male speaker: good afternoon,and welcome to talks at google in cambridge,massachusetts to most of the people here inthe room, and to everyone joining us via live stream. today, it's my enormous pleasureto introduce adrienne mayor.
mens snake proof hunting boots, professor mayor is here todiscuss her landmark new book "amazons: lives andlegends of warrior women across the ancient world." this is the first comprehensiveaccount of warrior women
in myth and history,across the ancient world, from the mediterranean seato the great wall of china. reading it, i'm notsure which is more thrilling the stories ofthe women she makes come alive for us, or the scholarlyrigor she brings to her work. this is really anexceptional book, please buy it and read it. professor mayor is anindependent folklorist slash historian of science whoinvestigates natural knowledge
contained in pre-scientificmyths and oral traditions. her research looks atthe ancient folk science precursors, alternatives,and parallels to modern scientific methods. she is research scholar,classics and history and philosophy ofscience at stanford. stanford is lucky tohave her on faculty, and we are fortunate tohave her here with us today. please join me inwelcoming adrienne mayor.
adrienne mayor: thank you. thank you. i'm really honored to be invitedto present my research here at google, and iwant to thank women at google forsponsoring my talk, and everyone else who mademy visit possible today. well, amazons seem to beeverywhere these days. first, there was "xena, warriorprincess," then the animated films "mulan," "brave,""the hunger games," atalanta
in the recent herculesfilm, "the shield maidens and the vikings,"the powerful women in game of thrones, and now marvelcomics has actually introduced a female thor wargoddess, and wonder woman is actually poisedto make a comeback. i hear that she's going tohave our own movie in 2017. and meanwhile,women of all ages, we've been talking aboutthis earlier today, are taking up bows and arrowsin unprecedented numbers,
and horse women archers,calling themselves amazons, are competing around the world. these are a few of them, youcould actually take the lessons from these women tolearn to do this. modern amazons. at the same time, thenews from the middle east is filled with images ofan estimated 10,000 women who are serving in thekurdistan peshmerga fighting islamic state in syria.
and they're fightingbecause their very lives depend on victory. so today, we're surroundedby images of warrior women. and some 2,500 yearsago, the greeks also surrounded themselves withstories and images of amazons. the greeks described amazonsas the equals of men, independent, fearless,foreign horse women who gloried inhunting and warfare. and these are just someexamples of some amazon
images from greek art. these are vases fromabout 550 to 450 bc. and who were the ancientamazons in greek mythology? they were fierce warriorwomen of exotic lands, they weren't greek. they were as courageousand as skilled in battle as themightiest greek heroes. amazons played a major rolein the legendary trojan war, and every great greek championfrom heracles, to theseus,
and achilles, they allhad to prove their courage by killing a formidableamazon queen. greek historians never doubtedthat amazons had really existed in theremote misty past. and many greek writersreported that women living the lives of amazonsstill dwelled in the lands around the black seaand beyond the black sea in the immense territorythe greeks called scythia. historians and archaeologistsstill use that word.
it's a blanket term, andi'll be using it today. in classicalantiquity, amazons were on view everywhereyou looked in athens and other cities in greece. they were featured inmonumental public sculptures, in mosaics, and in frescoeson public buildings. amazons wearing patternedtrousers and boots, riding horses, shootingbows, hurling spears, swinging battle axes, anddying heroically in battle
were wildly popular subjectsin greek vase paintings. more than 130 personalnames of amazons still survive from antiquity. they are on statuebases, they're labels on ancient vases, andthey are in many ancient texts. every greek man,woman, and child knew exciting amazontales by heart. and little greekgirls, we now know, even played with amazon dolls.
these are just two from thecollection in the louvre. they have-- some ofthem have movable arms and legs like barbie dolls. they could be dressedin different costumes, and these were foundin little girls' graves from classical greece. so were amazons real? or were bold,warlike women nothing but fantasy figuresinvented by the greeks?
were they simply theancient ancestors of wonder woman andkatniss everdeen? do we have to say theexhilarating world of amazons was just an elaboratefiction brought to life by the greekstorytelling imagination? until now, that is what modernhistorians had been assuming. but now, thanks to spectacularrecent archaeological discoveries across whatwas once ancient scythia, we have overwhelmingproof that women
fitting the descriptionsof amazons in greek art and literature really did exist. so there werehistorical counterparts to the mythical amazons. these women weremembers of a network of diverse, butculturally related nomadic tribes ofeurasia and beyond. each of those tribesnow, of course, they all have their own names, they havetheir own dialects, languages,
and their own histories, butthey became known to the greeks as scythians. and they-- theircultures were centered around archeryand riding horses. they were nomads. as nomads, the scythiansleft no written histories, so we have to relyon their neighbors, and their descendants,and on archaeology. long before modernarchaeologists
began excavating the gravesof real warrior women, the greek writers hadalready identified amazons as scythians. these warlike tribes haveno cities, no fixed abodes, wrote one ancientgreek historian, they live free and unconquered,and they are so savage, that even the women takepart in war, he wrote. amazons, remarked others, wereas courageous and as fearsome as their scythian husbands.
the nomad women werefirst described in detail by greeks in about 470 bc bythe greek historian herodotus. he, and later authors,accurately described the scythian lifestyleand preserved details of their burialsin mounds called kurgans on the steppes. and my talk today is goingto focus on the evidence from ancient greek artand modern archaeology. this is a scythian kurgan.
on the left, that'swhat they look like. they're very large,very complex burials. that one wasexcavated last year. and you can see thetypical finds inside. among these scythiannomads, girls learned to ride and handlebows and spears along with their brothers. they knew how todefend themselves. they knew how tohunt, and they knew
how to fight just like the men. the lives of those toughnomadic girls and women were so very different fromthe lives of greek women in antiquity. in greece, women and girlswere confined indoors to weave and mind children. and that differencein the two cultures made a deep impressionon the greeks. rumors and descriptions of thesehorse riding men and women,
much feared fortheir deadly arrows and their expandingconquests across eurasia, began to filter back to greece,perhaps in the bronze age, and the greeks firstbegan to directly contact these people in theseventh century bc. and that's when thegreek cities began to establish trading coloniesaround the coast of the black sea. and it's easy tounderstand then,
how genuine knowledgemixed with garbled details, intriguing travelers reports,curiosity, imagination, and a lot of speculation tofill in the gaps, fired up the greek imaginationand lead to an outpouring of exciting stories andvivid pictures of amazons. we now know aboutthese people because of archaeological excavationsof more than 1,000 ancient scythian graves fromthe ukraine, southern russia, the caucasus region,and central asia.
now before the adventof dna testing, it used to be taken forgranted that any time you find human remainsburied with weapons, it was assumed theybelong to a male warrior. and that was just taken forgranted, that was routine. but scientificanalysis is calling all of those assumptionsinto question, and there have been somespectacular reversals of previous discoveriesannounced as male warriors.
i'll just give a few examples. in the 1960s, in ancientthrace, that's now bulgaria. two grave mounds fromthe fourth century bc, that's the time when thegreeks were telling stories about amazons, those moundswere discovered in the '60s. and each mound hadmany weapons, armor, they were filled withgold and silver artifacts, and richly equipped horses. a pair of human skeletons layinside each of those mounds,
and these remains were announcedas too powerful male warriors who were buriedwith their wives. 50 years later, in 2010, dnatests were finally carried out, and the resultsrevealed that all four of the skeletons in thosetwo mounds belonged to women. another stunning discoveryof a warrior woman was reported just last month. i think it's in this month'sissue of archaeology magazine. since the 1970s, when themagnificent tomb of alexander
the great's father, philip ii,was excavated in macedonia, archaeologists havewondered about the identity of the mysterious second person,another person's remains, buried in other goldencasket next to philip's. you see the two caskets here. a pair of gildedbronze greaves-- greaves, leg armor, shin guards,are shown on the right there. and there was afabulous golden quiver, you see the golden quiver on thelower left, along with arrows,
and parts of a bow. those weapons posed a puzzleto the archaeologists, because those weaponsare not greek weapons, they're not macedonian weapons. those are typicalscythian weapons like those used by theamazons in greek art. and even more curious, if youtake a look at those greaves, the shin guards,they're mismatched. they're not the same size.
well, scientific analysisof those mystery bones was just taken out,taken a few weeks ago, and the analysisrevealed surprising news. the scythian bow and the quiverand those mismatched leg armor, they belonged to a woman. she was about 32 whenshe died in 336 bc. her bones showed the rigorsof constant horseback riding. one of her legs had brokenand had healed crookedly, leaving her with a--probably with a limp,
and the unevengreaves had obviously been custom-made for her. now, who was thisreal life amazon buried in the royal macedoniantomb with the king of macedon? theories about her identityare being debated as we speak. we can go into that laterif you have questions. now that dna analysis isavailable, it's very expensive, but it is available now, wehave more than 300 graves of battle scarred womenburied with their weapons,
and more being found every year. and archaeologistsare now going back to previouslydiscovered male warriors to see whether thosemight be women. the biggest concentrationof warrior women's burials are in bulgaria, romania,ukraine, southern russia, the caucasus, andkazakhstan, the very places that were identified asprime amazon territory by the ancient greeks.
in the scythian kurgans,warrior women were buried. they could be buried alone,along with other warrior women, or with male warriors, theywere always buried as equals. archaeology shows thatthe scythian women were laid to rest with thesame honors as the men. there was evidence oflarge funeral feasts by the mourners, lotsof sacrificed horses, the women like the men wereburied with tools, weapons, golden treasures, personalkits for smoking hemp,
and food for the afterlife, acup of fermented mare's milk, and a chunk ofhorse meat impaled by an iron knife ona wooden platter. bioarchaeology and dna canreveal the sex, the health, the age at death with morethan 90% accuracy now. the dna results tell usthat a substantial number, about 25 to nearly40% of scythian women were active warrior womenburied with their weapons when they died.
many of those armedwomen had war injuries like the male warriors. the typical grave goodsof the women warriors in the heart of ancientamazon territory included iron spears, massivearmored belts, leather and gold quivers filledwith bronze arrows, bronze swords,battle axes, shields, necklaces of beadsand animals claws, gold earrings,and sometimes even
clothing of wool,leather, fur, silk, and hemp has been preserved. the youngest girlwarrior ever found here she is-- oh, no, this is the16-year-old-- i don't have a picture of the youngestgirl warrior ever found was about 10. this one was 16. the youngest ever foundwas 10 when she died, and she was buried in iron armorwith two spearheads, evidence
that young children, boys andgirls, were trained for battle. also nearby, thiswas in the ukraine nearby, anotherkurgan, or grave mound, held the remains ofthree young girls. they were aged 10 to15, and their arsenal included heavy cavalry items,scaled armor, helmets, spears, shields, quivers full of arrows. and those girls also ownedtools, gold necklaces, and bronze mirrors.
three of the most ancient,the earliest amazon graves, were found in thesouthern caucasus region, a landstrongly associated with amazons in antiquity. the women'sskeletons were buried by their companions about3,000 years ago in 900 bc. one woman was about30 when she died, she was interred ina sitting position with her bronze sword acrossher knees, and a dagger
and a spear at her feet. there's the originalreport on the left there. the jawbone of her horseand her shield were nearby. the left side of her skullhas a wound from a battle axe that had begun toheal before she died. the second woman in that kurganhad an arrowhead embedded in her skull, andthe third woman wore a necklace oflion or leopard claws. the scientificstudies of skeletons
are yielding some verystriking results and details. some women's legs were bowedfrom a lifetime on horseback. these were nomads, who traveledgreat distances by horse. they suffered arthritis, theyhad broken bones, probably from constant riding and falls. some women's handbones actually reveal evidence of repeatedheavy use of a bow. typical battle wounds ofwomen buried with weapons include ribs slashed by swords,arrowheads embedded in bones,
and skulls puncturedby pointed battle axes. these are some examples. pointed battle axesare typical weapons of amazons in greekvase paintings. by careful analysisof the bones, bioarchaeologistscan often determine the direction of anopponent's attack. they can tell whetherthe blows occurred while someone was fighting faceto face, on foot on the ground,
or on horseback, whetherthey were in motion when the blow was delivered,and whether or not they tried to deflect the blow. most combat injuries ofthe women and the men are on the left side, indicatingthat their adversaries were right handed. all of thisarchaeological evidence points to a levelof gender equality unheard of amongthe ancient greeks.
so it's no wonder they werefascinated and horrified by the barbariansat the steppes. their myths, we can seethem as a kind of exciting what if story, pittingthese daunting strong women against the greek'smightiest heroes. here's achillesfighting and killing penthesilea on thebattlefield at troy. and on the right isheracles killing hippolyta. he looks a little nervousthere in that picture.
these images were incrediblypopular in antiquity, second only topictures of heracles. unlike the restricted livesof greek girls and women that i explainedbefore, being an amazon was an option forwomen on the steppes why? because of a series ofunique extremely successful scythian technologiesand practices, innovations perfectly suitedto their time and place.
the scythian way oflife, with opportunities for women unheard ofin ancient cultures, other ancient cultures,ensure that mounted nomad cultureflourished and dominated on the steppes sweeping overa millennium from eurasia to china from about700 bc to ad 500. in scythia, younggirls were raised to ride horses and shootbows and arrows, just like their little brothers.
and that made perfectsense in a nomadic culture. think about it. small groups or bands, isolatedon the harsh dangerous steppes, they're always onthe move, they're always facing attackfrom hostile enemies and other tribes. everyone, male andfemale, was a stakeholder. young and old, maleand female, they're all expected tocontribute, all expected
to take part in defenseand raids and hunting. on the plane from san franciscoyesterday, it occurred to me that scythian way of lifemight be of special interest to google, and maybesome of you will discern some parallels betweentheir world and your world. the scythians forged anextraordinary combination of sophisticated technologiesand unconventional tactics. they were based on agility,flexibility, speed, innovation, shared capacity, sharedknowledge, equality,
individual merit, alsocooperation, teamwork, within an extensive networkof loosely related groups of rivals as wellas potential allies. on the steppes, tribes waxedand waned in size and power. groups were free to splitoff from the main unit and establish newalliances on their own. small bands ofsurvivors or rebels might be absorbedinto larger tribes or ally with another tribe.
the stakes on the steppeswere extremely high. some tribes were decimated,some vanished forever, we have no trace them. alliances alternatedwith hostilities, former adversaries,however, sometimes united to pursue largergoals of conquest, control over territory,resources, trade. tribes often coalescedto meet and defeat powerful invading enemies.
the scythians united, forexample, in the sixth century bc to defeat the hugepersian army that was led by darius thefirst, and the persian king, cyrus the great,actually lost his life fighting the scythiansbeyond the caspian sea. and they were led by thewarrior queen, tomyris. two centuries later, evenalexander the great's army failed to subdue thescythians and the step nomads of inner asia.
the eastern scythians heldthe upper hand over china for several centuries. i think some stepnomads innovations might have had enough magnitudeto qualify as moonshots. do you still usethat word, moonshots? the first great leap forward wasthe domestication of the horse. the scythians, or theirancestors-- the ancestors of the scythians-- were thefirst people to ride horses. first they domesticated it,then they learned to ride them.
horses provided food,drink, clothing, agility in battle, speed, andendurance over vast distances. and riding horses requiredthe invention of trousers. essential tailoredaction wear that zoomed to success 3,000 years ago. think about it, thefirst tailored clothing. it's interesting that theancient greeks actually credited the amazons with bothof those nomad discoveries. they said that amazonswere the first ride
horses and the firstto wear trousers. another awesome newtechnology struck terror into the heartsof their enemies. the nomads of thesteppes perfected the small but powerfulre-curve scythian bow. scythian archers were fearedfor their terrific aim, and their ability to shootarrows at incredible speeds. and then they even went on toconcoct sophisticated and nasty arrow poisons by mixingviper venom with pathogens
so that you didn't evenhave to have good aim, just a scratch would kill the enemy. the parthian shot, thefeet of twisting backwards to shoot arrows asone gallops away, was another notoriousscythian skill. and they also useda floating anchor, which is an innovation--or not an innovation-- but is known nowadaysand used by people like this modern amazonof instinctive archery.
you don't have afixed anchor point, you actually useinstinctive aim. so you have, it soundslike an oxymoron, but they have a floating anchor. and we see that in thevase paintings of amazons. by now it might be obviousthat the crucial change with exponential advantagesfor the scythians was the combination ofthe horse and the bow. the horse combinedarchery, that was
the great equalizer forwomen on the steppes. mounted archery was the catalystfor women's full participation in hunting and warfare andall those other activities. astride a horse witha bow and arrows, a woman could be just as fastand just as deadly as a man. so among the scythians, womencould achieve the same skill sets as the men, and becomeoutstanding riders, hunters, and warriors, and riseto leadership positions. according to the ancientgreek historians,
scythian women typicallyformed ad hoc bands. and these bands could eitherbe all women, or men and women, and they formed thesebands for adventure, for hunting, and war campaigns. we have the names ofhistorical scythian women who rose to leadership roles,and devised strategies, and commanded armies. i just mentionedtomyris was one of them. as the ancient greeksreported, and as archaeology
seems to confirm,young women and girls served as the active dutywarriors and raiders, while older women withchildren could choose to continue that marshallifestyle or not, depending on what theywished in the circumstances. but in emergencies,because everyone had been trainedto same, everyone was capable of ridingout to meet the enemy. so whether by choice, orcompelled by circumstances,
ordinary women of scythiacould be hunters and warriors. in other words,these foreign women could behave just likeancient greek men, glorying in physicalstrength and freedom, roaming at willoutside, choosing your own sexualpartners, chasing game, and killing enemies. so archaeology,as i mentioned, is shedding new light on theancient greek narratives
and the artisticrepresentations of amazons, showing how some detailsin ancient greek literature and art that were oncedismissed as fantasy or just overlookedaltogether, now turn out to be accuraterepresentations of step nomad's customs and their life. and the step nomads werethe historical counterparts of the mythic amazons. we're now learning howmuch the greeks actually
knew, how much they gotright, maybe sometimes they were guessing, butthey knew a lot about real warriorwomen of scythia, and scythian technologiesand practices. and i think i have timefor a few examples. as the greeks learned moreand more about scythians, they revised theirportrayals of amazons, adding realistic details inwritten accounts and art. in the fifth century bc,for example, herodotus,
i've already mentionedthe greek historian, reported that the scythiansenjoyed the intoxicating smoke from burning hemp. as i mentioned earlier, personalhemp smoking hits like this one are among the grave goodsof scythian men and women buried in kurgans. amazon clothing andweapons are some of the most striking changesfor accuracy in greek art. the earliest images of amazonsappeared on vase paintings
about 2,500 years ago. and those earliest most ancientscenes show the women dressed and armed, or in the custom ofheroic nudity, as it's called, they were dressed likegreek hoplite warriors. they're wearing greekhelmets, armor, round shields, and they're fightingon foot with swords. the greeks just portrayedthem as counterparts of their own heroes. but soon, as they gotmore and more information
about the scythians,the greek artists began showing the foreignamazons with scythian style clothing and weapons, andthey show them on horseback. and we can even see two typesof horses on the vase paintings. some amazons ridetall, mean horses. akhal teke is the namenow for those horses, they were bred forspeed in the desert. and they also rode smallsturdy steppe ponies. both of those typesof horses correspond
to the two types of horses thatare found in scythian graves. some of them areactually mummified by the permafrostand dry conditions, as in these examples. scythian riders rode bareback. they didn't have stirrups. they had light, orno reins at all. they guided their horses withtheir thighs, knees, and feet, and voice commands.
and many greekvases and sculptures depict amazons writingbarefooted with heel and ankle guards against chafing. and this detailed vasepainting shows an amazon tying on ankle guards or spurs. greek artists began to equipthe amazons with real scythian weapons, just like thosefound in scythian burials. amazons were nowshown as archers, and they were outfitted withdistinctive scythian style
re-curve bows anddecorated quivers with flaps that hung upon belts at their waist instead of at the backof their shoulders. and here's another veryinteresting realistic scythian cultural detail ofscythian style archery. it's overlooked bythe art historians. when i showed vasepaintings of amazon archers to some archery experts,they immediately noted that the women areusing the nomad style thumb
draw, and also instinctivearchery with no fixed anchor. the thumb draw is sometimescalled the mongolian draw. they were using those techniqueswith their small bows instead of the mediterranean releaseused by the greek archers, using their bowsin vase paintings. you can see an example ofthat in the upper left. and as we've alreadyseen, greek artists illustrated amazons twistingaround on their horses to shoot arrows backwards inthe notorious parthian shot.
that re-curve bow usedby scythian archers was an equalizer, as imentioned, for women. and the bows' curvesstore a lot of extra force under compressionbecause of those curves. and that makes itvery difficult, impossible to string,unless you know the trick. instead of brutephysical strength, one has to learn thespecial technique. to attach the string, you haveto brace the bow onto your knee
while you'resitting or kneeling, and there are imageson ancient coins, as you can see above onthe left, and on vases showing amazons and scythians. but especiallyinteresting that they show amazons stringing their bowsusing this special scythian technique. it can also be donestanding if you brace one foot against arock or a helmet as shown
on this vase from thesmithsonian on the right. some greek imagesof amazon archers have been misunderstoodby scholars until now. for example, there'sa vase painting here that shows an amazon archerbetween two riders, one of them identifiedas a scythian, the other one is greek. the archer is bendingvery far backwards, seemingly aimingrandomly at the sky.
the ancient vase specialistsand art historians have interpretedthis scene as quote, a dying amazoncollapsing in battle. but in fact, the archersstance is an accurate portrayal of flight archery, shootingan arrow a very long distance. the greek and thescythian on the horses appear to be observers ofa flight archery contest. and flight archerycontests were described by ancient greekhistorians, and we even
have some of the recorddistances recorded on an ancient inscriptionon the black sea. the scythians werefamous for their accuracy and their longdistance shooting. amazons were shown ongreek vases holding more than one arrowwhile drawing their bows. that sometimespuzzled art scholars, they thought it might be amistake by a careless vase painter.
but instead of amistake, those images depict the proper techniquefor speed shooting arrows. it allows an archer toshoot in quick succession without having toconstantly reach for arrows from thequiver at their waist. scythian archers were alsofamous for their speed shooting, and they couldprobably estimate-- estimates today are that they couldprobably release an arrow every one to three seconds.
they would be daunting enemies. besides bows arrows,amazons were often shown with swords, battleaxes, and a pair of spears, the typical weaponsthat are found in scythian burials of menand women as in these examples from vase paintingsand one mosaic there. and this is a ratherfamous vase painting they're using all ofthe weapons at hand. a unique and beautifulvase painting
in the metropolitanmuseum in new york shows an amazon takingaim with a sling. her two spears,you can notice, are stuck in the ground on the left. according to slingingexperts that i've talked to, her stance is quite accurate. piles of sling pebbles have beenfound among the weapons buried with scythian womenin their kurgans. several ancient greek writersdescribe step warrior women
skills with thelasso, and they told how they use them to ropetheir enemies in battle, and then finish themoff with battle axes. so i was pretty delighted wheni came across this rare vase painting of an amazon onhorseback twirling a lariat, just like wonderwoman's golden lasso. that amazon there is chargingtoward a greek warrior, you can't see him, but he iscowering underneath his shield, decorated with a snakethere, in the upper right.
this action scene decorateda greek woman's jewelery or cosmetics box. a lot of women's objectscontained images of amazons. this amazon is wearing apatterned tunic and leggings, as you can see, that kindof sensible practical action wear invented by the nomads,whose lives centered on horses. and the wild patterns, andtextures of the leggings and sleeves worn by amazonsin greek vase paintings match the textilesin garments that
have been recoveredfrom scythian graves. amazons in thevase paintings are shown in long sleeved shirtsand trousers decorated with geometricdesigns, and sometimes even griffins, lions, anddeer, as in the upper right. they wear high leather bootsif they're not barefooted, and soft pointedcaps with ear flaps and spotted leopard skins. and all of those items are foundin the burials of scythians.
these are some artistreconstructions of warrior women'sgarments from clothing that was found inscythian kurgans. the greeks were fascinated andappalled by amazons trousers. that was something no greekman or woman would ever be caught dead in. greeks wore simplerectangles of cloth held in place withpins, like most people around the mediterranean.
trousers, as imentioned, were tailored. they were stitched togetherfrom fitted pieces. and who invented trousers? according to the greeks,it was the amazons. and in fact, trouserswere, as i mentioned, invented by the men and womenwho first began riding horses. these are somepictures of clothing that has been foundin scythian graves. and you can see thepatterns, decorations,
look very similarto what is portrayed on amazons in greekvase paintings. the earliest pairof trousers were found preservedin scythian graves from nearly 3,000 years ago. i think i mentioned thattrousers were not just sensible and practical,they were necessary for life on horseback. and they were equalizers.
i think i have time for one moreexample of an ancient artifact that demonstrates howgreek artists incorporated realistic featuresof scythian culture and life inillustrations of amazons. this beautiful goldenring was made in about 425 bc, classical greece. you can see it on displayin the museum of fine arts here in boston. the full significanceof the scene
has alludedunderstanding until now. at the boston museum,the museum text says it shows on amazonon a horse with her dog, hunting a deer. the amazon is wearing abelted tunic, as you can see, her hair and the cape orcloak are blowing back to indicate speed and actions. she has the reinschoked up tight to control thespirited horse as she
is about to spear thedeer with her javelin. and the deer on this tiny ringis so exquisitely detailed that we could evendetermine the species. it's a spotted fallow buckwith-- they have broad palmate antlers. her hunting dog is a typeof sighthound still used in central asia today. and it's attackingfrom the rear, you can see that thedeer's left hind leg--
i think it's the left--left hind leg is broken. and what about the large bird? what-- why is thatincluded in the scene? the scholars justignored that detail. but i was looking at photographsof traditional hunters on horseback inkazakhstan and mongolia, when i suddenly realized thesignificance of that bird on the ring in themuseum of fine arts. this is makpalabdrazakova of kazakhstan,
and she's an eagle hunter. falconry, trainingraptors to hunt has very ancient rootsamong the step nomads. i learned about adiscovery in central asia of a fully clothed mummy of ahorse woman in the tarim basin area, she lived whenthis ring that i showed you was beingmade in greece. and she was buried with thehuge leather mitt on one hand, just like the one on thismodern female falconer's arm.
i also learned that thebird perched on the arm is a golden eagle, and thatis the favorite bird of prey to train for traditional huntingon the steppes by the nomads. they hunt rabbits, deer,foxes, and even wolves with golden eagles. these are few moreyoung women who are eagle hunters or apprenticeslearning the traditional skill again. so that bird hoveringabove the deer's head
is not just a random decorationas assumed by the scholars. it's an eagle with a hookedbeak, spread wings and tail, it's about to attack the deer. so this stunning golden ringillustrates an amazon eagle hunter on horsebackaccompanied by a sighthound. all four, the amazon, thedog, the horse, and the eagle are focused on the prize. by training these threeanimals, the nomads made the harsh,unforgiving steppes
into a land richwith accessible game. the scene on the ringis compelling evidence that the classicalgreeks had heard about, or maybe evenobserved, horse women of eastern lands whotrained eagles to hunt. amazon figures may haveserved many symbolic functions for the greeks,but archaeology now proves that warriorwomen were not merely figments of thegreek imagination,
and the many examplesof naturalistic details and ethnographic featuresin ancient artworks provide very strong evidencethat the greek images and ideas of amazons werecertainly influenced by real nomadic horse people. the greeks interwovethreads of fact with imaginativestorytelling to create a panoramic world of amazons. it seems fair to saythat amazons as a dream
and as a realityhave always existed. sometimes they're hidden orsuppressed, but at other times, the amazons among us comeblazing into popular culture and history. and there are strong signs thata powerful amazon spirit may be awakening today, and asthe ancient scythians would tell us, that justmakes good sense. happy to take questionsif anyone has one. audience: so you explainedhow popular the scythians
and amazons werewith the greeks. did the greeksattempt to adapt any of the horse ridingor the trousers or the roles of womenin their fighting? adrienne mayor: no. audience: no, ok. but did they noticethat it was successful, or they said, that'sjust not for us? adrienne mayor: the greekshad such a strong aversion
to covering the arms and legs. they thought that was just anoutrageous and barbaric style of dressing. and they often mocked thepersians for-- the persians actually did adopt thescythian way of dressing because they becamehorse people. they copied the parthians andthe other scythian tribes. and the greeksmocked the persians for wearing theseeffeminate styles.
leg coverings and sleeves. a manly man wore a miniskirt. and it's interesting thatxenophon wrote a manual on horsemanship for the greeks. and he does not-- he's a horserider-- he does not-- he's in fifth century bc-- and hedoes not recommended greek men wear trousers to ride horses. but he does say makesure that you arrange your cloak under youso that you do not,
especially when you'regetting onto the horse, so that you do not presenta shocking spectacle as you mount your horse. so even a horsemanshipmanual could not bring itself torecommend trousers. audience: excuseme, did you come across any evidencein your research that the tribes were eithermatriarchal, or matrilineal, or was it simplyequal opportunity,
and it is the female leadersthat we've heard about? adrienne mayor: as imentioned, the scythians didn't leave anyhistory, so we have to go by what their neighborssaid and the archaeology and then also look at-- youcan do comparative ethnography by looking at peoplewho are following a scythian style of life onthe steppes in modern times, you can compare. so we don't have any evidenceof matriarchal societies
across the steppes. what we have is evidence ofequal opportunity, as you said. in that kind of lifestyle,women could give counsel in making decisions,and of course, they rose to leadership positionsbecause we have actually documented by the neighborsthat there were women leading armies against persians, againstegyptians, against chinese. so we know that they didhave equal opportunity in leadership.
we don't have anyevidence for matriarchy. audience: i guess myquestion is slightly related. ok, so the greek girlshave dolls of amazons, the greek women haveicons of amazons. is there any correlationbetween-- i mean, the way the greeks treatedwomen was terrible, but it wasn'tuniformly terrible-- so is there any correlationbetween how women were treated in different city-statesin different periods
with the popularity of theartifacts among the girls? adrienne mayor: the popularityof the amazon images on women's perfume bottles,on their jewelry boxes, on some of their itemsfor sewing and weaving, i think that really pointsto a mystery about greek life that we don't really--we can't explain. i mean amazons were also apopular, very popular, image on crockery that weknow was in a shape that was given to newlyweds.
why would you give newlywedspictures of amazons? there's something going onthere that we don't know. it's really very interesting. audience: i mean, i know alot of feminists like to say, ok wonder woman is going to be agreat icon for girls to empower them, and i'm justwondering, did that happen? adrienne mayor: accordingto most scholars, classicists haveargued and maintained that all of theseimages of amazons
were like domestic propagandato discourage girls from taking up archery,horseback riding and asking for equality. but the fact that the imagesare so popular among girls and women, and it showsthem in such a powerful way, i don't think that argumenthas any traction anymore. yes? audience: [inaudible]archeology question. so my question is,has anybody examined
the bodies of the peoplewhose tombs you talked about, and seeing if there'sasymmetrical development on the long bonesof the upper body? because i think we wouldexpect with archers to find one side moredeveloped than the other, and it would be away of determining who got these grave goodsbecause of their occupation, and who got it because of theirsocial status or their life cycle.
adrienne mayor: for one thing,the modern mounted archers that i've spokento, the ones who are using theinstinctive archery technique and especiallythe parthian shot, they shoot both sides, theycan shoot with both arms. they can just switch. so we know that thesenomads on the steppes were practicing archery sincethey were kids, little kids. so i don't thinkwe would see that.
but i did mention, ididn't call it out, but i didn't mention thatthey have found differences in hand bones of the women thathave sh-- one hand might show heavy use of a bow-- consistentwith heavy use of a bow. so i think that's the kind ofevidence you're looking for. audience: somewhatsimilar question. so the name amazoncomes from a-mazos, which is this myth thatamazon women would remove the breast so they couldshoot arrows better.
is there any evidence of that? audience: ok. adrienne mayor: but thatidea sticks like glue. it's just like super glue. audience: is that a modern idea,or did that trace all the way back to the greeks? adrienne mayor: it's such aninteresting idea, wrong idea, that i devoted an entirechapter to amazon breasts. so quickly, the namehas absolutely nothing
to do with breasts. it's not a greek word. the greeks borrowedthe word amazonis, and no one knowswhere it came from. most linguistsbelieve that it might be an ancient iranian word thatderives from [inaudible], which simply means warrior. so that makes a lot of sense. but the greeks had an obsessionwith making non greek words
in their language into greekwords for patriotic reasons. so there was an etymologistin the fifth century bc-- he was actuallyan historian dabbling in etymology. and he said, welllet's figure out what-- this mustbe a greek word, and so it sounds alittle bit like a-mazos. which, in greek, wouldsound a little bit like without, a, mazos, breast.
but he wasimmediately challenged by other historians of his day,who said, that's ridiculous of course not. there is not oneancient representation of an amazon withonly one breast. and as, if you watchthe hunger games, or you looked at any ofthe pictures i was showing, it is physiologicallyridiculous. and yet the ideajust won't go away.
it's the one thing everyoneknows about amazons. yeah. audience: this isfascinating, the combination of the archaeological evidence,and the documentary evidence, the imagery and so on. so you've mastered art history,and archaeology, greek sources. but i'm going to askyou if you've also looked at hittite andpersian and so on sources. and if they say anything,or if there's evidence
that they need to be re-read inthe light of what you've found. adrienne mayor: i haven'tlooked at hittite sources, but there is a chapter onpersian stories about amazons in my book. the persians did tell storiesabout step nomad women, and we have them. they're preserved forus because of the greeks who went to persia andpreserved and recorded the stories toldby the persians.
there was a greekdoctor named ctesias who served as a physicianfor the persian king. he wrote a book about persianstories about step nomads. so we have his reports. we have the names of manystep nomad warrior queens who fought persians, andwe have their stories. so yes, other culturesbordering scythia who encountered stepnomads definitely had stories about warriorwomen, amazon like women.
there was a papyrusfound recently, and then even more recently,has been finally translated and it's in tatters, butyou've got enough of the story to see that the title is theegyptians and the amazons. and it's about anegyptian prince who goes out to fight anamazon queen and her warriors. so many, many otherancient cultures told stories aboutwarrior women. audience: at what point dothe amazons start vanishing
from the historical record? because i know the boweventually turns up in mongolia and is used by themongol-- the mongol horde to devastatingeffect against the chinese and much of europeat that point. and the mongol womenalso shot, but at what point do the amazonsdisappear from the record? adrienne mayor: it'sinteresting that as you read the ancient greek andthen the latin, roman sources,
they tell an exciting storyabout historical warrior queens who are from scythia, andthen they say, and then with her death, theamazons disappeared. and then the nextwriter that you read says, but there were pocketsof them, there were vestiges, and they keep reappearing. so i don't thinkthere's any end point. as you say, the mon-- there's abook called the secret history of the mongol queens thatis about genghis khan's
granddaughterssaving his empire. the story, my lastchapter is on china. and we have chinesechronicles about warrior women from those step tribes. what's really interestingis all of these other groups from antiquity who tellabout amazon like women have a radically differentscript for the stories. they want them aslovers, as allies, whereas the greekskill them all.
all of the greek mythicscript dooms them to death, whereas all these othercultures say no, we want them on our side. so i don't think there's anyhistorical endpoint unless you get to the arab conquestand then islamic era. but even then there arestories in the middle ages
about women who go to war,and it goes all the way up through the middle ages. and now it's back.
ok, thank you.
