Ideal womanhood

The concept of the "ideal woman"

• Fatimah, daughter of Muhammad and wife of Imam Ali, seen as the pinnacle of female virtues and the ideal role model for the entirety of women.
• Sita as the ideal Hindu or Indian woman
• Penelope, wife of Odysseus in the Odyssey, described as the ideal woman of ancient Greek society, "the embodiment of chastity, generosity, cunning, and intelligence"
• Queen Victoria as the ideal Victorian era woman
• Proverbs 31 woman: "wife of noble character", as described in the Old Testament book of Proverbs, skilled in both household management and trade
• Mary, mother of Jesus as an ideal of both virgin and mother - a concept with some pervasiveness in Latin America.
• the "ideal woman" stereotype of the 1950s, described by Betty Friedan in The Feminine Mystique as defined by "sexual passivity, male domination, and nurturing maternal love"

  Examples

• Sophie, a character in Jean-Jacques Rousseau's who is raised to be the perfect wife.
• Lucretia as depicted by Benjamin Britten in The Rape of Lucretia.
• Sylvia, in William Shakespeare's poem Who is Sylvia?