Summary

In Greek myth, Amazons were fierce female warriors, arch-enemies of the Greeks, dwelling around and beyond the Black Sea. Depicted in ancient literature and art as the “equals of men,” Amazons were as brave and skilled in combat as male warriors. Glorying in riding horses, hunting, warfare, and sexual independence, Amazons were deemed formidable adversaries of the greatest Greek heroes of myth. Bellerophon battled Amazons, and Heracles, Theseus, and Achilles each proved their valour by defeating powerful Amazon queens—Hippolyte, Antiope, and Penthesilea. Amazons and Amazonomachies (battle scenes) were extremely popular in Greek art, in public spaces and on privately owned pottery. In the myths and artistic representations, Amazons were consistently portrayed as courageous, athletic, attractive, and heroic, running towards danger, and fighting and dying valiantly in battle. Amazons were first described in Homer’s Iliad as antianeirai, which can be translated as “men’s equals.” Many classical scholars consider Amazons to be purely fictional figures with no basis in reality, invented by Greek men to serve as “anti-women” and/or to symbolize Persians. Notably, ancient authors such as Herodotus (4.110–117), Plato (Laws 7.804–814), and Strabo (11.5.1) associated the Amazons of myth with real, contemporary female horsewomen-archer nomads of “Scythia” (Eurasia). Modern archaeological excavations of ancient burials of armed women, identified by bioarchaeology and DNA, from the Black Sea to Central Asia, now suggest that nomadic horsewomen-archers of the steppes influenced some ancient Greek ideas and images of Amazons (Amazons, Wiley Encyclopedia of Ancient History).