How Greek Hellenism caused women to be curtailed through history:
In 507 BC in Ancient Greece, a thinker named Cleisthenes started a political ideology known as Democracy.
Democracy, meaning the 'rule of the people' in Greek, stated that instead of having tyrants who inherit the title of ruler rule over the people, people who were mature enough to make a decision would vote for a ruler.
Though Democracy was supposed to treat everybody equally, women were not allowed to vote for a ruler, have jobs or hold big titles in society. Women were treated as second class
Ironically, in Greek civilization, people worshipped women goddesses like Athena, the goddess of wisdom. The capital of Greece, Athens was also named after Athena. This meant that though the Greeks worshipped women, they curtailed them.
In 334 BC, the Greek emperor Alexander the Great started his conquest of the known world.
He started with his invasion of Persia before trying to spread Hellenism (Greek values and culture) to the entire known world. Alexander invaded kingdoms and empires including Sumer, Egypt and Kush.
Like this, ancient kingdoms that practised customs from before 500 BC which empowered women, were influenced by Greek or Hellenistic - worshipping women but curtailing them.
Though it is argued that during this time, many great women rose to power in Greece, including the mother of Alexander the Great, Olympias, historical records show that powerful women like here were diminished or even killed.
Even Olympias was condemned to death by the Macedonian assembly, but when soldiers refused to carry out her sentence, she was assassinated by her enemies.
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