While securing her these privileges, the vows she took entailed corresponding responsibilities. Even when married, a votary was still obliged to remain a virgin, and, should her husband desire children, she could not bear them herself, but must provide him with a maid or concubine. But, in spite of this disability, she was secured in her position as the permanent head of the household. The concubine, though she might bear the husband children, was always the wife's inferior, and should she attempt to put herself on a level with the votary, the latter could brand her and put her with the female slaves; while in the event of the concubine proving barren, she could be sold. Unmarried votaries, too, could live in houses of their own and dispose of their time and money in their own way. But a high standard of commercial and social morality was expected from them, and severe penalties were imposed for its infringement. No votary, for example, was permitted to open a beer-shop, and should she even enter one, she ran the risk of being put to death. An unmarried votary also enjoyed the status of a married woman, and the penalty for slandering one was branding in the forehead. That the social position enjoyed by a votary was considerable is proved by the fact that many women of good family, and even members of the royal house, took vows. It is a striking fact that women of an Eastern race should have achieved such a position of independence at the beginning of the second millennium. The explanation is perhaps to be sought in the great part already played by commerce in Babylonian life. Among contemporary races, occupied mainly by agriculture and war, woman's activity was necessarily restricted to the rearing of children and to the internal economy of the household. But with the growth of Babylonian trade and commercial enterprise, it would seem that the demand arose, on the part of women of the upper class, to take part in activities in which they considered themselves capable of joining.[35] The success of the experiment was doubtless due in part to the high standard of morality exacted, and in part to the prestige conferred by association with the religious cult.