Most pagans held women in equal status as men, only slave women and men where lesser in value.

Not until abrahamic religions became wide spread did the whole women less than men thing happen...in fact women where sill regarded as higher than men, that's why they were treated like shit (if that makes sense) they bear the children they pass on the future of the culture and the religion so they had to be controlled and devalued because the future depended on them training their children to be the same way.

>>1
Proof... wait you have none...

Women were for breeding and keeping the children fed, not for taking into battle.