In Greek mythology, the Amazons ()Blok, Josine H., and Anne Ley, "Amazons", in Brill's New Pauly: Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World. Antiquity, Volume 1, A – Ari, edited by Hubert Cancik and Helmuth Schneider, Leiden, Brill, 2002. . were female warriors and hunters, known for their physical agility, strength, archery, riding skills, and the arts of combat. Their society was closed to men and they raised only their daughters, returning their sons to their fathers with whom they would only socialize briefly in order to reproduce. They were portrayed in a number of ancient epic poems and legends, such as the Labours of Heracles, the Argonautica and the Iliad.
Courageous and fiercely independent, the Amazons, commanded by their queen, regularly undertook extensive military expeditions into the far corners of the world, from Scythia to Thrace, Asia Minor, and the Aegean Islands, reaching as far as Arabia and Egypt. Besides military raids, the Amazons are also associated with the foundation of temples and the establishment of numerous ancient cities like Ephesos, Cyme, Smyrna, Sinope, Myrina, Magnesia, Pygela, etc.
The texts of the original myths envisioned the homeland of the Amazons at the periphery of the then-known world. Various claims to the exact place ranged from provinces in Asia Minor (Lycia, Caria, etc.) to the steppes around the Black Sea. However, authors most frequently referred to Pontus in northern Anatolia, on the southern shores of the Black Sea, as the independent Amazon kingdom where the Amazon queen resided at her capital Themiscyra, on the banks of the Thermodon river.
Decades of archaeological discoveries of burial sites of female warriors, including royalty, in the Eurasian Steppes suggest that the horse cultures of the Scythian and Sarmatian peoples likely inspired the Amazon myth. In 2019, a grave with multiple generations of female Scythian warriors, armed and in golden headdresses, was found near Voronezh in southwestern Russia. In 2017, another discovery was made in Armenia, where the grave of a woman buried with jewelry dating back to the Iron Age reflected injuries and musculature of a horse-back warrior who frequented battle.
Name Etymology
The origin of the word is uncertain. It may be derived from an Iranian ethnonym *ha-mazan- 'warriors', a word attested indirectly through a derivation, a denominal verb in Hesychius of Alexandria's gloss (": 'to make war' in Persian"), where it appears together with the Indo-Iranian root *kar- 'make'.
It may alternatively be a Greek word descended from 'man-/husband-less' (alpha privative combined with a derivation from *man- cognate with Proto-Balto-Slavic *mangjá-, found in Czech and South Slavic muž) has been proposed, an explanation deemed "unlikely" by Hjalmar Frisk. A further explanation proposes Iranian *ama-janah ('killers of manliness') as source.
Among the ancient Greeks, the term Amazon was popularly folk-etymologized as originating from the Greek , ('breastless'), from a- ('-less') and , a variant of ('breast'), connected with an etiological tradition once claimed by the Roman historian Mark Justin, who alleged that the Amazons had their right breast cut off or burnt out. There is no indication of such a practice in ancient works of art, in which the Amazons are always represented with both breasts, although one (often the right breast) would commonly be covered. According to Philostratus, the babies of Amazons were fed from both breasts, not only the left one. Author Adrienne Mayor suggests that the false etymology led to the myth.
Alternative terms Herodotus used the terms Androktones () 'manslayers' or 'mariticides', and Androleteirai () 'destroyers of men, murderesses'. Amazons are called Antianeirai () 'manlike', and Aeschylus used the term Styganor () 'men-loathers' (i.e., misandrists).
In his work Prometheus Bound and in The Suppliants, Aeschylus referred to the Amazons as 'the husbandless, flesh-devouring Amazons' (; ). In the Hippolytus tragedy, Phaedra calls Hippolytus, 'the son of the horse-loving Amazon' (; ). In his Dionysiaca, Nonnus refers to Dionysos's Amazons as Androphonos (), 'man-slaying'. Herodotus stated that, in the Scythian language, the Greek-named Amazons were known as Oiorpata (meaning likewise 'man-slaying'), a combination of the Scythian words oior ('man') and pata (a verb that meant 'to slay').
Historiography
The ancient Greeks never had any doubts that the Amazons were, or had been, real. Greeks were not the only people enchanted by warlike women of nomadic cultures, such exciting tales also come from ancient Egypt, Persia, India, and China. Greek heroes of old had encounters with the queens of their martial society and fought them. However, their original home was not exactly known, thought to be in the obscure lands beyond the civilized world. As a result, many classical scholars consider Amazons to be entirely fictional figures, invented by Greek men to serve as "anti-women" or to symbolize Persians. Some authors preferred comparisons to cultures of Asia Minor or even Minoan Crete.
The most obvious historical candidates are Scythia (and more narrowly Sarmatia) in the Pontic–Caspian Steppe, and Lycia in Anatolia, in line with the accounts by Herodotus. In his Histories (5th century BCE), Herodotus claimed that the (predecessors of the Sarmatians), who ruled the lands between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea, arose from a union of Scythians and Amazons. Herodotus also observed rather unusual customs among the Lycians of southwest Asia Minor. The Lycians followed matrilineal rules of descent, virtue, and status; they named themselves along their maternal family line and a child's status was determined by the mother's reputation. This remarkably high esteem of women and legal regulations based on maternal lines, still in effect in the 5th century BCE in the Lycian regions that Herodotus traveled to, suggested to him the idea that these people were descendants of the Amazons.
Modern historiography no longer relies exclusively on textual and artistic material, but also on the vast archaeological evidence of over a thousand nomad graves from steppe territories, from the Black Sea all the way to Mongolia. Discoveries of battle-scarred female skeletons buried with their weapons (bows and arrows, quivers, and spears) prove that women warriors were not merely figments of imagination, but the product of the horse-centered warrior lifestyle of Scytho-Sarmatians. However, it is not known for certain whether these people were the inspiration for the Amazons of Greek mythology.
Mythology
According to Apollonius of Rhodes the Amazons were the offspring of Ares, the god of war, and the nymph Harmonia of the Akmonian Wood.Apollonius, Argonautica, 2.9 989–992
Early records refer to two events in which Amazons appeared prior to the Trojan War (before 1250 BCE). Within the epic context, Bellerophon, Greek hero, and grandfather of the brothers and Trojan War veterans Glaukos and Sarpedon, faced Amazons during his stay in Lycia, when King Iobates sent Bellerophon to fight the Amazons, hoping they would kill him, yet Bellerophon slew them all. The youthful King Priam of Troy fought on the side of the Phrygians, who were attacked by Amazons at the Sangarios River.
Amazons in the Trojan War
There are Amazon characters in Homer's Trojan War epic poem, the Iliad, one of the oldest surviving texts in Europe (around 8th century BCE). The now lost epic Aethiopis (probably by Arctinus of Miletus, 6th century BCE), like the Iliad and several other epics, is one of the works that in combination form the Trojan War Epic Cycle. In one of the few references to the text, an Amazon force under queen Penthesilea, who was of Thracian birth, came to join the ranks of the Trojans after Hector's death and initially put the Greeks under serious pressure. Only after the greatest effort and the help of the reinvigorated hero Achilles, the Greeks eventually triumphed. Penthesilea died fighting the mighty Achilles in single combat. Homer himself deemed the Amazon myths to be common knowledge all over Greece, which suggests that they had already been known for some time before him. He was also convinced that the Amazons lived not at its fringes, but somewhere in or around Lycia in Asia Minor - a place well within the Greek world.
Troy is mentioned in the Iliad as the place of Myrine's death. Later identified as an Amazon queen, according to Diodorus (1st century BCE), the Amazons under her rule invaded the territories of the Atlantians, defeated the army of the Atlantian city of Cerne, and razed the city to the ground.
In Scythia The Poet Bacchylides (6th century BCE) and the historian Herodotus (5th century BCE) located the Amazon homeland in Pontus at the southern shores of the Black Sea, and the capital Themiscyra at the banks of the Thermodon (modern Terme river), by the modern city of Terme. Herodotus also explains how it came to be that some Amazons would eventually be living in Scythia. A Greek fleet, sailing home upon defeating the Amazons in battle at the Thermodon river, included three ships crowded with Amazon prisoners. Once out at sea, the Amazon prisoners overwhelmed and killed the small crews of the prisoner ships and, despite not having even basic navigation skills, managed to escape and safely disembark at the Scythian shore. As soon as the Amazons had caught enough horses, they easily asserted themselves in the steppe in between the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea and, according to Herodotus, would eventually assimilate with the Scythians, whose descendants were the Sauromatae, the predecessors of the Sarmatians.
Amazon homeland Strabo (1st century BCE) visits and confirms the original homeland of the Amazons on the plains by the Thermodon river. However, long gone and not seen again during his lifetime, the Amazons had allegedly retreated into the mountains. Strabo, however, added that other authors, among them Metrodorus of Scepsis and Hypsicrates claim that after abandoning Themiscyra, the Amazons had chosen to resettle beyond the borders of the Gargareans, an all-male tribe native to the northern foothills of the Caucasian Mountains. The Amazons and Gargareans had for many generations met in secrecy once a year during two months in spring, in order to produce children. These encounters would take place in accordance with ancient tribal customs and collective offers of sacrifices. All females were retained by the Amazons themselves, and males were returned to the Gargareans. 5th century BCE poet Magnes sings of the bravery of the Lydians in a cavalry-battle against the Amazons.
Heracles myth
Hippolyte was an Amazon queen killed by Heracles, who had set out to obtain the queen's magic belt in a task he was to accomplish as one of the Labours of Heracles. Although neither side had intended to resort to lethal combat, a misunderstanding led to the fight. In the course of this, Heracles killed the queen and several other Amazons. In awe of the strong hero, the Amazons eventually handed the belt to Heracles. In another version, Heracles does not kill the queen, but exchanges her kidnapped sister Melanippe for the belt.
Theseus myth Queen Hippolyte was abducted by Theseus, who took her to Athens, where they got married and had a son, Hippolytus. In other versions, the kidnapped Amazon is called Antiope, the sister of Hippolyte. In revenge, the Amazons invaded Greece, plundered some cities along the coast of Attica, and besieged and occupied Athens. Hippolyte, who fought on the side of Athens, according to another account was killed during the final battle along with all of the Amazons.
Amazons and Dionysus