Into battle, women: did ancient warriors really exist
Popularizers of ancient history and archeology Olga Kolobova and Valery Ivanov, united by the pseudonym Oleg Ivik, in their new study do not answer the question of whether the so-called Amazons actually existed. The authors of The Daughters of Ares immediately clarify that it will be "not about women who fought side by side with their husbands, not about queens who led male or mixed armies, but about tribes in which women were the only military force." Critic Lidia Maslova presents the book of the week specifically for Izvestia.
Oleg Ivik
"The Daughters of Ares: The Story of the Ancient Amazons"
Moscow: Alpina Non-Fiction, 2026, 266 p.
Speaking about his terminology and methodology, Ivik distinguishes between the historical and mythological (that is, scientific and literary-artistic) view of the Amazons, and also rejects the word "mythical", meaning something that did not actually happen (although, here's the paradox, even "mythical personalities are sometimes perfectly dated and have bindings towards real geography"). Leaving the dubious Amazons with a chance to exist, the authors of "The Daughters of Ares" suggest calling them mythological creatures after all.
The story of the Amazons acquires an additional shade, which could be called anecdotal, in the short appendage "The Amazonian Company of Catherine II" that concludes the book. Established in 1787 in Crimea on the initiative of His Serene Highness Prince Potemkin, the ladies' military formation under the leadership of Russia's first female officer, Elena Sarandova, Ivik compares with the notorious Potemkin villages. The main, if not the only, purpose of the Amazonian Company was to amuse the Empress, who, in conversation with her favorite, playfully questioned the courage of ancient Greek women. The main emphasis in the description of the Crimean Amazons by the journalists of that time is on their appearance: their outfit consisted of "skirts of crimson velvet, trimmed with gold braid and gold fringe, jackets of green velvet, also trimmed with gold braid; turbans of white mist, embroidered with gold and sequins, with white ostrich feathers. The armament consisted of one rifle and three cartridges of gunpowder."
The arsenal of the ancient Amazons was somewhat more diverse: they used spears, bows, labrises, slings, and swords and darts are found in ancient graves that have been identified as female. However, archaeology achieved relative accuracy in determining the sex of skeletons only at the end of the 20th century, and before that, it was too likely to confuse a male grave with a female one based on the objects accompanying the deceased and, based on this, assume the existence of a fair number of militant women who took with them into the other world not only ladies' accessories like mirrors and makeup spoons, but also weapons. However, when anthropologists became more actively involved in the issue of the gender of the excavated remains, "it turned out that at least some Sauromatian men also willingly looked in mirrors, used spoons (although perhaps not for cosmetic purposes) and, apparently, were going to do it in the afterlife."
The Daughters of Ares contains numerous references to the Amazons by the most respected ancient historians and writers, including Plutarch, Herodotus, Aeschylus, and Euripides. Amazons have been seen and touched by many mythological heroes and even political figures. Theseus was married to the Amazon Antiope, who bore him a son Hippolytus (who would later become the hero of the famous tragedy Phaedra). And in the IV century BC, Ivik writes, "the world was shocked by sensational news: the queen of the Amazons Thalestris (Falestria) arrived at the headquarters of Alexander the Great to conceive a child from the lord of the Ecumene." According to the authors of the book, historians and writers most likely invented this story to enliven the biography of the great emperor, which was too poor in romantic adventures.
According to legend, Alexander the Great willingly went to meet the queen of the Amazons and allocated her as many as 13 days in his busy work schedule, however, this did not help the Amazons in the historical (more precisely, in the mythological) perspective. According to the ancient Roman historian Pompey Trog, after meeting Alexander, Thalestris "returned to her kingdom and soon perished, and with her perished the entire people of the Amazons." The heyday of Amazonian statehood, according to Ivik, occurred in the last 100 years before the Trojan War and in the war itself, where the Amazons sided with the Trojans. However, "after the fall of Troy, the mythological era gradually fades away," and in fact, the Amazons of Greek myths end their active existence under the walls of Troy.
Restoration of mosaics depicting Alexander the Great
In mythology, Amazons are traditionally considered the daughters of Ares, the god of war, and the nymph Harmony. Ivik slightly ironically passes over Ares, who is not at all as formidable and invincible as is commonly believed: "... if you put aside the lofty words and carefully consider the real biography of Ares, he does not look like a strong warrior or a "super-powerful fighter." Surprisingly, he was beaten by everyone who was not lazy — not only the gods, but also people. For example, the Iliad describes how this god was put in a barrel by two young hooligans..."However, the daughters of Ares are invariably characterized in various sources as young ladies who are not just determined and brave, but aggressive and cruel. The iron rule of the Amazons is repeatedly mentioned in the book — a girl cannot marry until she kills an enemy (and preferably three). Ivik quotes, among other things, the poem "Argonautica", the author of which Apollonius of Rhodes sincerely rejoices for the Argonauts, who, due to weather conditions, managed to avoid landing at Cape Amazons: "If the heroes had stayed there, they would have had a battle with a crowd of Amazons, and the battle would not have been bloodless. / After all, Amazons are not kind at all and do not appreciate the laws."
From the point of view of historical science, Scythian and Savromatic women are proposed as the main prototypes of Amazons — and, if we assume, then real ancestors or descendants: "... the authors themselves happened to dig up the mound of the Savromatic warrior filled with weapons (warriors?). The Sauromatians were considered by the Greeks to be direct descendants of the Amazons from their marriages with the Scythians. And the women of the Sauromatians, according to ancient authors, were distinguished by exceptional belligerence." Nevertheless, the chronological, geographical and other discrepancies in the testimony of numerous witnesses to the exploits (or atrocities) of the Amazons do not provide complete clarity and only allow us to speculate about which people were meant by "Amazons" and where the paramilitary women's state was located.: "They were placed in Asia Minor, the Black Sea steppes, the shores of the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus, the Rhodope Mountains, Italy, and even northwest Africa. And if you shade on the map of the ancient Greek ecumene all those areas that were allegedly conquered by the Amazons, attacked by them or fell into their sphere of influence, then there will not be so many white spots."
But in any case, mythology would be much more boring without Amazons, and even if they are a romantic fiction, they are very effective, long—playing and fruitful in socio-cultural terms. As soon as it comes to women's assertive independence and energetic awareness, the archetypal Amazon will surely pop up somewhere nearby (recall at least the famous Polish comedy "Sex Mission", released in the Soviet box office under the name "New Amazons"). The most powerful — though more emotional than rational — argument in favor of the Amazons is included in the epigraph of "The Daughters of Ares" and belongs to the ancient Greek historian Flavius Arrian: "That there was no tribe of these women at all, I do not admit it: so many such poets praised them!" Arrian cannot imagine that numerous poets together they sang about some kind of fiction, but knowing a little about poets and their mores, it's quite possible to argue with him.
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