I not asking for realistic armor (although I hate silly pauldrons) I'm just saying that both genders should be treated equally. If one set of armor shows legs and buttocks on women then the same armor should also show legs and buttocks on men. Sexualize both genders or neither.
Patriarchy is:
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Patriarchy is a social system in which men hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property . . .
Which describes Roman society to a T. If you can't call Roman society patriarchical by this definition then no society is patriarchical. This conflict, which did indeed concern patrilineal property rights as well as also political authority. Boudica was not just getting the property but the ability to lead. And it's difficult not see the gendering of the punishments. Which is consistent with Romans -- the often had creative (and terrible) punishments set to fit the crime.
Wikipedia continues:
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Patriarchy is associated with a set of ideas, a patriarchal ideology that acts to explain and justify this dominance and attributes it to inherent natural differences between men and women.
Which is true of Romans. It's expressed very well in the marriage ceremony. Men were Gaius, women Gaia -- marriage relate to each in terms of Gaius / Gaia roles. These marriage rules were enforced by ritual sexualized humiliations. And again we see this in how much of the society was devoted to a celebration of masculinity -- magic penis amulets, ballsack oaths, 'seminal' agricultural ceremonies the terrible anxieties Roman men had about being made cuckold.
Back to chicken / egg point. So if we live in a world with certain gender roles, if those were stable for much of European history what explains that? One possibility is nature, this is just the order of things. Another is that we are the children of Rome, that Roman law became church law became civil law . . .
