Virago - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Virago is a term used to describe a woman who demonstrates exemplary and heroic qualities. The word comes from the Latin word vir, meaningvirile 'man,' to which the suffix -ago is added, a suffix that effectively re-genders the word to be female. Historically, the concept for the word virago reaches back into antiquity where Hellenistic philosophy

Hellenistic philosophy

Hellenistic philosophy is the period of Western philosophy that was developed in the Hellenistic civilization following Aristotle and ending with the beginning of Neoplatonism.-Pythagoreanism:...

asserted that elite and exceptionally heroic men were 'virtus

Virtus

In Roman mythology, Virtus was the deity of bravery and military strength, the personification of the Roman virtue of virtus. The Greek equivalent deity was Arete....

.' Women and non-elite or unheroic men (slaves, servants, craftsmen, merchants) were in a lesser category, and believed to be less excellent (see Roman morality: Mos maiorum

Mos maiorum

The mos maiorum is the unwritten code from which the ancient Romans derived their social norms. It is the core concept of Roman traditionalism, distinguished from but in dynamic complement to written law. The mos maiorum The mos maiorum ("ancestral custom") is the unwritten code from which the...

. A woman, however, if exceptional enough could earn the title Virago. In doing so, she surpassed the expectations for what was believed possible for her gender

Gender

Gender is a range of characteristics used to distinguish between males and females, particularly in the cases of men and women and the masculine and feminine attributes assigned to them. Depending on the context, the discriminating characteristics vary from sex to social role to gender identity...

, and embodied masculine-like aggression and/or excellence. Virago, then, was a title of respect and admiration. In Christianity

Christianity

Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...

, a female nun

Nun

A nun is a woman who has taken vows committing her to live a spiritual life. She may be an ascetic who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live her life in prayer and contemplation in a monastery or convent...

or holy woman who had become equal in divinity to male monks through practiced celibacy

Celibacy

Celibacy is a personal commitment to avoiding sexual relations, in particular a vow from marriage. Typically celibacy involves avoiding all romantic relationships of any kind. An individual may choose celibacy for religious reasons, such as is the case for priests in some religions, for reasons of...

, exemplary religious practice and devotion, and intact virginity

Virginity

Virginity refers to the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. There are cultural and religious traditions which place special value and significance on this state, especially in the case of unmarried females, associated with notions of personal purity, honor and worth...

, was considered to have surpassed the limitations of her femaleness and was called 'Virago.'

The word Virago has almost always had an association with gender transgression. A Virago, no matter how excellent, was still technically a biological woman. There are recorded instances of Virago women (Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc

Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...

is a famous example) fighting battles, wearing men's clothing, or receiving the haircut of a male monk, called a tonsure. This could cause social anxiety. For this reason, the word Virago could also be used disparagingly, to infer that a Virago was not excellent or heroic, but was instead violating cultural norms. Thus virago joined pejorative

Pejorative

Pejoratives , including name slurs, are words or grammatical forms that connote negativity and express contempt or distaste. A term can be regarded as pejorative in some social groups but not in others, e.g., hacker is a term used for computer criminals as well as quick and clever computer experts...

s such as termagant
Termagant
In Medieval Europe, Termagant was the name given to a god that the Europeans believed Muslims worshipped.-Origin of the concept:European literature from the Middle Ages often referred to Muslims as pagans, with sobriquets such as the paynim foe...

. and shrew
Shrew
A shrew or shrew mouse is a small molelike mammal classified in the order Soricomorpha. True shrews are also not to be confused with West Indies shrews, treeshrews, otter shrews, or elephant shrews, which belong to different families or orders.Although its external appearance is generally that of...

to demean women who acted aggressively or like men.

Today, in standard dictionaries, Virago is defined as both a woman who has unexcellent male characteristics, such as being noisy or domineering, as well as a woman of "great stature, strength, and courage." . The word Virago continues to be associated with the naming of a woman who has risen above cultural and gender

Gender

stereotypes (see also sexism

Sexism

Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...

) to embody heroism at its best. For example, the British Royal Navy christened at least four warships Virago
HMS Virago
Four ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Virago, after the term virago, to mean a strong, warlike woman: was a 12-gun gun-brig launched in 1805 and sold in 1816. was a wooden paddle sloop launched in 1842 and broken up in 1875. was a Quail-class torpedo boat destroyer launched in 1895,...

.

Vulgate Bible

The Vulgate

Vulgate

The Vulgate is a late 4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. It was largely the work of St. Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of the old Latin translations...

Bible, translated by Jerome

Jerome

Saint Jerome was a Roman Christian priest, confessor, theologian and historian, and who became a Doctor of the Church. He was the son of Eusebius, of the city of Stridon, which was on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia...

and others in the 4th Century C.E., was the first Latin translation of the Hebrew Bible Old Testament

Hebrew Bible

The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...

. In the in Genesis 2:23, Jerome uses the words Vir for man and Virago for "woman" attempting to reproduce a pun on "male" and "female" (Is and Issah) that existed in the Hebrew text. .

The Vulgate reads:

Dixitque Adam hoc nunc os ex ossibus meis et caro de carne mea haec vocabitur virago quoniam de viro sumpta est.

"And Adam said: This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man."

The Middle English poem Cursor Mundi
Cursor Mundi
Cursor Mundi is an anonymous Middle-English historical and religious poem of nearly 30,000 lines written around 1300 AD. The poem summarizes the history of the world as described in the Christian Bible and other sources, with additional legendary material drawn primarily from the Historia...

retains the Latin name for the woman in its otherwise Middle English account of the creation:

Quen sco was broght be-for adam, Virago he gaf her to nam; þar for hight sco virago, ffor maked of the man was sco. (lines 631-34)

"When she was brought before Adam, Virago was the name he gave to her; Therefore she is called Virago, For she was made out of the man."

Vulgate Bible

See also