RPG Evolution: Whither the warrior women?

Picture by Unknown author - Universal Compendium [1], Public Domain, File:Urdu-begi-woman-superintendent-harem-camp-timurid-mughal-empire-art-muslim.jpg - Wikimedia Commons ​

Avery Bad Translation​

It all started with the Pirate King. To understand how we lost one of the most tactically fascinating military units in history, we have to look back to the seventeenth century and the infamous English pirate Henry Every—sometimes recorded as Avery or "Long Ben". When Every's pirate coalition captured the Ganj-i-Sawai, a massive treasure dhow belonging to the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb in 1695, the ensuing melee with warrior women collided with a profound cultural blind spot. Retelling of the pirate assault dismissed these formidable defenders as "harem women armed with swords," completely erasing a centuries-old institution of warrior women who formed the innermost line of defense for the wealthiest rulers on earth.

The reality of the zenana was not a stagnant playground, but a self-sufficient, highly cosmopolitan administrative city housing upwards of 5,000 noblewomen, officers, and attendants under the grand design of Emperor Akbar. Because the practice of purdah strictly forbade unrelated adult males from entering these private chambers, the physical safety of the palace fell entirely upon female administrators and guards. Since the Mughal emperors spent a massive portion of their leisure time within the zenana, these female warriors—known as the Urdubegis—were trusted with the ultimate responsibility: preservation of the sovereign's life.

No Veil, No Surrender​

To build an effective shield around the emperor, the Mughal court turned recruitment into an art of tactical alienation. Rather than pulling guards from local noble families who might harbor political ambitions or family loyalties, the Urdubegis were recruited from foreign and non-local groups, including Abyssinian (Habshi), Tatar, Turk, and Kashmiri communities. Crucially, they were selected from cultures that did not observe purdah, meaning they were accustomed to moving freely and unhindered by veils. This lack of restriction allowed them to act as highly visible travel escorts, managing the complex logistics and safety of the imperial family during outdoor excursions, hunts, and dangerous military campaigns.

From childhood, these women underwent rigorous training in martial arts. They were proficient in both long-range and close-quarters weaponry, utilizing heavy composite bows, lances, short daggers, and specialized swords (the talwar, bana, and khanda) with lethal precision. During the early reigns of Babur and Humayun, when the empire's borders were constantly shifting and the court lived in mobile military encampments, the Urdubegis kept guard right outside the royal tents, regulating entry and acting as the primary intelligence gatherers of the camp. They were so formidable that even the royal family feared their wrath; during a brutal war of succession, Prince Aurangzeb famously refused to visit his ailing father Shah Jahan because he was terrified the female guards of the zenana would execute him.

While court histories written by male scribes rarely named these warriors, the remarkable Humayun-nama—penned by Humayun's half-sister, Gulbadan Begum—names the legendary Bibi Fatima. Originally a royal wet-nurse, Fatima proved her absolute loyalty and tactical cunning so thoroughly that Emperor Akbar promoted her to the chief of the Urdubegis, placing her in charge of the entire inner security apparatus. Under Akbar's vision, this defense was organized into three highly disciplined, concentric rings to prevent any single point of failure. At the outermost perimeter stood the heavy Rajput cavalry and the specialized Ahadi gentlemen-at-arms. The middle tier was manned by watchful eunuchs who controlled the physical gates and administrative boundaries. But if an assassin bypassed both, they stepped into the innermost ring: the private chambers, where the Urdubegis patrolled with notched bows and unsheathed steel. To ensure absolute alertness and prevent internal conspiracies, the entire guard staff was rotated every twenty-four hours.

Purdah and Initiative​

The Urdubegis make incredible NPCs, patrons, or adversaries in a campaign. Because they were highly trained in martial arts, archery, and diplomacy, and were the only armed forces permitted inside the private royal quarters, they operated at the intersection of deadly combat and high-stakes espionage. Here are three adventure hooks to integrate them into your campaign:

• The Poisoned Zenana. An assassination attempt has been made on the Empress inside the forbidden palace grounds. Because no men are allowed within the inner walls, the Sultan's regular army and male investigators are prohibited from investigating the crime scene. The Captain of the Urdubegis secretly recruits the party to act as external operatives. While the Urdubegis lock down the palace and interrogate the court from the inside, the PCs must hunt down the rare beast used to harvest the poison in the outside world. The players discover the poison was bought by a rogue Urdubegi who has been compromised by a rival faction, forcing a tense, high-stakes confrontation within the palace barracks.
• The Diplomatic Shield. A high-ranking princess is traveling across dangerous, monster-infested borderlands to negotiate a crucial peace treaty. A detachment of Urdubegis is assigned as her primary vanguard and personal shield. The Urdubegi commander hires the adventuring party to serve as a decoy convoy or heavy frontline support to handle the larger, monstrous threats (like drakes or giants) while the warrior women manage close-quarters defense and political espionage. The "princess" traveling with the Urdubegis is actually a body double—one of the warrior women themselves—while the real princess is disguised as a low-ranking guard. The party must maintain the ruse even as assassination attempts grow increasingly lethal.
• Vault of the Fallen Dynasty. A magical coup has overthrown the central empire, and the capital has fallen into the hands of a treacherous vizier. The regular military has surrendered. The players are approached by a battered but unbroken squad of surviving Urdubegis. They have successfully smuggled the infant heir out of the palace, along with the keys to the royal treasury, but their commander was left behind. To secure the heir's safety and fund a rebellion, the party must infiltrate the occupied capital alongside the Urdubegis, utilizing the secret, hidden passages of the zenana that only the warrior women know exist.

Stranger Than Fiction​

History is the ultimate resource for any game master looking to inject cultural depth into their campaigns. The Urdubegis challenge assumptions and provide context for a society of warrior women, be it as backgrounds, allies, or foes. They'll be showing up in my campaign soon enough, searching for Every's buried treasure.

Your Turn: What cultures do you use as inspiration for your warrior women?

 

[bluecatreddog]

Why are all of the comments here: "yeah, well, tons of cultures had women warriors, you ain't special?"

No duh. The OP did not say "Urdubegis were the ONLY warrior woman in existence," it was merely showing an obscure, lesser known example that would be cool inspiration for a game.

"But they were slaves!"
So was a majority of people who existed in these empires. Do you have any Knights in your campaign? Then congrats, you are glorifying a corrupt class of warlords who would beat their peasants, steal land, and burn cities for their kings. Aside from the fact Urdugegis weren't sex slaves, why would the inclusion of a group of woman warriors who are NOT idealized (and reinforcing awful social structures) super-feminists be a bad thing? Isn't there are a lot of OSR games that go out of their way to NOT depict the adventurers as "lawful good" because they simply murdered the right people? That would make this a good case of moral ambiguity. These women are slaves, but they still wield swords. How do the PCs (ideally of multiple genders) react to this?
"But it only works if women warriors are rare!"
All of the plot ideas suggests focusing on their status as body guards, not primarily as women. Women soldiers aren't rare nowadays, but there's still multiple units in some armies mostly made up of women. Why couldn't there be one in fantasy feminism land? If it's okay to have mostly men knight orders, why not mostly/all women warriors? And if it was rare in your campaign, why would that be a bad thing? Aren't all campaigns about groups of highly rare and unique members of society? As long as sexism isn't glorified, I think a campaign that dealt with the inherent nastiness of traditional social structures, while still exploring and acknowledging the exceptions, would be an interesting one, assuming the players are down with it.
"The idea that women couldn't be warriors is a modern idea!"
Only in certain cultures. Greek and Rome, and most of Europe after it's conquering by the Romans, largely either did not have many women as warriors, or if they did, was largely through mythical, folkloric legends (i.e. Valkyre, Amazons). One culture that wasn't European where the idea of women being good at killing was rare? The Mughal Empire.

It really sucks to see an interesting article blasted to pieces for bizarre non-reasons. I could see myself using them in a game that was set in a middle-eastern/south asian setting that wasn't generic "arabiaaaaaan niiiiiiiights" nonsense, but probably not as protagonists. If anything, a troop of all women soldiers who were villains that's motivations WEREN'T "grr, kill all men" but instead in service of a highly rich dictator could make for some interesting political commentary. (Is it really "Feminism" when the warrior women own and use/possibly are slaves? No, very not.)

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Surprised Osprey Books has not yet had a volume on the Urdubegis.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

...is the website having a stroke...?

 

[Tonguez]

Why are all of the comments here: "yeah, well, tons of cultures had women warriors, you ain't special?"

No duh. The OP did not say "Urdubegis were the ONLY warrior woman in existence," it was merely showing an obscure, lesser known example that would be cool inspiration for a game.

"But they were slaves!"
So was a majority of people who existed in these empires. Do you have any Knights in your campaign? Then congrats, you are glorifying a corrupt class of warlords who would beat their peasants, steal land, and burn cities for their kings. Aside from the fact Urdugegis weren't sex slaves, why would the inclusion of a group of woman warriors who are NOT idealized (and reinforcing awful social structures) super-feminists be a bad thing? Isn't there are a lot of OSR games that go out of their way to NOT depict the adventurers as "lawful good" because they simply murdered the right people? That would make this a good case of moral ambiguity. These women are slaves, but they still wield swords. How do the PCs (ideally of multiple genders) react to this?
"But it only works if women warriors are rare!"
All of the plot ideas suggests focusing on their status as body guards, not primarily as women. Women soldiers aren't rare nowadays, but there's still multiple units in some armies mostly made up of women. Why couldn't there be one in fantasy feminism land? If it's okay to have mostly men knight orders, why not mostly/all women warriors? And if it was rare in your campaign, why would that be a bad thing? Aren't all campaigns about groups of highly rare and unique members of society? As long as sexism isn't glorified, I think a campaign that dealt with the inherent nastiness of traditional social structures, while still exploring and acknowledging the exceptions, would be an interesting one, assuming the players are down with it.
"The idea that women couldn't be warriors is a modern idea!"
Only in certain cultures. Greek and Rome, and most of Europe after it's conquering by the Romans, largely either did not have many women as warriors, or if they did, was largely through mythical, folkloric legends (i.e. Valkyre, Amazons). One culture that wasn't European where the idea of women being good at killing was rare? The Mughal Empire.

It really sucks to see an interesting article blasted to pieces for bizarre non-reasons. I could see myself using them in a game that was set in a middle-eastern/south asian setting that wasn't generic "arabiaaaaaan niiiiiiiights" nonsense, but probably not as protagonists. If anything, a troop of all women soldiers who were villains that's motivations WEREN'T "grr, kill all men" but instead in service of a highly rich dictator could make for some interesting political commentary. (Is it really "Feminism" when the warrior women own and use/possibly are slaves? No, very not.)

Because it's not framed as an interesting examination of "women in a middle-eastern/south asian setting that wasn't generic "arabiaaaaaan niiiiiiiights" nonsense", instead it's these are an for women warriors in your campaign, how do you justify women warriors?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Because it's not framed as an interesting examination of "women in a middle-eastern/south asian setting that wasn't generic "arabiaaaaaan niiiiiiiights" nonsense", instead it's these are an for women warriors in your campaign, how do you justify women warriors?

Irrespective of history, "this setting does not differentiate based on gender" is the D&D default. So the question really should be the other way round.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Because it's not framed as an interesting examination of "women in a middle-eastern/south asian setting that wasn't generic "arabiaaaaaan niiiiiiiights" nonsense", instead it's these are an for women warriors in your campaign, how do you justify women warriors?

To be fair to the OP, they didn't ask how we justified women warriors, they asked what we use as inspiration. And it kinda was an interesting examination of an example of women in a Middle Eastern/South Asian setting.

Beyond the actual historical synopsis, the only thing OP said was:
"History is the ultimate resource for any game master looking to inject cultural depth into their campaigns. The Urdubegis challenge assumptions and provide context for a society of warrior women, be it as backgrounds, allies, or foes. They'll be showing up in my campaign soon enough, searching for Every's buried treasure.
Your Turn: What cultures do you use as inspiration for your warrior women?"

So the whole of the thing is roughly 'here's this thing I've just discovered and am really excited about. I'll be using it in my game. What do you think?' And honestly, if OP didn't have a picture up, I would have assume it was a young adult regurgitating their latest History course that really inspired them, and wished them well on it. Entire gaming franchises have been built on roughly that setup.

Irrespective of history, "this setting does not differentiate based on gender" is the D&D default. So the question really sould be the other way round.

I think that's why this might have hit a nerve. Given that TTRPGs have come a long way on the whole 'boys clubhouse' mentality, just dropping this example here with an otherwise relatively neutral 'what do you use as inspiration?' somehow comes off as confrontational. It'd perhaps have been good to set up the article with an intro paragraph about how the game has come a long way, buy maybe there is still an opportunity to mine history for inspiration and here's an example I (the OP) would like to highlight, etc.

 

[Maxperson]

Only in certain cultures. Greek and Rome, and most of Europe after it's conquering by the Romans, largely either did not have many women as warriors, or if they did, was largely through mythical, folkloric legends (i.e. Valkyre, Amazons). One culture that wasn't European where the idea of women being good at killing was rare? The Mughal Empire.

While not widely known, this was an empire that had no wizards or witches. Interestingly, the word evolved over time to the more modern usage, muggle.

 

[Minion X]

"But they were slaves!"

I cannot recall anyone glorifying the Janissaries either (though I don't read Turkish), so at least it is not a question of gender discrimination.

And I would be surprised if the subjects of the Mughal Empire thought of the Urdubegis as anything but a exception to social norms. After all, they were not an organic development, like German shieldmaidens or Scythian warrior women, but rather a warrior corps created at the orders of the emperor for a specific purpose, similar to the Mino of the Dahomey.

 

[talien]

So the whole of the thing is roughly 'here's this thing I've just discovered and am really excited about. I'll be using it in my game. What do you think?' And honestly, if OP didn't have a picture up, I would have assume it was a young adult regurgitating their latest History course that really inspired them, and wished them well on it. Entire gaming franchises have been built on roughly that setup.

I think that's why this might have hit a nerve. Given that TTRPGs have come a long way on the whole 'boys clubhouse' mentality, just dropping this example here with an otherwise relatively neutral 'what do you use as inspiration?' somehow comes off as confrontational. It'd perhaps have been good to set up the article with an intro paragraph about how the game has come a long way, buy maybe there is still an opportunity to mine history for inspiration and here's an example I (the OP) would like to highlight, etc.

Nice to meet you Mr...uh "the Duck". I've been writing for EN World for about a decade: RPG Evolution

You're not wrong though, in that my original goal was to start with Every's Pirate King tale outrageously mentioning that a captain 1) "armed his harem girls because he was a coward" > 2) "actually the Mughal Empire was run by amazing women" > 3) "not only that, they had a highly trained warriors". I screwed up in the timing (you'll see first comment on this article mentioning the time stamp being wrong) and so the second article is being published out of order. It will be up Monday and will hopefully give a bit more context.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Nice to meet you Mr...uh "the Duck". I've been writing for EN World for about a decade: RPG Evolution

Yes, I know who you are. By having a picture up, I just meant 'if I discovered the same text knowing nothing about who wrote it.' And to be clear, I said young adult simply because that's who tend to get fervently excited about new bits of knowledge.https://www.enworld.org/ewr-porta/categories/rpg-evolution.89/

You're not wrong though, in that my original goal was to start with Every's Pirate King tale outrageously mentioning that a captain 1) "armed his harem girls because he was a coward" > 2) "actually the Mughal Empire was run by amazing women" > 3) "not only that, they had a highly trained warriors". I screwed up in the timing (you'll see first comment on this article mentioning the time stamp being wrong) and so the second article is being published out of order. It will be up Monday and will hopefully give a bit more context.

Any kind of intro would have helped. But I think it would have been best if it was on this article, not by this being the second of two articles and the other one clarifying what they were about. Plenty of times, only one thread really takes off, and then someone will stumble upon only the second one. And if it were this one, perhaps they would have the same reaction as seems to have happened for some here.