Inside the last matriarchy in Europe - BBC REEL 

Romania too

agree, this looks just like any village in deep Russia, where all men gone to cities looking for work or died of war, alchogol, age or all together.

Exactly! My grandma can do all the men work just because she had to learn since there was not so much help from the man’s side.

Like in Almost every country in Eastern Europe!

@@2010annaalexandra TRUE

I'm guessing it's because of the travel restrictions right now.

Exactly

Consider making one instead?

the book is BIG HEART, STRONG HANDS

@Alex Evans if you understand some german i can really recommend the documentary "ein jahr auf kihnu" Maybe that would help getting the stick out of your arse

Well if he is useless in domestic things, reckless behavior and constantly drunk is that a bad thing? (Joking 😉)

But are they isolated? They have each other!

4:13 Are they Orthodox Christians? I did't know there were Orthodox people among Estonians.

It is not a tradegy to live without a man.

@@oOIIIMIIIOo Of course it is, if you were married to him and knew him for most of your life.

I have been to West Sumatra. It's a very beautiful place.

what bullshit

@@novayu666 care to explain what's bullshit?

@@novayu666 what is bullshit

@@novayu666 come on coward

Okay "Lucian"

Mda, in special in Romania =)))))) that was funny

Yeah that's true

I agree. I'm from Latvia and when I was growing up, this is what I encountered visiting the dad's side of the family in a super rural area.

Southeast Europe too. Montenegro, where my father is from, is still a matriarchal society.

It's interesting to see what was her Norwegian grandmother doing?

Shocker there.

@@rhonda6791 Yes I saw a video of a half Kihnu half Canadian and she said that is not really a matriarchal society but more that man leaves for a long time and they take care of themselves when men are there their decision is what goes 1st. The only matriarchal society I know of is The Mosuo, really run by women for 2000yrs

@@sociologica4247 sounds like BCC has a very lax definition of matriarchy.

Scarlett O'Hara. But yeomanry never had slaves.

which means its not a matriarchy, its a patriarchy. so bizarre they would glorify this lifestyle which is held by most women around the world. if this is a matriarchy than so is all of the developing world.

shut up

if it makes you feel better theyre only saying it to suit their narrative. Nothing personal about your homeland.

Yep. Propaganda

If they are Orthodox, there is a problem : they inherited the laws of the Byzantine Empire. The laws regarding the women 's property were made by the Empress Theodora... a married feminist.

I'd actually blame victorians categorizing everything without realizing that most things are in the grey. Not binary but blurred and we even use words in a blurred and open to interpretation way. This culture actually reminds me of the Scandinavians as they lived traditionally. It says more about us that women outside of a computerized world. Working and doing what needs to be done is a matriarchy. A woman can work part time, while going to college, with a child. And many still consider her at fault for not being married in the USA.

...look, it'a a wonderful, feel good story, about Estonia. As an Estonian, and a woman - we don't get mentioned a lot in global media. So let's just collectively look at our grannies and go "aaaw" :3

Yes but that doesn't sell, now does it?

I think in this case it's more about the position that women hold in their culture. The women are more active in the local community because they're present when the men aren't.

@@clicktell1449 and you intend to keep it that way, like your grandmothers let it to you or you will have soon another dump there too?

@@eedragonr6293 who hurt you?

Ginger Rodgers did every dance step with Fred Astaire, but backwards and on heels.

Cringe

@Cope Harder The reason for your existence is "cringe"? You dishonor your foremothers

@@femalesupremacistoverlord6800 I almost got aborted you don't deserve my respect

No not men. Only women. Men don't menstruate.

But isnt the name at a point so long that it's Impossible to say/write it?

@@warcrimeenjoyer881 No, because every Spanish person has 2 surnames. Example: Maria Garcia Gomez, Miguel Perez Sanchez and their children could have the Surname combinations of: Garcia Perez/Perez Garcia, Garcia Sanchez/Sanchez Garcia, Gomez Perez/Perez Gomez, Gomez Sanchez/Sanchez Gomez. I think it's like that, but maybe there's a rule about the which Surename has to come first, which I don't know about.

@@warcrimeenjoyer881 no, a typical hispanic name has 3 or 4 words: name, second name (this one is optional upon birth as names can be compound), paternal surname, maternal surname. Surnames and names also vary in length. It depends a lot.

@@MonkeyDLuffy-rr3wl the paternal surname is the one passed upon children so if Maria Garcia Gomez and Miguel Perez Sanchez have a baby it would most certainly be (let's suppose the baby's a girl and her name is Isabel): Isabel Perez Garcia. Gomez and Sanchez (maternal surnames of both parents) become irrevelant to the baby's name. So when Isabel Perez Garcia grows old enough and engages with a Jose Antonio Espinosa Blanco and have a baby boy named Alvaro. The boys name would be: Alvaro Espinosa Perez When Alvaro has kids they will inherit Espinosa from him but not Perez. Sorry.. I'm bored as heck lol.

@@lordpickle65 Oh, thank you! I'm a clueless girl from Hungary, but I felt smart enough to answer. Your answer makes way more sense than mine, thank you for that😇

Exactly! This is very much like the village where my grandparents lived in Ukraine( Western region ). I was stunned by the similarities in culture, clothes, housing, decor and even crafts. Brought lots of warm memories.

@@OLHA767 I'm from Western Ukraine and my grandparents and a lot of old people have this kind of relationship))

That is too bad. We Minangkabau here are quite urbanized, so it does not look traditional anymore. But fortunately people still trying to preserve the cultural structure of the matriarchy, even the men, who actually don't get to own any of the clan's property.

It’s definitely an eastern thing

Similar in Albania

I have known plenty of older women like that.

@@robinlillian9471 As women grow older they begin to produce more testosterone, as men grow older they begin to produce more estrogen.

@@robinlillian9471 Obviously this only happens afer a considerable amount of time (40s-70s).

Pater semper incertus

this is why the joke: say ”Good day” to all the men you meet, you might not know when you say ”good day” to your father!

People go through stuff like that all the time. They are just too busy living their lives to be conplaining on social media. The core of humanity has not changed, it's just the parts of it that you see.

@@lunarose9 you are not wrong. Things like that are constantly happening. The circumstances are different tho.

I live here. Its matriarchy

Nope. Globalization will cause many more to die out.

irish is taught in school in ireland and there are still 100,000 ppl in ireland who are fluent in irish and use it as their first language everyday. However many ppl dont like learning irish in school as it's just based around exams and is taught rly badly. A lot of ppl (including me lol) would love to be fluent but school makes us hate it

why? it's not possible to keep every culture alive lol, if there is no need for it then why? it's just a concept (one that does much more harm than good) so if the Irish themselves don't want to speak irish than why should there be an effort to keep it alive? old cultures die and new ones are born, it's only natural that way

@@curanki8868, you are right, like the "Soviet culture" is an example of a new culture. But I wish Irish and Badeshi could be revived somehow.

It's one thing to look at other people living in small isolated pockets of archaic culture, it's an entirely different thing to try and live it yourself. There are good reasons why the population there leans heavily towards elderly and why all the capable young people have gone to find better opportunities elsewhere.

@Grey Donovun : Oh, bullshit! They explained that the men are away most of the time fishing. It's called survival. The men are not oppressed - or no more than the women, given that both sexes were under Soviet rule and both sexes appear to live in fairly limited circumstances economically.

@Grey Donovun Based

We could if we learnt.

You can answer that question if you really want to.

I am on minimalism now.

@Heloise O'Byrne Fridges, washing, washing machines are ok, but think of al the other stuff no one really needs. 30 bowls you never use together and so on.

@Heloise O'Byrne You can habe, what you think, what you need. I don't need a big kitchen and useless stuff for status quo. It was just an overdrawn example. I 'judge' character, not belongings. 😀

I think the future of humanity is reliant on us wanting less. Everything we take has a cost to the planet, our resources are finite and belong to everyone. The actions of a tiny % of greedy humans is destroying what could be a fairer, equitable and healthier way for humanity to live in harmony with our natural parameters

You say on your phone/PC. Admit it, you're part of the stain too.

Just my thought. When you are young, you think you need everything, when you are getting older, you experience, that many things are needless. 😀

I would certainly defend that a city life is better for those seeking it. Many people adapt to different ambients and it's totally up to teenagers if they think living an urban life will make 'em happy

I would say better for opportunity, education, healthcare, etc. The unfortunate part is that in order to do so, the positive aspects of this way of life have to be abandoned and the community is lost.

We are at the chapter machine gun or tank.

If this is true why was so many people named Mc or Mac meaning son of.

@@iancrawford1382 Mac means (son), Nic means (daughter) in Gaelic then (insert fathers name) is I think what you mean. This is modern, I’m talking about long long before.

Same in China, used to follow maternal surname

We were all matriarchal if you go back far enough.

@@nataliebutler Not all

so what was its religion before?

@@piotrnogas8448 It was Lutheranism like for Estonians in general, but there was a hoax spread by the local authorities in the 19th century that converts to Orthodoxy would get free land. Especially people in Southwestern Estonia went along with it, but most converted back to Lutheranism after it had turned out to be a lie. Kihnu islanders however retained Orthodoxy.

@@eksiarvamus Yeah, that was part of Russification attempt in the end of 19th century. Another important change was that the Baltic law system, based on Baltic German laws, and German as official local language were replaced with Russian. After the people were converted, they were told: "Of course you can get your free land, just go to places like Siberia to grab it". And, it was forbidden to leave the Orthodox church, so it became possible only after Estonia became independent. While in other areas in Estonia, many rejoined the Lutheran church again, in coastal areas the Orthodox church remained. But, Kihnu was the only area, where the conversion to Orthodox church was total, in any other areas (excluding Setomaa, what was connected to Russia since the medieval time) Orthodox were a minority.

Not really, because a lot of cultures have matronymic names, it's just that patronymic's prevail. In the neighbouring Serbia you have a lot of names based on female ancestors. Serbian last names tend to come from the most prominent ancestor, and there's a lot of women who earned that right, by, for example, being widowed at a young age and then raising a bunch of kids on their own. Last names like Katić (comes from Katarina or Kata for short), Nedić (Neda), Miličić (Milica), Višnjić (Višnja) etc. are all examples of that.

@@lemmypop1300 That's interesting, it s very probable it is a slavic thing too. I mean Slavs have the idea of live giving mother and source of life (matrioshka)

Even in India. In India too, in ancient India too people were known by their Mother's name not Father's. Like 'Kunti putra Arjun' Kunti - Is the women's, the Mother's name ' putra - means son and Arjun - The persons name So the full name 'Kunti Putra Arjun' Kunti's son Arjun 'Ganga putra Bhishma' etc. and if daughter than after Mother's name its 'putri' than adding daughter's name the same way. Even Gautam Buddha's name comes from 'Gautami' his Aunt who raised him not Father's. And 'Sita pati Ram Chandra' 'Sita's husband Ram' Sita- Name of the wife, Pati - Husband Ram- Husband's name Even while taking couple's name the wifes name always came first before the husbands name. Husband always needed his wife by his side for performing important rituals if there was no wife than husband was not allowed to perform, may he be the King of land but he can't perform important duties without the wife by his side.

Kihnu Virve

It’s not just in Latvia, I think the lives of old women in villages are pretty similar in all Eastern Europe and Russia. This village really reminded me the russian one were my Grandma lived

@@whoareyou7399 Yes, everywhere really that got severely impacted by the WW2 and the Soviet Union.

Why

I know right! Its like they forget theres a queen... .. .

wuss

@Icaleb yes

embarrassin

Lmao you have an interesting world view

You havent thought this through

Like raising kids? Please dont reproduce

Hmm 🤔 interesting

How are they in poverty? They have food & shelter.

@@wolfzmusic9706 bestie you did not just say that

@@wolfzmusic9706 just meaning their lives aren't cluttered with piles of material objects. Not that they should, just the way it is.

@@monsieurtyrell9652 Poverty & being poor are different. Poverty is when you lack basic things like food, shelter, water etc. They clearly do not lack these things.

@@kathryncarter6143 That isn’t poverty though. Poverty is when you don’t have the basics; being poor is when you don’t have much money & struggle.

Yes it's almost the same as a patriarky just with more absent men, but this isn't a true matriarky.

No, the men are working away from the village to earn bread and butter...

lol you all don't understand the importance of these women doing everything by themselves. they are able to produce their own food and can repair their own production tools (aka machines etc.) which means they are autonomous. or eveven further: they are the ones with controlling power (work force + food production) in their little society. so yes it is a little matriarchy.

@@_de_reve these are TRUE independent woman Unlike modern, lazy, feminists who screech that they are soooooo independent

@@steyn1775 jesus go being a prick somewhere else if you don't understand people's problems

I was thinking the same. I'm from Bulgaria and it's pretty much the same here. Women do everything, while men just go to work, lay on the couch and drink rakia. And honestly, it's not that great as it's described in this video. I am extremely thankful that my man is not like that.

@@reginapriest5287 "go to work" takes a lot out of a man's soul these days. Ain't no real work left here anyways. Just fake capitalism work they could have a robot for but keep open so that the economy doesn't crash and they can keep exploiting us

@@namaenamae1 well, going to work takes a lot outta my soul too. But I still clean, cook and take care of the child, right? It wouldn't take up much from the man to play with the child while I do something else. Or do the laundry when i can't. I understand if a man's job is super physically draining, but manufactury heavy work is not so common these days. There are a lot of men doing various other jobs. And while every job is draining to a point, at the end of the day it's good and appreciated to help each other. It creates compassion and balance. I know and have grown up around people who didn't have that and argued all the time.

@Dozer Mramur I am interested in what you have to say, Dozer, but it is not easy to figure out what that is. Not trying to be the grammar or punctuation police, just trying to figure it out. Do you reread what you've written, to be sure we readers can understand?