Babylonia’s Social Structure and That of the U.S. in the 19th century

Chapter 6 of Age of Empire described the social and economical development of the Babylonian society. While reading about the social stratification, I found interesting similarities between the Babylonian social system and that of the U.S. in the mid-late 19^th century.

Since the Babylonian society has reached a rather steady pace of development, its social structure started to emerge clearly. First of all, the society was patriarchal, in which the male figure in the family completely dominates and its female counterpart doesn’t have much saying in domestic or social affairs. Furthermore, there existed a distinct social status spectrum, in which people were divided into groups based on where they stood in the society. Slaves were obviously on the very bottom of the ladder; but one thing worth mentioning is that, by then slaves were seen more as a part of the family rather than just temporary labors. In other words, slaves were bonded to their family units, even maybe they were considered as properties of the families. Moving up the ladder we have dependents (children and women), free men, nobles, and finally the king.

This social structure closely resembled that of the U.S. during the time period when, especially down in the South, slavery prospered. Slaves working on farms were seen as unalienable properties of their owners. Free men, higher than slaves but lower than elites, accounted for the majority of the society. Similarly, women were believed to be inferior to men and were thus expected to take care of the family rather than going out to work. Similarly, women were deprived of rights that men were granted (e.g. voting). It’s really interesting to see that the ancient Babylonian society can resemble the relatively modern society so much in the way that explicit social distinctions were made.