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A widespread notion suggests that in some bygone periods of human history, females enjoyed equal standing to men, or even dominated, resulting in happier and less violent societies. Subsequently, the patriarchy arose, ushering in centuries of conflict and subjugation.

The Origins of the Matriarchy vs. Patriarchy Debate

The concept of female-led societies and male-led societies as diametrically opposed—with a sudden switch between them—was seeded in the 1800s through socialist thought, influencing archaeology with little evidence. From there, it permeated into popular awareness.

Social scientists, by contrast, were often more sceptical. They documented significant diversity in gender relations across human societies, including contemporary and past ones, and some theorized that such variety was the standard in prehistory too. Proving this was difficult, in part because determining biological sex—let alone gender—frequently proved tricky in ancient remains. Then around 20 years ago, that shifted.

The Breakthrough in Ancient DNA

This so-called ancient DNA revolution—the ability to recover DNA from ancient bones and analyse it—enabled that abruptly it was feasible to determine the sex of ancient individuals and to trace their family connections. The isotopic composition of their bones and teeth—specifically, the proportion of isotopes present there—indicated whether they had lived in different places and experienced shifts in nutrition. The picture emerging due to these advanced methods indicates that diversity in gender relations had been absolutely the norm in ancient eras, and that there was not a clear turning point when a particular model gave way to its opposite.

Theories on the Rise of Patriarchal Systems

The Marxist idea, actually credited to Engels, suggested that early societies were egalitarian before farming expanded from the Near East approximately ten millennia back. With the more sedentary way of life and accumulation of wealth that farming introduced came the necessity to defend that wealth and to set rules for its inheritance. When populations grew, men took over the leading groups that formed to coordinate these affairs, in part because they were more skilled at fighting, and assets passed to the male line. Men were also more likely to stay put, with their female mates relocating to live with them. Female oppression was often a byproduct of these changes.

An alternative theory, put forward by researcher Marija Gimbutas in the 1960s, was that female-oriented societies prevailed for longer in Europe—until five millennia back—after which they were overthrown by incoming, patriarchal nomads from the steppe.

Findings of Female-Line Societies

Matrilinearity (where property is inherited through the mother’s side) and matrilocality (where women stay together) often go together, and both are associated with greater female status and influence. In 2017, American geneticists reported that for over three centuries around the 10th century, an elite mother-line group lived in Chaco Canyon, in what is now New Mexico. Later, this June, Asian experts reported a female-line agricultural community that thrived for nearly as long in eastern China, more than 3,000 years earlier. These findings add to others, suggesting that matrilineal societies have existed on every inhabited continents, at least from the arrival of farming on.

Power and Autonomy in Ancient Societies

But, though they possess greater standing, females in mother-line societies may not hold decision-making power. That generally stays the domain of men—specifically of maternal uncles rather than their spouses. And since old genetic material and isotopes don’t reveal a great deal about female agency, sex-based hierarchies in ancient times continue to be a subject of debate. In fact, such research has forced scholars to ask themselves what they mean by power. Suppose the wife of a king shaped his entourage through support and back channels, and his own policies through advice, did she hold less influence than him?

Experts know of multiple instances of pairs sharing power in the bronze age—the era after those migrants came in Europe—and later historical records confirm to elite women shaping policies in such ways, across the globe. Maybe they did so in the distant past. Women wielding indirect influence in male-dominated societies may even have existed before Homo sapiens. In his 2022 book about sex and gender, a titled work, ape expert Frans de Waal described how an dominant female chimp, Mama, chose a successor to the top male—who outranked her—with a gesture.

Factors Shaping Gender Relations

In recent years another aspect has become clear. While the theorist may have been generally right in associating property with patrilinearity, other factors affected sex roles, as well—such as how a community sustains itself. In February, Chinese and British scientists reported that traditionally matrilineal villages in a highland region have become less gender-biased over the last 70 years, as they moved from an agricultural economy to a trade-focused one. Struggle also plays its part. While matrilocal and male-resident societies are equally prone to conflict, says researcher Carol Ember, internal strife—rather than war against an external enemy—pushes societies towards male residence, because fighting groups choose to keep their sons nearby.

Women as Hunters and Leaders

Meanwhile, evidence is mounting that women engaged in combat, hunted and acted as shamans in the distant past. No role or position has been closed to them in all times and places. And even if female decision-makers were perhaps rare, they were not nonexistent. New genetic analyses from an Irish university demonstrate that there were at least instances of female-line descent throughout the British Isles, when Celtic tribes controlled the island in the iron age. Alongside archaeological evidence for women fighters and ancient descriptions of female tribal chiefs, it appears as if ancient European women could wield hard as well as indirect authority.

Contemporary Female-Line Societies

Mother-line societies still exist nowadays—the Mosuo of China are one case, as are the Hopi of Arizona, descendants of those ancient clans. Their numbers are declining, as state authorities flex their male-dominant muscles, but they act as reminders that certain extinct societies tilted more towards gender equality than numerous of our modern ones, and that every culture have the potential to evolve.