Gender assumptions and women's experience provide litmus tests of family flexibility, resilience, and the capacity to use the talents of all. Islamic invasions brought migrations of families from Asia and even from East Africa to northern India, an older pattern of wealthy households that were large, co-residential and contained many generations of dependents persisted. In medieval Europe, prone to invasions in the early part of medieval era and less successful in acculturating new populations than Asia, two family patterns emerged. The universal religions of the medieval world all spoke of man as the generic norm, which made women perhaps not less worthy, but less human. One topic that elucidates Middle Millennium gender assumptions, family life, and sexuality is domestic slavery and the web of exchange that provided slaves to families. Gender remains the category of analysis when considering sexuality in medieval era, because sexual responses and reproduction were apprehended through gender distinctions.