Amazons and Anatolia

Speculation about if there were real warrior women in the ancient world who inspired the Amazons of Greek mythology (even if the Greeks massively exaggerated how literally Matriarchal they were) usually focuses on the Scythians and Sarmatians.  But I have some issues with that.

The idea of connecting the Amazons to the Scythians and Sarmatians began in antiquity with Herodotus, but to him it was that the Sarmatians came from Amazons and Scythians mating together, so they were connected but still distinct in origin.  Later classical sources would start swapping the order and having the Amazons begin north of the Black Sea and travel south like the Scythians themselves did.  I similarly think Diodorus Siculus’s Libyan Amazons narrative is based on late speculations, but once his Myrina narrative reaches Anatolia it could reflect actual ancient traditions.

The myths and stories about the Amazons that are definitely older than Herodotus even if they weren’t written down till later geographically associate the Amazons with western Anatolia aka Asia Minor.  

In the Iliad Bellerphon’s encounter with them places them either in or near Lycia, where they are also associated with the Solymi named for Mount Solymus near the border of Lycia and Pamphylia.  Also in the Iliad a younger Priam and the Phrygians are said to have fought the Amazons at the Sarngarios River which empties into the Black Sea in Bithynia. 

Their mythical founder Otrera was said to be the daughter of Ares and Harmonia a Nymph of the Akmonian Wood in Phrygia. 

Other stories say the Amazons founded the city of Ephesus and other cities of Greek Asia Minor like Myrina, Smyrna, Cyrne, Pitana,Priene, Magnesia, Pygela, as well as on Islands like Lesbos and Lemnos.  Queen Hypsipyle who Jason encountered on Lemnos I think was originally part of the Amazon tradition but was separated from it later.  On Lesbos Mytilene was named after the sister of Myrina.

The Gargareans is the name of a male tribe the Amazons are said to have gotten their husbands for breeding from.  Strabo based on the post Herodotus Scythian fixation tried to place them near the Caucasus, but there is a mountain called Gargara on the North-Western Aegean Coast of Asia Minor just a little south of the site presumed to be Troy.

Speaking of Troy the Amazons are presented as a Trojan ally.  All of the other Trojan allies like the Mysians and Dardanians came from very near Troy, lake Ascania in western Bithynia seems to have been the eastern extent of Troy’s sphere of influence.  Later traditions do add a Memnon of Ethiopia but there is no hint of him in Homer.

The overlap between locations probably associated with the Amazons already before Herodotus and places that were associated with the Scythians are just Themyscira on the Thermodon River and Sinope both in Pontus, but that’s a region the Scythians held hegemony over only for a brief time in the 7th century BC.  The core of what was meant by Scythia to the ancients was north of the Caucasus. And likewise for the Amazons Themyscira seems to be a place some of them migrated to later, but they seem to have come to it from the opposite direction.

The evidence that Scythians and more so Sarmatians had occasional female warriors is legit, but it was still uncommon enough that they were never included in actual Scythian artistic depictions of warfare.

The association of the Amazons with Horses is another reason the Scythian connection is attractive to people.  That’s what the Hippo and -ippe in many Amazon names mean.  But there were domesticated horses in Asia Minor by 1600 BC and it in fact seems to be from there they came to Greece.

So IF there was a real tribe that inspired the Amazons however loosely it could be one of the Arzawa peoples known from Hittite Inscriptions.  Apasa/Abasa is what the Hitties called Ephesus while Lazba is what they called Lesbos, and there was also near them the Seha River Land and Mira.

Ethno-Linguistically I think the Amazons were in fact Hellenes with different Gender norms, since they are the alleged founders of so many Greek cities, in fact even Themyscira was a Greek City in Antiquity.  

Usually people seek to explain all the notable Amazons having Greek names by the Greek myth tellers translating the meanings of their names.  But when Greek myths depict the Levant or Mesopotamia they are fully willing to transliterate foreign names.  Artistic depictions of the Amazons also show them in Greek style military garb.  And again they founded cities that archaeologically seem to have always been Greek.

As far as the etymology of the word Amazon itself goes, I still don’t believe in the “Breastless” or “One Breast” folk etymology.  A more likely Greek etymology would be *n̥-mn̥gʷ-yō-nós 'manless, without husbands'. 

So this post is a reversal of prior sentiments I’ve expressed on this Blog.  When I’d said one of the things DC Comics Wonder Woman lore gets wrong about Greek Mythology how is presents the Amazons as essentially being Greeks.  But I now think that was correct actually, other things DC still gets wrong (or changes intentionally, however you want to look at it), but on this issue they are more correct then the Xena Warrior Princess Amazons.

Update February 2025: I now am more aware that this part of Asia Minor isn't believed to have been so Greek before Greek Colonization during the 1st Millennium BC, with even groups suspected of being Linguistically Cousins to the Greeks like the Phrygians, Bryges and Mushki not arriving till after the Trogan War.

So Anatolian Languages are probably actually more likely.  IF when the myths involving the Amazons happened when they are traditionally dated, but there's a bit of a question mark on that even.

Wonder Woman lore and Greek Mythology

I love the Wonder Woman movie, faithfulness doesn't equal good, and unfaithful doesn't equal bad.  This analysis of how Wonder Woman comics and their adaptations handle Greek Mythology should in no way be seen as a criticism of the film or the comics.  I simply like talking about these things as a Nerd of both Mythology and Western Comics.

The first change in how Wonder Woman lore uses Greece Mythology is in basically treating the Amazons as Greeks, when the Greeks saw them as the ultimate antithesis to the Greek way of life.  I'm the kind of person who does want to believe real Amazons actually existed, and on my Revised Chronology blog I've recently speculated some on that very topic.

For a long time Wonder Woman lore at least depicted the Amazons as favoring female deities, even if which ones they got wrong (ironically in Greek Mythology Aphrodite was an enemy of the Amazons more often then Ares was).  It's the New 52 trend of making Diana another offspring of Zeus that has caused this to change.  And now the Wonder Woman movie never even mentioned any Goddess by name, it was only Zeus and Ares.

Wonder Woman Comics have at least never been guilty of what TVTropes calls the Hijacked By Jesus trope.  The movie however seems to have fallen into that area.  Is it because an Israeli actress is playing Diana? who knows.

 "But Mithrandir, didn't you just argue the Amazons were Israelites on that other blog"  yes, Danites after they fell into Idolatry and became devotes of Anath, so still not Monotheists or even particularity Henothesitic.

However I can say as a positive, making Ares the Lucifer figure fits far better then Hades.  The Ancient Greeks did tend to view Ares as a necessary evil at best (Ironically the Amazons were often depicted as Daughters of Ares, though I think that came from them being daughters of Anath).  It was their greatest contrast to Greece that Rome viewed Mars as their patron deity.  And the Roman cult of Mars continues today in America, commemorated on Memorial Day and the Fourth of July.

The movie arguably makes Wonder Woman herself Jesus.  And having a female as the Messianic Archetype is interesting to me, with my arguing a Biblical Example of it in the Song of Solomon itself.  And was part of my recent praise of Nausicaa of the Valley of The Wind.

There is a point in the film's backstory where the Amazons seemed effectively like Tolkienian Elves, with the biggest difference being the Elves are usually older then Humankind.

The gods all being dead now feels like a huge waste.  But I have a hunch we may learn in the Justice League film, or it's sequel, that the New Genesis gods are basically the Olympians reincarnated.

Some people are upset that Ares doesn't look how he usually looks in Wonder Woman Comics, or the 2009 Animated Movie which I hated.  I for one hate that look for Ares, the Greeks took great pride in that their gods looked human.  Olympians being British always works for me.

I have posted before on The Titans of Myth, how on the Titans at least DC Comics is better then other modern depictions of Greek Mythology.  The main thing that is off about the DC Titans is they pair all of them together into 6 pairs while in actual Mythology only 8 of them were paired up.  Kronos&Rhea, Oceanus&Tethys, Hyperion&Theia and Phoebe&Coeus.  Iapetos wasn't married to Themis but rather a daughter(s) of Oceanus and Tethys.  Krios married a daughter of the primordial sea gods.  Themis and Menemosyne either never mated or were among the mothers of Zeus's many demigods.

If the Wonder Woman solo sequel focuses on non Mythological Wonder Woman antagonists like Cheetah or Dr. Psycho, it might work out, but would feel like a step down in scale.  However nothing in the movie rules out Circe or The Titans still being around.  But the Titans I like best in Teen Titans stories.  I would love it if Troian Bellisario got to be Donna Troy.

Could the Gerudo have been based on The Gorgons?

One of the many things that excites me about Breath of The Wild is seeing the Gerudo finally being given some attention.  I have been fascinated by them for many reasons, like my general interest in Amazons as a concept.  I suggested a theory on a Zelda forum once that they might reproduce by Gynogenesis.

Here, offspring are produced by the same mechanism as in parthenogenesis, but with the requirement that the egg merely be stimulated by the presence of sperm in order to develop. However, the sperm cell does not contribute any genetic material to the offspring. Since gynogenetic species are all female, activation of their eggs requires mating with males of a closely related species for the needed stimulus.

Since we were told in OoT (in the most kid friendly way possible) that they do have sex with males to reproduce.  Yet they seek these males from totally different tribes, and their distinct ethnic features remain un-distorted, most of the time.  Rarely in a Gynogenesis species a sperm will actually contribute, that could explain characters speculated to be part Gerudo (like Telma in Twilight Princess), as well as a male being born every 100 years.

But let's get to the topic I want to discus today.

You might be thinking "aren't Gorgons ugly monsters with hair made out of snakes?".  Traditionally yes.  But Diodorus Siculus claims in his account of Myrina and the Libyan Amazons, that the Gorgons or Gorgos were another Matriarchal Tribe who Myrina encountered before reaching Egypt.  Which would seemingly place them somewhere in the Sahara Desert (Though the Geography of this account doesn't exactly hold up under scrutiny).  As a Creationist interested in this subject, I've speculated they could fit into Genesis 10 via being of the Girgashite tribe of Canaan.

Scholars who think there might be some truth to this claim, have speculated this tribe maybe worshiped a Snake Goddess and that is why they became Snake monsters.  Inside the Desert Colossus/Spirit Temple of OoT, the inner statue of the Desert Goddess has a Cobra wrapped around her.

It may be this is just a coincidence, influenced by my own personal interests, like my tendency to see Solomon's Temple in the Temple of Time.  But it's an interesting comparison to make.

The common tendency to see the Gerudo as being like Arabs could make my Feminism of Pre-Islamic Arabia post interesting to look at.  [And I have since considered reasons to relocate the geography of Myrina's story from North Africa to Arabia.]

I can't play Breath of The Wild anytime soon as I'm so far behind I still own neither Console it's playable on.  But I've been watching others play it on YouTube, and I just love the detail put into creating it's world, it's mind blowing.

I'd love to see this new kind of engine applied to a revisiting of the concept of Majora's Mask.  Bring back all 4 of the original transformation masks, plus add three more.  A Gerudo Mask, a Sheikah Mask and a Rito Mask.  And maybe this Majora's Mask sequel could star Linkle rather then Link?

Mercy Graves and The Amazons

It's never been included yet in any of Mercy's Animated or TV appearances. But in the Comics (at least Pre-Flashpoint) she (and the short lived character of Hope) are Amazons. This was first strongly hinted at in Secret Files: President Luthor and confirmed in Justice League: Cry for Justice. 

I'd speculated on this being relevant to this movie well before it was known if Mercy would even appear, just from knowing Wonder Woman would be in it. Now since the Actress playing Mercy is the same age as Gal Gadot, I'm thinking that supports them being perhaps counterparts to each other. 

In all likely hood she is not a Themiscirian Amazon. DC Comics does have at least one other Amazon tribe. Bana-Mighdall, it's location has inconsistently been refereed to as either Africa or the Middle East. 

For this film a set for an African looking city was built. They were originally supposed to film in Africa but the Ebola scare scrapped that plan. The City was still built in an African style. It has been speculated to be Themiscyria, but Gal Gadot's costume implies that her Amazon tribe is Greek in atheistic as usual. I'm thinking maybe that city is Bana-Mighdall. 

Artemis, who was Daina's temporary 90s Anti-Hero replacement was also from Bana-Mighdall in origin. The Bana-Mighdall Amazons do not share the Immortality of the Themsicyrian Amazons, which is one of the main reasons Mercy is more likely to descend from them. I wonder if there is a tall Blond woman in the cast who's role isn't known yet who could possibly be Artemis?