more evidence of warrior women!

[Aaron2]

I was reading an article about the Muslim's early wars against the Byzantines. At the battle of Yarmuk (in 636), the leader Abu Ubeida told the Arab women (part of the army's camp) to use tentpoles and stones to discourage any of the male soldiers from fleeing the battle. Later in the battle (which lasted four days), he actually commits the women into the fight to stiffen the men's resistance by example. Neither of these events were atypical of that period.


Aaron

 

[tarchon]

Case in point, Discovery Channel ran a special on Nefertiti (sp?) a while back. They uncovered a chamber with three mummies. One mummy was female, had a wig on, and had double pierced ears. She was buried with a younger male and old woman. The archeologists and historians involved were convinced by these clues that it was Nefertiti because the wig came from the same era as she lived (wonder how common that was in ancient egypt), Nefertiti was often seen depicted with double pierced ears (wonder how common that was in ancient egypt), and Nefertiti had a mother in law and a brother that she was close to.

I mean come on! This is NOT a case for this is Nefertiti, its a case of this could possibly be her. But the show was shot and narrated as if it WAS her, no doubt about it. My opinion of Discovery dropped ten notches that day.

The Discovery Channel is an entertainment medium. It's not representative of the way actual science is done. If they did programs that accurately depicted the way archaeology really works, it would be renamed the Snooze Channel.

 

[jasper]

The Discovery Channel is an entertainment medium. It's not representative of the way actual science is done. If they did programs that accurately depicted the way archaeology really works, it would be renamed the Snooze Channel.

The what would we call ABC?

 

[Zander]

Indirectly - it most likely indicated that she was of high social status by birth, and that seems to be true of most instances of fightin' femmes.

I agree, but as you say, it's not true of all fighting women. Joan of Arc came from a very humble background.

Of course in many other cultures there are singular historical and legendary accounts of it, Boudicca, Sichelgaita of Salerno, Mu Lan, and Camilla the Volscian. Frequently the idea is heavily romanticized I've found.

Don't forget al Kahina, the 7th century AD warrior-queen of the Berbers.

Some samurai women in Japan were trained in the use of the yari and the bow. To this day, archery is considered an equally male and female pursuit in Japan. AFAIK Japanese women were never committed to the battlefield though.

 

[Gellion]

We do know quite a bit about the past, but we also "know" stuff based on assumptions that quite often turn out to be completely wrong. As an amateur student of history, it's amazing to me to see, in my lifetime, complete shifts in what we believed about certain ancient cultures, for instance. In other words, reapersaurus and Amos_Sten: I think you're both right!

Ya na kadishtu nilgh'ri stell'bsna Nyogtha,
K'yarnak phlegethor l'ebumna syha'h n'ghft,
Ya hai kadishtu ep r'luh-eeh Nyogtha eeh,
S'uhn-ngh athg li'hee orr'e syha'h.

 

[barsoomcore]

Some samurai women in Japan were trained in the use of the yari and the bow. To this day, archery is considered an equally male and female pursuit in Japan. AFAIK Japanese women were never committed to the battlefield though.

Actually, there are a number of well-known Japanese women who took part in battles or fought notable contests with male samurai. The quintessential woman's weapon in Japan is the naginata, something like a European glaive -- in the tradition I studied, after you completed the first round of katana forms you then moved either to the bo staff if you were a man, or the naginata if you were a woman.

It's interesting that the school evolved a separate tradition for each gender -- it implies that both were reasonably common. When that tradition evolved I can't say but certainly training women in the naginata goes back to medieval times in Japan. There's any number of illustrations and stories dating to those times.

As Zander says, archery is taken up by pretty much equal numbers of men and women (if anything, women outnumber men these days).

I recall a National Geographic article on the Sudan recently that spent some time among a group of people living in the southern part of that country where the women were substantially larger and stronger than the men -- made me wonder to what degree the gender-based size distinctions in homo sapiens is "natural" -- have we been unconsciously selecting for smaller women?

Of course females are smaller amongst all primates that I'm aware of, and indeed among most mammals, but you know, I wonder.

 

[Stormrunner]

There's a Maori legend about a village which was being terrorozed and devoured by a pair of flying-head monsters (similar to vargouilles or penanggalan) who were magically invulnerable to the men's weapons. Then a canoe appears from the southwest, filled with "strong women". Their leader wields a magic throwing weapon that "cuts with a noise like thunder" and returns to her hand. She knocks the heads out of the sky and straddles them, which negates their masculine magic with the female power of her menstrual blood, enabling them to be killed.

Interestingly, the TV show Xena, while nominally set in ancient Greece, is filmed in New Zealand, and features an Amazon wielding a magic throwing weapon that returns to her hand...
Is there a connection? I don't know - but it wouldn't surprise me. The weapon in the legend is never well described - we only know that it throws and returns, and has a sharp edge. Historically, if you look southwest from New Zealand you're looking towards Australia. Gee, an Aussie with a returning thrown weapon - wonder what it could be?

 

[tarchon]

I recall a National Geographic article on the Sudan recently that spent some time among a group of people living in the southern part of that country where the women were substantially larger and stronger than the men -- made me wonder to what degree the gender-based size distinctions in homo sapiens is "natural" -- have we been unconsciously selecting for smaller women?

Of course females are smaller amongst all primates that I'm aware of, and indeed among most mammals, but you know, I wonder.

Sexual dimorphism in body size is considered to be strongly related to mating patterns in a species. Usually, the more monogamously oriented species (like swans) tend to have low dimorphism while species like lions and gorillas with a more harem-like social structure tend to have very high dimorphism, apparently due to competition between males. Human body mass ratios fall somewhere between the extremes, which has given rise to much speculation about the "natural" social structure of <i>H. sapiens</i> over the years. In the few cases among mammals where females tend to be larger, the social structure tends to be dominated by competing females, like with spotted hyenas.

 

[William Ronald]

I seem to recall a Discovery channel special about a female gladiator whose burial site, dating back to the 1st century C.E., was found in London. The gladiatrix also had some religious items associated with the cult of Isis buried with here.

Many of the women warriors recorded by history were exceptions in their cultures and often members of an elite or ruling class. However, there were probably many times when women of humbler origin had to fight. In the desperate times after Rome evacuated its armies from Britain, it is not too surprising to find a woman warrior. (The Welsh Triads names three warrior women.)

Joshua is correct in that what we often assumed to be true does not always remain so. In one instance that I recall reading about, the Egyptians claimed victory over the Hittites at Kadesh and it was accepted as truth by Egyptologists. Further studies showed that the victory was at best a draw, if not a defeat. (It is very late in my time zone, so if someone knows the details, post them.)

 

[green slime]

However we were not discussing "truth" the original comment was

"As a general comment, it will never cease to amaze me how people believe that we know what actually happened historically, much less pre-historically.

We know jack, and what we do know is skewed by who wrote/translated what we've read."

No where in this was "truth" mentioned. Yes we may not know exactly how many people died in an event but we atleast know the event happened and have a rough guess at why and how many did die. Which is a long way from the we know nothing about history.

Yes there are differences in the wriiten records of the holocaust but look again at my post on dealing with historical bias and think through reasons why both sides would have different figures for the number killed.

If history is too confusing something for people lets try something else. Do we know everything there is to know about physics? Almost certainly not but would you find it acceptable to claim that we know nothing? It would seem to me that such a claim is over simplifying matters, not a good idea when you are trying to prove your knowledge.

Because certain myths are perpetuated. How many times have you read "6 million Jews were gassed to death"? This is common "fact". Something you may see in any newspaper article on the subject.

The majority of deaths in the concentration camps were of Cholera, Dysentry, TBC, and similar, due to truly inhumane treatment, in unsanitary conditions. Yet the myth persists, and is permitted to persist. Yes, people were gassed, but not 6 million.

And this is just for events 60 years ago.

Are you telling me that we know the cause-and-effect chain leading to any major event? To the actual reasons behind decisions? Simply stating that an event has occured is not good enough for Historians. We strive to explain why events occur.

The further back in history we go, we become even uncertain as to whether cerain events have even occured. Did X really met Y? Where they really lovers? Was it really the cause of war Z?

I suggest that you go pick a history book from the early twentieth century and examine what is said there, about certain events and their causes, and then read a more modern text on the same subject.

Histories depend very much on the records of those who were closer in time to the events, yet in many cases these can be several hundreds of years after the events they are describing. You see the problem? Certain inventions, certain events, certain details, are inevitably wrong. And when you cannot ascertain the absolute truth, speculation leaps in through the window, all to often.

Reapersaurus did not say "We now nothing about history". He stated, rather poorly perhaps, that we think we know alot more than we in actual fact have confirmation for/proof of. The question is: How much of the information we have can we trust? How much of the information we have do we consider reliable?

Physics is something completely different, because we rely purely on empirical evidence, not on local descriptions of what occured 500 years prior. It is repeatable. Modern physics is not thrown out the window every time a new theory is brought forth.

The question is even more apparent if you choose an area in which there is lots of controversy. Examine texts by a variety of authors on the development of Homonids. You will find a great number of different theories and ideas as to how we evolved. Controversy and speculation are an important part of science, but in the study of history, we are never going to exclude it. Because we examine not only what, but why and how. That is what is interesting, and that is what is so hard to pin down.

Many historical records we rely on a single author, who lived many years after event, as a source of the information. This is hardly a satisfactory situation?