The heading is a partial title of a 1999 study by Pam McAllister that discusses the role of women and non-violent action of the social movement in which the author argues that “most of what we commonly call women’s history is actually the history of women’s role in the development of non-violent action”.

In other words, women’s involvement has been instrumental to the use and expansion of civil resistance and non-violent struggle. This column will not exhaust the full history of this phenomenon, which has finally flourished in our country following the assassination of the investigative journalist, Daphne Caruana Galizia.

This piece is not a study in gender as it has accelerated in the past several decades but a cursory exploration of the experiences of women, historically and in the contemporary era.

Ordinary women have always played a part in civil resistance since time immemorial but it has always been downplayed. Part of the reason for this downplaying in the recording of history is the predilection of patriarchal societies to view all human activity through the lens of male interests.

Women were barely considered agents in their own right, unless they had risen to leadership either through accident of birth or circumstance like, for example, Cleopatra, both queens Elizabeth, Catherine the Great or Joan of Arc.

But unsung ordinary women have always stood up to tyrants with feminine guile and panache. Honourable mentions go to Shiprah and Puah, two midwives in the book of Exodus who stood up to the pharaoh; the war-weary Athenian women of Aristophanes’s Lysistrata; Doña Gracia Mendes Nasi, who singlehandedly led the boycott of the port of Ancona after she heard that the entire population of Portuguese Jews in the city had been arrested by order of Pope Paul IV.

I can continue with notable examples of civil disobedience by women throughout history: the women who kept the workforce going in both world wars; the women of the Resistance in WWII; Rosa Parks, who some black historians argue Martin Luther King would not exist were it not for her; the women of Solidarność; the women of the Plaza de Mayo of Argentina; the women of the Arab Awakening; the women of Iran; the women of Belarus and the list goes on.

Women who boldly stand up to men in power, as we know all too well in this country too, pay a high price for their activism. We are stigmatised as “mad women”, “prostitutes”, “witches” and are ridiculed, vilified and even unjustly punished for daring to have an opinion. This only happens in deeply patriarchal cultures across all major institutions, secular or otherwise.

Gloria Steinem, writer and activist, wrote that “the best way for us to cultivate fearlessness in our daughters and other young women is by example. If they see their mothers and other women in their lives going forward despite fear, they’ll know it’s possible”.

Courage inspires bravery in others. We were inspired by Daphne’s fearlessness throughout her career and, more recently, an entire nation stood up to be counted when another woman rose up to fight for her son, Jean Paul Sofia. Isabelle Bonnici has firmly placed herself in the pantheon of women who will not take things lying down.

Women who boldly stand up to men in power, as we know all too well in this country too, pay a high price for their activism. We are stigmatised as “mad women”, “prostitutes”, “witches” and are ridiculed, vilified and even unjustly punished for daring to have an opinion

But one other deeply private woman, another mother, Rose Vella, was also thrust in the glare of the public gaze nearly six years ago when her daughter, Daphne, was assassinated yards from her home.

Mrs Vella did not leave any quotable quotes behind but I do cherish several things we spoke about when we met at the vigils, at the protests demanding justice for her daughter’s stories and during Mass in suffrage for Daphne. Mrs Vella didn’t give speeches, she did not write in newspapers or post on Facebook. But her voice was the loudest.

Her strength lay in her stoic, dignified, elegant resistance to the climate of impunity that killed her daughter. Her protest was manifested with every court appearance, by sitting yards from the very people who dehumanised, vilified and, ultimately, killed her daughter.

Her strength lay in walking alongside her husband, Michael, and her brave, surviving daughters, especially when her physical strength was flagging, behind our various banners demanding truth and justice. They killed her daughter but they did not kill her spirit.

The movement that sprung right after Daphne was killed was started by women and I am infinitely proud to have joined immediately but Rose Vella was and will forever be our lodestar.

She did not tell us what to do but she lived quietly showing us how to do it. Whenever we felt tired fighting in the trenches, we looked to her and her husband, Michael, and our backs stiffened with determination to walk the long road to justice with them.

Mrs Vella left no written manifesto on how to resist. Her quiet yet defiant demeanor was her manifesto. Her philosophy was clearly bequeathed to her children. I can see it in Daphne’s iconic words: “Know your rights, know your civil liberties, know what the fundamental principles of democratic thinking and behaviour are and never give in to authority just because it is authority.”

Mrs Vella was more than a mother and grandmother.

But her ultimate legacy is the upbringing of her children and her grandchildren, who keep writing fresh pages of honest, responsible citizenship in the face of much brutality.

Mrs Vella’s legacy is in our resolve to keep doing the right thing in spite of anything that keeps being thrown our way. We owe it to her and to all the women who showed us the way in a man’s world.

Farewell, Mrs Vella. I shall miss you but I will always remember you.

And thank you.