puritans mirrored this, sanctioning the murder of adulterous women under biblical law.
Medieval Europe escalated cruelty with devices like the “breast ripper,” a torture instrument designed to tear a woman’s breasts—a punishment sometimes applied even for a miscarriage, not just infidelity.
The sheer brutality of these methods highlighted a societal willingness to inflict extreme suffering on women for perceived moral transgressions.
2 Women Were Killed With Their Husbands
Until the 19th century in India, widows were expected to immolate themselves on their husband’s funeral pyre, a practice known as sati. In wartime sieges, entire villages of women would voluntarily set themselves ablaze, taking their children, to motivate their husbands for battle.
Male relatives would watch the flames, later smearing the ashes of their spouses on their faces as a gruesome talisman before heading back to combat.
1 Women Have Gone Through This Since The Beginning Of Humanity
Archaeological evidence from prehistoric African sites shows that early men remained in one locale while women were born elsewhere, implying that women were relocated—likely abducted—into their husbands’ homes.
This pattern suggests that even before recorded history, women experienced one‑sided, non‑consensual unions, with many likely kidnapped from rival tribes and forced into marriage.