Image above: detail of a mosaic featuring Theodora from Ravenna

However, while male warriors were supposed to be at the pinnacle of warrior aristocracies, women could gain power in these societies, too. Contrary to the view presented in popular culture—and in some medieval lawcodes— not all medieval women were powerless. A few noblewoman could gain a great deal of influence. Women were involved in almost all the major political, social, and economic transformations that we have discussed so far. Constantine’s attitude to Christianity was probably influenced by female family members and women were prominent leaders and funders of the early church. Some of the key written sources for Alaric’s sack of Rome were written to (and about) women. Merovingian and Carolingian queens could be powerful political forces. In the east, Theodora ruled along with Justinian. Women like Khadija and Fatima were central to the early Islamic community (ummah). Some of the most prominent iconophiles were empresses, including Empress Eirene, who seized power from her own son.

Usually, women gained power as queens or regents, ruling on behalf of their children while they were too young to govern. There were, however, some examples of women who ruled alone, such as Eirene, mentioned above, and Æthelflaed (d. 918) unusual in ruling alone, who ruled as ‘Lady of the Mercians’ following the death of her husband in 911. She fought Scandinavian and Welsh leaders, negotiated, and massively expanded the territories under her control. Even more unusually, was briefly succeeded by her daughter. (It would be over 500 years before there was another female to female succession.)

Women warriors?

As we have discussed, many of the societies that we have studied—particularly in northern Europe—had become warrior aristocracies in the early medieval period. This begs the question, were any women warriors? Modern technology suggests that some women were at least associated with weapons. In the past, it was difficult to tell if skeletons from early medieval graves in northern Europe were biologically male or female, since organic matter tends to deteriorate when buried in northern European soils. However, using new technologies, scholars have shown that a grave from Birka, Sweden, contained a female skeleton along with a sword and other weapons. Scholars still debate whether this was enough to prove the female skeleton in the grave used or owned these weapons, or if they were just put in the grave to honor her. However, it raises some intriguing possibilities and at least suggest the woman buried in that grave was high status.