Gender Roles In Ancient China

Looking back on China before 1450 C.E. people can see just how class and gender roles were played. These role were a very important part of Ancient China; they were a way of life for the chinese people. Class roles played a huge role in China. These roles decided how society looked upon someone. In the “Chinese legal code, seventh century” it mentions how the king is the highest position and everyone must be loyal to him. This piece of historical content demonstrates how much class roles affected the way people of that time period looked at or acted towards certain people. In early China there was a grand historian named Sima Qian. While looking at this historical figure, people can see a sense of class roles. While being a grand historian, Sima has a higher class status than an average farmer would have. In early China when people are given certain titles they were also given a class role and status. Taking a look into an “extract from a scholar’s account of the day to day realities of country life, late eighteenth century” people can see that in early China, a person’s class determines their lifestyle. This extract talks about a farmer living in poverty and doing all that he can just to keep his farm going, while the people in the gentry can live with no worries. Class role in China determined how a person would

In this time period women were seen to be below men and the only jobs that they had were in the house. In the “Odoric of Pordenone” it talks about the imperial throne and how the empress is on the emporer’s left and his other wives are one step below and at the bottom sit all of the women in his family. This article demonstrates how women are unequal to men. In the “Biographies of Admirable Women” it says that a woman’s duty is to cook, look after their parents-in-law, and make clothes. Women had no other roles except for these. Gender roles in China were very important and had to be