6/14/2023 0 Comments Total conquest female![]() The indomitable Cleopatra Thea held her own in the ruthless world of Hellenistic dynastic chaos as the queen to three Hellenistic kings, while Cleopatra IV, when divorced from one husband, took a personal army with her to her next husband as dowry. The role of fighting queen had already been well established by her namesakes including Cleopatra Thea and Cleopatra IV. The fabulous Cleopatra VII – best known for her affair with Julius Caesar and marriage to Marc Anthony – was the last of a long line of impressive Egyptian queens who went to war. ![]() They were the mothers, daughters and sisters of the kings and generals who succeeded Alexander the Great. These extraordinary and influential queens often held the keys to power, had personal armies and would not hesitate to go to war. In the Hellenistic period – which is generally held to be the period between the death of Alexander the Great in 323BC and the conquest of Egypt by Rome in 31BC – women with real power and agency appear in numerous kingdoms across the Eastern Mediterranean. She must have been skilled and competent and inspired those she commanded. When Artemisia of Caria commanded ships on the side of Persians at the battle of Salamis in 480BC she fought so well that the Persian king Xerxes exclaimed: “My men have become women and my women men.” It was a world turned upside down according to the Greek historian Herodotus – but the soldiers who willingly followed Artemisia into battle could not have thought that way. These legendary warriors were usually portrayed as slightly unhinged women who behaved unnaturally, and symbolised – to ancient men at least – a world turned on its head. In the eyes of the (male) contemporary historians, female warriors were aberrations and often remembered as embodiments of the mythical one-breasted Amazons. The ancients believed, as Homer’s Iliad claimed, that “ war will be men’s business”. ![]() In the ancient world, when women did go to war, it was usually reported as a complete reversal of the natural order of things. The historians of the ancient world recorded tales of impressive female military commanders from across many cultures. But it has been reported that gamers are boycotting Total War: Rome II on the grounds of historical accuracy after developers introduced women generals, apparently to please “feminists”.īut while it’s true that the Romans would not have had female soldiers in their armies, they certainly encountered women in battle – and when they did it created quite a stir. One of the great things about computer games is that anything is possible in the almost endless array of situations on offer, whether they are realistic or fantasy worlds.
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