Judith Tarr returns to the always fascinating character of Alexander the Great in this fantasy novel that springs from the legend that the Queen of the Amazons came to meet him in Persia, and became his friend. Hippolyta was Penthesilea, or Queen of the Amazons. She ruled as war leader and high priestess of a scattered tribe of women warriors who had dwelt on the high plains to the north and east of Persia for time out of mind. They were not isolated---travelers came and went through their territory, bringing news from the west, and carrying tales of the warrior women back home with them. But the Queen had a great grief in her life: her daughter and heir was a strange child. The girl had been born, so the Priestesses said, without a soul. And it was true that she was like no other child alive. She did not speak, and often seemed not to even see the people around her. She could not dress or feed herself, but she could ride and hunt like no other woman of the tribe. Many of the Amazons believed that the child must never be Queen, but that was a problem for a later time--Hippolyta was young and strong. Selene, the niece of the tribe's Seer, was put in charge of the child, to be her nursemaid and guardian. And it was a good, though sometimes difficult, life for many turns of the years. But then one day news came from the West of a new Conqueror, a young man who came out of Macedon with a spirit like flame, intending to rule the whole world. The Queen's daughter responded to the tale as a woman in the desert would to the sound of falling water. That very night she stole out of the camp and rode west. Selene could not stop her, and so she must follow, praying that the Queen would understand. Hippolyta herself followed the next day, and so they rode together, controlled by the child's compulsion, until they had crossed the mountains and entered into Alexander's Empire, and under the sway of Alexander's powerful personality.

An “excellent” A-to-Z reference of female fighters in history, myth, and literature—from goddesses to gladiators to guerrilla warriors (Library Journal). This is an astounding collection of female fighters, from heads of state and goddesses to pirates and gladiators. Each entry is drawn from historical, fictional, or mythical narratives of many eras and lands. With over one thousand entries detailing the lives and influence of these heroic female figures in battle, politics, and daily life, Salmonson provides a unique chronicle of female fortitude, focusing not just on physical strength but on the courage to fight against patriarchal structures and redefine women’s roles during time periods when doing so was nearly impossible. The use of historical information and fictional traditions from Japan, Europe, Asia, and Africa gives this work a cross-cultural perspective that contextualizes the image of these unconventional depictions of might, valor, and greatness.

The real history of the Amazons in war and love Amazons—fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world—were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus of Persia, Alexander the Great, and the Roman general Pompey tangled with Amazons. But just who were these bold barbarian archers on horseback who gloried in fighting, hunting, and sexual freedom? Were Amazons real? In this deeply researched, wide-ranging, and lavishly illustrated book, National Book Award finalist Adrienne Mayor presents the Amazons as they have never been seen before. This is the first comprehensive account of warrior women in myth and history across the ancient world, from the Mediterranean Sea to the Great Wall of China. Mayor tells how amazing new archaeological discoveries of battle-scarred female skeletons buried with their weapons prove that women warriors were not merely figments of the Greek imagination. Combining classical myth and art, nomad traditions, and scientific archaeology, she reveals intimate, surprising details and original insights about the lives and legends of the women known as Amazons. Provocatively arguing that a timeless search for a balance between the sexes explains the allure of the Amazons, Mayor reminds us that there were as many Amazon love stories as there were war stories. The Greeks were not the only people enchanted by Amazons—Mayor shows that warlike women of nomadic cultures inspired exciting tales in ancient Egypt, Persia, India, Central Asia, and China. Driven by a detective's curiosity, Mayor unearths long-buried evidence and sifts fact from fiction to show how flesh-and-blood women of the Eurasian steppes were mythologized as Amazons, the equals of men. The result is likely to become a classic.

(Book). The Modern Amazons: Warrior Women on Screen documents the public's seemingly insatiable fascination with the warrior woman archetype in film and on television. The book examines the cautious beginnings of new roles for women in the late fifties, the rapid development of female action leads during the burgeoning second-wave feminist movement in the late sixties and seventies, and the present-day onslaught of female action characters now leaping from page to screen. The book itself is organized into chapters that group women warriors into sub-genres, e.g., classic Amazons like Xena Warrior Princess and the women of the Conan films; superheroes and their archenemies such as Wonder Woman, Batgirl, and Catwoman; revenge films such as the Kill Bill movies; Sexploitation and Blaxploitation films such as Coffy and the Ilsa trilogy; Hong Kong cinema and warriors like Angela Mao, Cynthia Rothrock, and Zhang Ziyi; sci-fi warriors from Star Trek , Blade Runner , and Star Wars ; supersleuths and spies like the Avengers and Charlie's Angels; and gothic warriors such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Kate Beckinsale in Underworld and Van Helsing . In addition, the book is lavishly illustrated with over 400 photos of these popular-culture icons in action, interesting articles and sidebars about themes, trends, weapons, style, and trivia, as well as a complete filmography of more than 150 titles.

Drawn from the story lines presented in recent motion pictures featuring Wonder Woman, presents background and details on Wonder Woman's birth place, her Amazon sisters, and her journey into the outside world.

In SEARCH of the HISTORY of the AMAZONS. This book attempts to look at the phenomenon of Amazons from all sides, in order to shed more light on it and bring us close to its explanation. To fathom this legend, it is necessary first of all to refer to its earliest tradition that forms the foundation, without which the solution itself would be inconceivable. In the following, we look beyond the narrow confines of classic antiquity, to find where else in the world such Amazon-like myths exist. Our next step will be to moot different approaches to the question of Amazons. A central theme is the archeological research and our on-site investigation in those regions which are considered to have been the homelands of the Amazons, namely the land of the river Thermodon and Lemnos Island. According to this latest investigation, the lost history of the Amazons can be reconstructed.

'Golden-shielded, silver-sworded, man-loving, male-child slaughtering Amazons,' is how the fifth-century Greek historian Hellanicus described the Amazons, and they have fascinated humanity ever since. Did they really exist? For centuries, scholars consigned them to the world of myth, but Lyn Webster Wilde journeyed into the homeland of the Amazons and uncovered astonishing evidence of their historic reality. North of the Black Sea she found archaeological excavations of graves of Iron Age women buried with arrows, swords and armour. In the hidden world of the Hittites, near the Amazons' ancient capital of Thermiscyra in Anatolia, she unearthed traces of powerful priestesses, women-only religious cults, and an armed, bisexual goddess - all possible sources for the ferocious women. Combining scholarly penetration with a sense of adventure, Webster Wilde has produced a coherent and absorbing book that challenges preconceived notions, still disturbingly widespread, of what men and women can do.

This is the very first study devoted to the anonymous "Tractatus de Mulieribus," a remarkable, virtually unknown Greek work, telling of fourteen outstanding ancient women, Greek and barbarian, who were notable for their intelligence, initiative and courage.