Amazons

1. Amazons

   A nation of militant women who lives in the southern borders of Turkey, founders of the town Themiscyra in a country on the River Thermodon. Amazon women are tall, lithe and fullbreasted, their limps powerful from constant exercise, their features stern and noble and their gaze sharp and challenging.

   They know themselves superior to men, whom they use only as sex objects. Each year, a selected group of Amazon virgins visits a neighboring tribe, the Gargareans, in order to conceive children. They return any boys to the fathers and bring up the girls in their own occupasions of agriculture, hunting and war.

   The name
   

   1. In Sanskrit the word 'Uma-soona' means 'Uma's children'. Uma was a Goddess worshipped in India and vicinity.

   2. An Armenian word meaning 'moon woman'. Artemis, the deity the Amazons worshipped, was the Goddess of the Moon as well as the hunt, so her followers may have been referred to as the moon women.

   3. The Scythians called the Amazons 'Oior-pata' which means 'man killer' or 'man-slayers'. (Oior = man, pata = to kill, to slay). This is how ancient historian Herodotus referred to Amazons.

   The Amazon river or rain forest should not be confused with the Amazon women warriors, but, the Amazon itself may have been named after them. Female warriors of the Tapuyas in South America attacked Orellana, a 16th century Spanish explorer. Legend has it that he named the area Amazon, after the ancient women warriors.

   One breast?
   Some ancient histories claim that each Amazon woman has her right breast amputated, so that she may draw her bow more easily, but this is a fallacy. Their name derives from the Greek word mazos, meaning 'breasts', with the prefix 'a' denotin an amplitude. Historians have attributed the one-breast-saying to:

   1. They have sacrificed one breast to Artemis, the Goddess they worshipped. There is a statue of Artemis at Ephesus which depicts her with many breasts, this could be an example of all the breasts sacrificed to her.

   2. Supposedly the Amazons where better able to shoot their bows and arrows without the left breast.

   3. The name Amazon may have come from a word which means 'without breast' in ancient Greece.

   The warriors
   A regiment of Amazons on the move is an awe-striking sight. The archer companies are naked but for brief tunics and armed with bows and arrows. The others wear tight trousers, tunics, and caps, and carry spears or axes. Amazon fighting tactics comprise a sudden rush by arches, who release a blizzard of deadly arrows upon the enemy to soften them up for the stabbing and hacking assault by axe-women and spear-women.

   Amazon society is a matriarchy ruled by a queen, who is selected at regular intervals out of the fiercest and strongest of the regimental officers. The Amazon capital, Themiscyra, is a small but noble city where the queen lives in an elegant palace of classical design, but she makes frequent expeditions around her country to inspect the forts, agricultural villages, and training camps. Amazon women spend a portion of each year in looking after their farms and the remainder in various necessary crafts, military training and manoeuvres.

   For some 400 years (1000-600 BC) they held sway over that part of Asia Minor along the shores of the Black Sea. According to some records as far as the islands of Samothrace and Lesbos. Or so the Greeks believed for hundreds of years after the legendary warriors last engaged them in battle. Later Greeks attempted to dismiss the earlier tales as untrue.

   But if they never existed, they could never have invaded Athens as Plutarch (among others) assures us they did. While the issue of their existence remains far from settled, the stories of the Amazons continue to inspire the generations.

   Sometimes stories are told there are two queens - one for defense and one for domestic affairs. Under their military queen, the Amazons were a mighty army of mounted warriors bearing ivy-shaped shields and double-bladed battleaxes. At home, the Amazons lived peacefully supplying all their own economic needs and producing artistic treasures coveted far outside their borders.

   Mythology
   It was said they were descendants of the god of war, Ares, and the nymph, Harmony. They worshipped Artemis and were fearsome warriors. Ares, a greek/roman god, was the son of Hera, who bore him without the assistance of male seed. He was a supreme fighter who cared little for the interest he defended, changing side without scruple. He loved fighting for fighting's sake and delighted in bloody massacres. He was the god most hated by the Olympians.

   Artemis, eternally young was the equal to any man. Her only pleasure was hunting.

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   Origin: Greece

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   See also
   Alphabetic list of Amazon women | Myths and Legends
   
   
   

2. Amazons in the Attica war

   According to myth Theseus invaded the country of the Amazons (some myths say with Heracles/Hercules, some say on his own) and kidnapped Antiope (some myths) or her sister Hippolyta (other myths). Whichever one it was, all myths say she bore him a son, Hippolytus. After the birth of Hippolytus the Amazons invaded Attica to rescue their queen. They were defeated by Theseus and driven back to their homeland.

   Antianeira
   Dueled with Theseus in single combat and lost.

   Aristomache
   Was the Amazon who fought Mounichos in the Attica war.

   Clyemne
   Was an Amazon who fought both Theseus and Phaleros in single combat.

   Doris
   An Amazon named for the sea-goddess. She was a spear-woman.

   Echephyle
   She fought Eudorus in single combat in the Attica war.

   Eumache
   She was an Amazon who, disarmed and out of arrows, fought with a stone.

   Kreousa
   She was killed by Phylakos in single combat.

   Okyale
   An archer who engaged Astyochos in single combat.

   Orithia | Oreithia
   The leader of the invading Amazons.

   Other Amazons serving under Orithia
   Amynomene, Androdameia, Antimachos, Deinomache, Euryleia, Hippomache, Laodoke, Melousa, Mimnousa, Molpadia, Pyrgomache, Xanthippe.