Djebar has no clear role there, having given up both the traditional role of the
gynaeceum and the de-sexualized role of her father's confidante and companion.
(61) This location, adjacent to the northern women's aisle (the gynaeceum (62)) on the ground floor, indicates that their duties included general oversight or management of the gynaeceum, just as the Apostolic Constitutions prescribed for deaconesses in the early church.
(19.) According to Constantine, De ceremoniis 44 (35), for the feast of the Annunciation, the emperor, after visiting the skeuophylakion (where relics and vessels were kept, and the Gifts prepared), "passes through the narthex of the gynaeceum where the deaconesses of the Great Church have their customary place." Constantine VII Porphyrogenitos, Le livre des ceremonies, ed.
When he refers to the
gynaeceum, Cornelius Nepos clearly envisions it as situated deep within the interior of the house: "But the situation is very different in Greece [from Rome].
Even in its long-drawn-out demise, the traditional
gynaeceum may have exerted its influence through suggesting to wealthy householders that slavery represented a cost-effective solution to the competitive endeavours of display, entertainments and wearing rich clothes.
(73.) Johann Heinrich Feustking
Gynaeceum haeretico fanaticum, oder, Historie und Beschreibung der falschen Prophetinnen, Quackerinnen, Schwarmerinnen und andern sectirischen und begeisterten Weibes-Personen, ed.
In his discussion of the
gynaeceum, or women's workshop, he argues that Yvain demonstrates the idea that "women worked at least part of the year in the open", while at the same time, he acknowledges the fictionality of Chretien's scene in the scale of the workshop: "Chretien's 300 girl workers ...
41-67, chapter 2: "Constanza de Castilla and the
Gynaeceum of Compassion").
