The boy from the Gran Dolina was a girl. The flower man it was a woman. And the Lady of Baza was not the tomb of a man, but of a woman, no matter how many weapons she had in the burial. History does not stop correcting itself or, rather, correcting the “sexist bias” of historians and archaeologists, as criticized by Marga Sánchez Romero. This 51-year-old professor of Prehistory at the University of Granada (from Antequera, although she was born in Madrid) launched into the study of women in prehistory after discovering that they were totally invisible. And that this has consequences today: “It is directly influencing the concept, the identity, the ways of the woman of the present.” “Prehistory is used, the discourses that are made about the past, to justify the inequality of women: they cannot do that, they do not have to be there, the things they do are not important… A story: this has always been the case, don’t try to change it”, he denounces.
Sánchez has condensed her entire speech —and the innumerable proofs that women have been erased from prehistory— in a book that is now in its third edition, prehistories of women (Destination), which has earned him the label of feminazia fashionable adjective: “Am I feminazi If I study women from the past, but when they hide them, is it the most objective and pure science? For this researcher, the first culprits were the archaeologists of the 19th century, loaded with prejudices, who made wrong readings because when they looked into the past they only asked what interested them.
Question. What did they ask?
Reply. What builds a historical story in which what is important are issues related to the exercise of power, how the social hierarchy is built, certain technologies… Back then many borders are being redefined and archeology is used to say: here they are my ancestors and, therefore, this is as far as my State ends. And of course, the women are not there, because what they do is build a story about the women of the past that eliminates any possibility that they could have power. They, the suffragettes, are asking for the vote, because they also want to be elected. But the discourse of the time is that we are not capable of doing that, and they go back to prehistory to justify it. And that’s why they leave the women behind, they don’t see the women.
Q. What is it noticeable?
R. That makes up an idea. If you put a woman painting Altamira, everyone will ask you why you say there was a woman there. Or if you put a woman hunting, everyone will ask you why. And if you put a man they will never ask you. It does not appear in the collective imagination, which is why when a woman hunter is discovered in a field, of which there are many, she goes around the world as if it were something exceptional.
A sharp blade in a man’s grave is a dagger; if it’s a woman’s, it’s a knife
Q. Why are you interested in looking at the past?
R. I believe that archaeology, and especially prehistoric archaeology, is a powerful instrument for social transformation. I do archeology because I want to transform society and for that I use prehistoric populations, because what they teach is that there are no unique paths. That there are many possibilities, that decisions, that culture, are all constructed issues. The societies of the past have used very different strategies, resources, dynamics, decisions and there is no unequivocal way of doing things. And that is useful in the present, because it shows us that as a society we are capable of making very diverse decisions that do not always end in war and inequalities. Inequality is not necessary, it is not mandatory, it is just one of the options.
Q. And the museums do not help, where many times the figures of women appear as secondary characters.
R. This seems especially serious to me. The Archaeological Museum of Almería is the one that has more women represented and they are 33%, according to a study. From there down, that is the maximum we have in Spain. A girl enters a museum and she only sees men, who are doing everything, and she doesn’t see women. She only sees one there in the background, with a child in her arms, which is as far as we can get. And the girl thinks: we have not been part of history. A boy sees it and thinks: I am the protagonist of the world and you are not. If you are not in history, how can you tell me that you are the same as me, if you have not done the same as me? It is very serious, but there is increasing awareness [en los museos] and that shows in the temporary exhibitions.
Q. In the book he talks about the dagger and knife bias.
R. In the study of the reports of deposits it is clear: if a sharp blade appears in the grave of a man, it is a dagger, if it appears in the woman’s, it is a knife. And it’s the same sheet metal. The way we name objects is also qualifying the person who wears it.
Q. The concept of presentism is widely applied to criticize progressive readings of the past, but not conservative ones like that.
R. I do not qualify prehistoric society, I do not say that the men of Neolithic societies were macho, because I do not know. What I do qualify is the behavior of archeology in the 19th century to the present, very androcentric and very macho. They are perverting a past, by excluding women from hunting, from war… Like rock art, how can women not paint, if it is a worldwide cultural manifestation for thousands of years? Where is the scientific proof that has made it affirm for a long time that women did not make rock art? That you think not, that is not scientific. Where is the proof that only men have painted? It’s that there isn’t. If there is no scientific proof, why do we cling so much to that idea? Because it is part of that discourse, that general idea of what is important and who has done it.
It annoys them when it is shown that there were women hunters, warriors, who had power, because it breaks that dynamic that the only ones who can command are men
Q. Which of these reinterpretations is the best example of misreading?
R. Hunting in general, because it also has a historical discourse behind it. The idea that hunting is the engine of human evolution has a very powerful historical discourse behind it, which is what was told after the Second World War. That women have been doing a lot of things that don’t correspond to them, for a circumstantial thing, and now they have to go back to their homes. Man is the one who makes tools, man is the one who hunts, you have it in scientific books on prehistory, in the common imagination and even in The Flintstones, who do not hunt, but they are the providers. It is very important that it is beginning to show that women are also involved in hunting.
Q. And the one that stings the most?
R. Everything that has to do with the exercise of power. It annoys them when it is shown that there were women who had power, because it breaks that dynamic that the only ones who can rule are men. The Warriors [descubiertas] they bother a lot because it is very likely that they had power, and that is why they have always refused. The controversy with the Lady of Baza it was because she has four sets of weapons, and for a long time the possibility that she was a woman was denied, because that was incomprehensible. How has history been explained to us? War, treaty, treaty, war and treaty. And if we give women warlike capacity, it bothers them a lot. But in studies that have been made in the Bronze Age in central Europe, between 20% and 30% of the graves that have weapons are of women. And they have been hit hard, because they have head injuries, defensive wounds, they were in battles. Aren’t they all women? No, it’s not all women. Are they more men than women? Yes, but don’t tell me they aren’t, because they are.
Q. She writes: “We women need DNA to prove that we were there.” Genetics has helped make this presence visible.
R. It helps us a lot, because sometimes it is proof that it is a woman that is buried there. The methodology, DNA and isotopes are very important, fundamental. But if I don’t ask the right questions, this is useless. With all the technologies we may have, if we don’t ask different questions, we’re not going to change the historical discourse. In science, the important thing is the questions, what we ask ourselves about the society of the past.
If we do not ask different questions, we are not going to change the historical discourse. In science, the important thing is the questions
Q. Is science done better with a feminist perspective?
R. Yes, because we are asking questions that have never been asked before. And I think that is very important. When you are a scientist, you need the best possible sample so that the results correspond as much as possible to the reality of that population. Speaking of flies or stones, if you do not use all the sample you have available, you are biasing the result. Asking about women, about childhood in the past, is expanding the sample brutally and, therefore, is giving you information that is much closer to the reality of what happened. But all this doesn’t work if you haven’t asked yourself about food production, textiles, care practices, learning and socialization in the past, what methods are used for healing and healing. That knowledge is much more enriching to understand the past, or is it just necessary to know how an arrowhead is made? Is that what is going to teach us who we are?
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