Women Who Went Before
Women Who Went Before is on a gynocentric quest into the ancient world. Join hosts Rebekah Haigh and Emily Chesley as they interview the world’s top scholars and unearth the lives of women from the past. It’s a history podcast and detective journey in one, sifting through texts and tropes to find the women who lived beneath. | Season 2 episodes every other Thursday!
Podcasting since 2022 • 19 episodes
Women Who Went Before
Latest Episodes
To Have and To Hold: Sexual Violence and the Bible
CW: This episode discusses themes of sexual assault and intimate partner violence.Dr. Rhiannon Graybill shares her research on sexual violence in the Hebrew Bible and ways of reading such messy stories for then and now. We also talk abou...
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Season 2
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Episode 7
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57:37
Bad Blood: The Period Talk in Rabbinic Judaism and Zoroastrianism
We talk with Dr. Shai Secunda about the Babylonian rabbis’ science of blood, breaking taboos through sex education, and menstruation as a cure for rabies.Today, taboos about menstruation keep thousands of girls from attending school. For...
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Season 2
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Episode 6
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57:00
The Pee Test: Pregnancy and Childbirth in Ancient Egypt
Dr. Ada Nifosì tells us about the gymnastics of ancient Egyptian birth, why Egyptian women ate donkey balls and their cats ate penis cakes, and why the god Seth should be avoided at all costs.Childbirth was a scary time for women, ...
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Season 2
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Episode 5
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56:11
Blemished Brides: Women’s Bodies and Disability in Ancient Judaism
Dr. Julia Watts Belser talks about ancient prenups, dancing at weddings, and what the rabbis had to say about beauty. We meet an Etruscan woman named Seianti Hanunia, an Egyptian Jewish woman Tapamet, and hear the (sometimes damaging) ideas of ...
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Season 2
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Episode 4
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58:07
Veiled But Not Hidden in Ancient Greece
Dr. Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones tells us about the veil in ancient Greek culture. Many women in the distant past (as today) wore veils during their life. Veiling meant many things to many people. It could be a means of patriarchal control, a sensual ...
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Season 2
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Episode 3
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58:05
