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Well as a leader you just need to inspire people not actually fight. When people point to the sexual dimorphism it's that they want to point out that an army consisting of women is not competitive in almost any circumstances. Not that there can't be a female leader who can score a win with the help of the mostly male army.
In times of crisis you want everyone to contribute. That is why in WW2 teenage boys would be sent to the front. Are they gonna be as effective as grown-up trained soldiers? No not even close. But it is better than not having no additional fighters at all.
Interesting fact about female soldiers (aka warrior women) from WW2: There where some female soviet pilots flying bombing runs against the German forces.
I also hate hypothetical comparison "man v Woman" as if war were a sport. War is not a sport because there are too many variables to consider such as weapons, formations, ambush or battle. I also found feminine armor ridiculous in movies
We have records of women dressing up as men and participating in modern wars. So it's not far-fetched to think that happened in the ancient ppl's wars as well. But as you said, it was more likely the exception rather than the norm.
@@als3022 There was a 2.WW documentation with still living soldiers from that time. A german, who was in the Wehrmacht of that time described how those beside him were just shredded apart by anti air cannons at the eastern front, used against them. When they finally reached the position, those who had manned these anti air cannons had all been women.
@@miriamweller812 That's as they approached Stalingrad. And yup, Soviet AA unit (1077th Anti-Aircraft Regiment), so a unit that was supposed to be behind the lines, but pressed into frontline service to slowdown the German tanks. They fought to the last gun. And you'll find plenty others serving in the Soviet military in combat roles in WW2 as well. The widow who bought and then drove a tank to avenge her husband's death. The Nightwitches. Various snipers. But even there, with the USSR , the female combatants are generally kept in "safer" positions... snipers rather than front line troops. Night ground attackers rather than fighter pilots or daytime bombers. And, of course, manning the AA guns. About 5% of their military was women. And they did suffer losses. For the women snipers, for example, about 80% didn't survive the war. As an aside, there is a 2015 movie about one of those snipers: Battle for Sevastopol.
in Aztec mythology, Ilhuuicatl-Tonatiuh is the afterlife place where warriors would go when they die. It's also where women who died giving birth would go, symbolizing that they were equal to warriors as they died in the battle of childbirth.
it's to mention that 10% of woman died in childbirth back then, therefore the legends of woman who give a men many children without dying. With every child the risk of the woman dying increased therefore many men who had more as 4 or 5 children not only hoped for non additional kids bc of money but also to not lose their woman. Sure this isn't the total number of births cause 2 to 3 kids died during childhood which drives the amount of births to 6 to 8 which is a giant strain on the woman. Woman back then had to have their own heroism to make it back then. 2 to 3 pregnancies are considered today as straining it nothing against ancient times with 3 times the amount. So back then woman were half of their life time between 15 and 30 years pregnant. After that many couldn't go on with giving births cause some exceeded over 10 pregnancies before they reached 30. Many knew back than that it's the semen of a men which gets the woman pregnant so a certain birth control was possible. But this didn't always worked out so even after 6 to 8 pregnancies of which 4 to 5 children reached adulthood, often additional non wanted pregnancies occurred, with high risk of stillbirths and/or the woman dying. Such circumstances of many woman have 10 pregnancies before reaching 30 in ancient times sound horrifying for today's 'modern' woman who have 1 kid between 30 and 35.
This is one of my favorite videos, thank you :) I’m from North Caucasus and in our folklore there are still legends of female warriors that have survived till this day. In Chechen folklore they were exceptional mounted archers, usually first born daughters and unmarried. These legends are indeed remnants from the ancient world, as the Sarmation influence reached the North Caucasus but didn’t really go past to the South Caucasus. In Chechen language the word for dragon is Sarmak and since the word is so similar to Sarmat (Sarmation) and because of their Scale Armour (like a dragon) - we believe that our word for dragon was coined during that time :)
Also makes a certain amount of sense with the plains nomads like the Sarmatians. A huge portion of their method of war was in lightly armoured, fast moving horse archers, which the women of the tribe could manage given that even the women were trained to ride almost from birth, and in many cultures the bow was an acceptable weapon for women. So essentially you have a pool of somewhat trained women that you can draw on if the tribe is in a really bad place and needs more bodies who can ride and shoot now, even if they are not capable of some of the more complex manoeuvres simply because of lack of practice. In the right situation those women could mean the difference between survival and death for the tribe. Even with the Sarmatian's its probably not something they did very often, but the option was there if they needed it....
@@alganhar1 I think there's also something to be said for the lower carrying capacity of steppe nomad societies. One of the reasons women warriors are generally inefficient is because more warriors can be made if women don't fight (and die) as long as there's enough food to grow the population. If food is relatively scarce, there's more impetus to employ women in hunting, raiding, and expanding your territory. The horse as a force multiplier just meshes perfectly with this survival strategy.
@@anastasiya256 Genetically speaking, the Sarmatians’ closest descendants are today North Caucasians, and the Ossetians even still speak an Iranian language that traces back to the Sarmatians. (Ossetians call themselves decendants of the Alans) You can also see some genetic Sarmation influence in southern Russia and Ukraine. Plus, the Alans (a Sarmatian subgroup) migrated west and mixed into populations in places like France and Spain. Even Polish and Hungarian nobles once claimed Sarmatian roots :)
Personally I believe the reason there are so many female warriors in Dungeons And Dragons novels is actually to reference female players who don't want to play as a man. Though for the sake of story telling "Good character so who cares." Only reason it stopped working in movies post 2008 is the "Good character" part was taken from us.
I would like to say I really am refreshed by you. So much of stuff today is biased and so actually hearing a honest and realistic, impartial discussion is so nice. Thank you again.
@@metatronyt Take it from a guy who constantly tries to do research into ancient history and keeps hearing modern talking points or biased views veiled as facts is like nails on a chalkboard after a time. Who knew you can have an interesting discussion on history without constantly bringing up your politics! Honestly its like we forgot how to think... Thank you for restoring my sanity!
I once had a Scottish friend tell me that inland/highland Scots never needed feminism because "have you ever tried telling a Celtic woman what she can and cannot do?". That is a woman who's competent in a donnybrook though and not a participant in warrior culture. The Japanese villager woman who learns Yari - because if the village is attacked everyone dies if not everyone participates - is a very different tale from a woman who leaves home and goes through trials and initiations into a warrior's subculture. Making the distinction between capable fighting and "a warrior" really changes how you would interpret the answer.
Your Scottish friend is bang on! Those ladies need to be so bold because of how particularly rowdy Highland men are! It's nice being told off once in a while, it keeps your ego in check :) It doesn't necessitate that they are warriors, but if they needed to fight they certainly would. There is, as you mentioned, a difference between a warrior and a fighter. Warriors are trained to be violent by trade and are paid for their specialized focus on violence. They are usually not productive members of society in other ways. A farmer, male or female, defending their home from invaders and winning doesn't make them a warrior. It makes them a hell of a good fighter, though! In fantasy writing, there is an extremely justifiable case to be made for a woman to be a warrior. As Metatron showcased, there are genuinely documented cases of female warrior cultures. But the author needs to set up their societal structure and environment in a way that would actually encourage and produce such a culture.
Bro, a small percentage of women were/are warriors, but not the majority or even half of them. Even among the Iranic nomads (not among all of them, for example, excluding Alans who didnt have such female warrior tradition) the graves with armed women were not so common, about 20% of all warrior graves*. Even in a modern Western armies women make up less than 20%. And even in Israel with a mandatory military service for women less than 40% of idf soldiers are females... Its just a biology, not a s exism or something. *"About 20% of Scythian- Sarmatian “warrior graves” on the lower Don and lower Volga contained females dressed for battle as if they were men" David Anthony. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language (page 329)
Also, for nomadic or semi-nomadic populations like those in central Asia, the normality of camp life and frequent movement on horseback would suggest the necessity for both men and women to be proficient riders and archers.
İndeed. İt's beyond silly that such nomadic people's females couldn't ride horses😅, and can't use a bow.... I mean, yes maybe (?) not for war but one must know archery at least for hunting, and protection from wildlife, like wolves etc...... They had family as everyone but additionally had herds to protect.... And knowing that is a good way to aid your men's army when needed too. Like as skirmish groups to rain down arrows from sides....
Nice informative video man!! Please read about Indian female warriors and queens as well , just for an example start with ' Jhansi ki Rani - Rani Laxmibai '.
As great as Boudica is, I hate how British propaganda became obsessed with depicting her revolt as one of the most important events in the history of the entire empire, even though her greatest achievement was committing a few massacres before being beaten in combat. Queen Zenobia literally took Egypt from the romans for years, and yet she gets much less recognition than Boudica.
Zenobia gets 0 attention. That's criminal. Of course, I doubt feminists would appreciate seeing her humiliated in chains, displayed as a captive in a Roman triumph.
@@AaSs-ln9mm To say that men are the main provider of food, is probably only true in some societies. And in those the lack of men, would not prevent women from providing food, a lack of women will at a point lead to the fall of a society.
@@AaSs-ln9mm Women can farm, but men can't have babies. Societies can survive with very few men, but would totally collapse without women due to the lack of population growth. In raw terms, that's just how it is.
@@AaSs-ln9mmIn what fantasy world? In the real world men were constantly leaving for war or exploration. I'm Portuguese, during the Age of Discoveries, in the XV and XVI centuries there was only 1 million of us... For an empire that spanned the world. Many adult men left never to return, leaving mostly the very young, very old or very sick. Women held this country for centuries, often keeping the least desirable cuts from farmed animals (look up tripas à moda do Porto) so they could send the best cuts to the men.
I mean imagine that your tribal community is living on the middle of an open steppe in its yurts, without any fortification. For miles there are basicly no natural barriers like forests or rocky mountains, so when your enemies come for you there is literally no place to hide, the only option is to try and fight them back in the open with everything you got. Probably this is the main reason that in many central asian nomadic cultures women were also expected to learn atleast the basics of light cavalry warfare, they simply had to know how to defend themselves and their homes.
True but based on the evidence i could gather in this comment section fighting works like Videogames. Man are physicly stronger than woman. So a woman can never defeat a man in physical Combat. If she has a weapon, she can win but Not If the man has the same weapon too because of the physical Advantage. This even counts in a gun Fight. If a man and a woman use guns the man wins because of His physical stats. Thats why only man can beat man but only when they are stronger of course. Rome for example never won because of weapon Advantages or tactical Advantages its because their man were able to lift much more than their enemies. Obviously thats why the germanic people overthrow rome because they were physicly stronger than the Romans.... seriously why do people argue like this?
Another point is armies win and lose on logistics. Male biology is just better for logistical issues with stamina and hygiene differences. But if you are nomadic and bring everyone with you anyway... might as well have the women fight, you have already paid the logistical cost to get them there after all. I don't know if it is general true, but the examples I know of for these nomadic steppe cultures seems more brutal as well. Could be that it takes a curtain level of callousness to send women into combat. Though this might be my bias as I personally think it is barbaric to put women in combat roles.
There were two great female generals in Iranian history. One is *Pantea Arteshbod,* who served under the army of Shahanshah Cyrus the Great and played a tide-turning role in the Battle of Opis in 539 BC, when the First Persian Empire defeated the Babylonian Empire, allowing Cyrus to enter Babylon. The other is *Apranik,* a Sasanian military commander who led the army of the last Sasanian Shahanshah Yazdegerd III against the Arab invasion in 651 AD. After the Sasanian defeat at the Battle of Nahavand in 642 AD, she took command of many surviving forces and mounted an ongoing guerrilla war against the Caliphate, particularly in northern Iran.
Yeah, this is true. I have read about this. Women also had a bit more freedoms under the Achaemenids, they could enter the army, they could own businesses and be bosses of men.
@@CordeliaWagner1999 I hope you don't mean islam cuz that's anything but the religion of peace Their campaigns is literally called the islamic conquest P.S : Coming from someone grown in an islamic country
Just found your channel following the Yasuke debacle and loved how thorough you've been in your history video. I would highly appreciate a series of videos comparing the daily lives of regular people across multiple cultures, locations, and time periods. Keep up the great work!
Persian women back then: becoming a fighter and a general and had more rights than any woman at that time. Persian women now: fights for her simple freedom because a bunch of turban wearers who are not even Persian, forcing them to wear head scarf.
@Monk_Chud no he's not. non of the rulers of iranians after the fall of the sassanids were iranian. in fact whoever wears turban is not an iranian/persian. All of them are legit enemies of persia.
@Monk_Chud well iranian and persian are different things, I don't know about Khameini, but there are several etno-cultural groups in Iran, persians, kurds, buharis, baluchi, etc...
During the Ottoman invasion women did help men defend their cities from the walls (At least in Hungary, the siege of Eger was famous for this reason). They threw stones, and boiling water on the head of the Ottomans. But they didn't really participated in direct combat.
There's a much earlier reference from the Bible around 1300BC: "But a certain woman dropped an upper millstone on the head of Avimelekh, and crushed his skull. He then immediately called the young man, his armour-bearer, and said to him, 'Draw your sword and kill me, lest men say of me, "A woman killed him." ' And his young man thrust him through, and he died." (Judges 9:53-54)
That's direct combat. Saying it's not is like saying a sniper, fighter pilot, submarine captain, or artillery man aren't martial artists. The Art of War doesn't talk much about melee combat but rather overarching strategy. Direct combat can be different than just close-quarter melee fights.
Love your channel! I know a great deal about some portions of history, but you have taught me so much more than I thought possible. I keep looking for more to study, and always start here.
There are also stories from the Peninsular War of women taking up arms to defend themselves or their towns & country. With the attitude, "If I'm going to be raped and murdered anyway, I might as well put up a fight!" There were similar cases in WWII also. The Russian "Nacht Hexen" being a good example.
@@bigguy7353 USSR fighter squadron 588 during the Great Patriotic War (WW2) was manned by women, flying at night primarily as night fighters. The Wehrmacht called them "Nacht Hexen" or Night Witches. Sabaton did a great song about them.
Well it was quite rare for women to succed, it had more to do with exploiting the weakness of men wanting to rape them by faking to seduce them. Didn't end very well most of time for those women anyways though.
You are talking about wars with guns. That is a lot different than women warriors fighting hand to hand. The gun is the great equalizer, even an eight year old girl can kill a large man with a gun.
One of the only things I remember in “GI Jane” is Vigo telling Demi about the Israelis having female soldiers in the 1967 war: “the men couldn’t get used to the sight of women blown open… They would linger over wounded females - often to the detriment of the mission, often endangering their own lives”.
@@Marta-zm8oe The natural protectiveness men have over women and how it can lower the effectiveness of male units? Or the fact that mixed units just don't work in combat situations based on mountains of modern evidence?
@metatronyt, thank you for the work you have done! I didn't even realize that instances of women participating in wars were not rare and go far back in history. 👏
@@metatronyt Of course, but as someone not specialized in historical science, I have three challenges: 1. Where can I find sources? 2. How can I find the right sources? 3. How can I find enough time to read all the sources? 😃
It’s always made me curious why some people thought women would never and could never pick up a weapon in defense of her home. Of course it was insanely rare to have an actual woman trained in the art of war, that has always been considered a man’s job, but women also lived in war torn areas. War doesn’t avoid towns and homes. If women didn’t raise arms, I feel like humanity would’ve died out long ago simply due to civilian casualties. What do these people think women did during war? Sit and wait to be r@ped and killed?
Unfortunately some men these days - actually - believe that women never did anything before 1960. They just sat inside and drank tea while the men were working and dying. That is how they view history.
Women did fight when the war came to their homes if they couldn't flee. But so did male children. Should we go around and say "look all these male pubescent and prepubescent children fighting"? Not really. Also your last statement is just ridiculous. Women fought when the war came to their home but it wasn't an often occurrence. Usually, they were captured with little resistance and either became slaves, concubines or even weded by the soldiers that captured them. Most women tried to flee and then got r*ped and captured and sometimes even killed. If male populations can be enslaved in masses, so do women. In fact it's far easier to enslave women. And no even if the few times women fought valiantly to defend their home didn't happen, virtually nothing would change.
Hey I was the one who left the comment on last video about the Bracari women. I'm glad they're mentioned here. As I said oral tradition here in Portugal says that the bravery of the Bracari women led to the Lusitanian women also picking up arms in defensive situations to defend their villages. I never implied they were a fighting force and if it came across that way I apologize. Again, based on oral tradition which should be taken with a grain of salt, Viriatus, leader of the Lusitanians, during the war of fire, told the women under his command (Lusitani, Bracari and Vettone) to bear arms and defend their children and their homes when the time comes, instead of being taken as sex slaves or taken advantage of by the enemy, or have them and their children be enslaved. "For he was (Viriathus), as is agreed by all, valiant in dangers, prudent and careful in providing whatever was necessary, and that which was most considerable of all was, that whilst he commanded he was more beloved than ever any was before him." - Diodorus Siculus "And, in fine, he (Viriathus) carried on the war not for the sake of personal gain or power nor through anger, but for the sake of warlike deeds in themselves; hence he was accounted at once a lover of war and a master of war. " -Cassius Dio "And yet the country north of the Tagus, Lusitania, is the greatest of the nations in Hispania, and is the nation against which the Romans waged war for the longest times." - Strabo, Geography (Book III Chapter 3 is all about the Lusitanians and how they waged war, a topic you should one day cover since Viriathus gave the Romans more problems than Boudica and a lot more names that are sung throughout history but didn't put such a fierce resistence nor were they as highly acclaimed as masters of war as Viriathus Edit: By the Romans themselves, who as you know is an extremely high honour) PS: Please leave a heart on my comment if you read it Metatron, no need to reply, just the acknowledgement you saw it would be a great favour
You're absolutely right, and your points highlight the physical realities that contributed to the disadvantage women faced in melee combat throughout history. Here's a more detailed breakdown based on what you've mentioned. 1. Height and Reach: On average, men are taller and have longer limbs than women, giving them an advantage in reach during combat. This longer reach is crucial in melee combat, particularly when wielding weapons like swords or spears, as it allows one to strike or defend from a greater distance. 2. Muscle Mass and Force: Men generally have more muscle mass, especially in the upper body, which translates to greater strength and the ability to deliver more forceful blows. This physical advantage is significant in combat, where striking power and the ability to wield heavy weapons effectively can determine the outcome of an encounter. 3.Armour Design: Armour was historically designed with the male body in mind, as men were the primary combatants. This meant that armour might not fit women as well, potentially reducing its effectiveness. Poorly fitting armour can hinder movement, leave gaps in protection, or be uncomfortable, all of which would put a female warrior at a disadvantage in battle. 4. Shield Wall Tactics: In historical warfare, battles were often fought in formations like shield walls, where soldiers would stand shoulder to shoulder to create a solid defensive front. The effectiveness of a shield wall depended on uniformity and strength across the line. If some soldiers were shorter or less physically capable, it could create gaps or weak points that enemies could exploit. Women's generally shorter stature and different body proportions could have made it more difficult for them to integrate seamlessly into these formations. In summary, the physical differences between men and women played a significant role in the dynamics of historical melee combat. These differences were not just about individual combat but also about how well one could perform in a tightly coordinated group, such as in a shield wall, where uniformity and strength were essential to maintaining the line and ensuring collective survival.
Add : Larger average heart which means greater oxygen circulation and thus activity energy. Pound for pound more efficient muscle. The ability to put on muscle at a significantly faster rate (in response to demand) due to testosterone. Hip design. Women involved in rigorous activities that involve heavy use of the hips and legs (ex: soccer) are about 5 TIMES more likely to sustain injury due to their hip structure. Male mental compartmentalization. If you look at physical performance levels within the American military, the biggest cross-sex overlap is best performing females and worst performing males. The physical performance potential between the sexes is HUGE. For every single woman that qualifies for SOF (Special Operations Forces) within the US Military, literally thousands of men do. And within 3 years, almost NONE of those women that qualified are SOF involved due to injury. The BEST performing female tennis players in the WORLD (within the top 10), can be easily beaten by very low ranking (200th for example) male tennis players. A number of years ago the US Women's Soccer Team was beat by a all male high school team.
We are build differently and that’s ok. There are and there were exceptions, but frankly this 1-1 warrior capabilities are only true in fiction or if the female character has extra powers. 😂
Before watching The most prominent ones i can think of from the top of my head were the Scythians, certain female warriors in Japan and women dressing up and pretending they were men to fight like in the 80 years war. It's also not hard to imagine that women although not actively going out participating in wars were still there defending their towns if they were getting attacked.
@@cal2127 Archery takes more strength than melee combat actually. War bows require more raw strength to use than swinging swords, a weapon that is generally on the lighter side. Though admittedly, Scythian warbows probably had lower poundages than say Mongol ones due to the lack of advanced armor during their time period.
@@Cherrywick76 Horse archers, such as the Mongols, used bows that had just over 100 pounds of draw weight. That is a hefty bow, _however,_ you need to consider that humans who live and work hard for a living and eat well become _really_ strong. For example, today's farmers are stronger than the vast majority of bodybuilders. Nomadic societies have a distinct and reoccurring aspect: men and women had far more equal respect for one another than in farming societies. This is because a nomadic person, no matter their sex, needed to know how to tend to, ride, and control a horse, as well as herd their animals and perform all the necessary manual labour for that lifestyle. The women could probably handle a 100lb bow given how much manual labour they did all damn day
It makes me so happy listening to your videos, knowing that there is someone who is historically objective and straight up scholarly and not influenced by contemporary fluctuations in opinions
The heroic figure of my home town of Nice is a heroine; Catarina Segurana. To be honest, she's become more of a myth than a truth, as many women helped defend the town against the invader alongside men and not all names were recorded. She was a professional washerwoman. Do you imagine the shoulders on that broad? She beat up a soldier with her board and stole his flag. I'm eager to watch your video. I expect you'll be talking about Boudicca and the Shield Maidens.
in defense of settlements everyone useful is needed regardless of fitness. in some cases people that arent useful would get eaten or thrown out by the defenders
Oh the recurring theme of "but, but women helped defend the village!" Dude, chill with the copium for a minute and think rationally. If a city is put into the position where it is forced to use women to defend, do you think it's doing so out of desperation or choice?
@@Crimea_River dude, there's no need to pick fights here. they weren't on copium or anything like that, hell they even said that most of the stories about her were more myth than truth. they were just sharing something interesting about their home town.
One correction I really think should be made is regarding your use of the phrase "go to war". What you mean is that men were overwhelmingly engaged in combat, however women DID go to war throughout history including in Antiquity where they served as camp followers, cooks, wives, prostitutes and all other manner of roles that allowed an army to function. We often ignore or dismiss these kinds of roles as our understanding of military history tends to focus exclusively on battles and politics, but they are essential to successful military campaigns. As the saying goes: "amateurs study tactics, experts study logistics", and women played a central role in logistics throughout history.
Humans are sexually dimorphic for a really good reason. We are honed by evolution to function as a team, and a team of specialists is ALWAYS more effective than a team of generalists. Generalists, while having no strong weaknesses, also can't have any notable strengths. On the other hand, specialists have specific weaknesses and specific strengths, and in a group the strengths of one covers the weaknesses of another, allowing for the group to be far stronger than one of generalists. Men and women have specialized traits that allow us to function really, really well as a team when we work together. Our bodies are obviously dimorphic, but less obviously _so are our brains!_ The male brain has specializations for task completion. It is readily able to compartmentalize emotional turmoil and strife with others in order to focus solely on the task at hand until it is done to help their group stay productive. The female brain has specializations for political organization. It is finely attuned to the emotional states of all other people around them and organizing logistical information in order to maintain a productive and healthy family group. The Indigenous societies of the Americas, which were still stone/copper age when their societal structure was documented, reflected this dimorphism advantage. (The reason their technological age is relevant is because humans evolved the above mentioned traits during the stone age. Modern societies are structured in a way that actively hinders us from utilizing our specializations properly) Tribes were ruled by one of their female elders, and the chief was the leader of the tribe's men. The elder would know the history of the tribe and had observed its triumphs and failures. She would also know all of its occupants and their relationships well. The Chief would organize and lead the men of the tribe to complete necessary tasks such as hunting, warring, building, or moving their camps. He would seek the council of the eldest woman as for what those tasks needed to be. They didn't always agree and would need to work it out or call for the rest of the tribe's opinions to settle disputes. The elder would handle all of the internal disputes between members of the tribe to ensure nothing festered and caused the tribe to fail. Both the Chief and Elder were integral positions to their societies and are a good example of a strategy that utilizes each sex's strengths to their fullest advantage. Having women accompany armies, even if they aren't fighting, was definitely a huge asset due to their ability to keep morale high and maintain the order of the group by tamping down infighting. Genetics isn't black and white, however. There are plenty of men who are more emotionally/ politically attuned than the average, and there are plenty of women who are more task oriented and practical than the average. These more 'male brained' women would be the type that could make for female warriors, and they certainly do exist.
@@Madonnalitta1 Exactly! Women and men are equally as valuable to society as each other for reasons that aren't apparent to many, unfortunately. Because a lot of our modern societies are male dominated, with women purposefully pushed down, their inherent strengths are rendered invisible to many. We live in an unbalanced world right now :(
@@Madonnalitta1 Exactly! Women and men are just as important in a society as the other. Unfortunately many of our societies are male dominated and render the strengths and roles of women invisible. We live in an unbalanced world right now...
In Iranian mythology, women warriors are mentioned and are not treated strictly as magical. Two examples are Gordafarid and Banu Goshnasb (banu is Persian term for lady). Gordafrid is mentioned in the history of “Rostam and Sohrab” where she dons armor and combats Sohrab in a one-on-one combat. She gives Sohrab, who has supernatural strength and is a great warrior. She gives trouble to Sohrab but is eventually defeated. when Sohrab takes of her helmet to cut her head off, he is struck by her beauty and let’s her go (some lesser poems say that she has a son by Sohrab called Borzu). Banu Goshnasb is the daughter of the mythical Scythian warrior, Rostam (he is referred to as “Sagzi” which is a variation of Saka which is the Persian word for the Scythians, and he rules his fief of “Sistan” which is a corruption of the original word “Sakastan” or the “Land of the Saka” or essentially “Scythia.”) She like her father is an immensely strong and a skillful warrior. She proclaims that she would only marry a man who could defeat her in combat. She kills the losers and it is only when her father tells the warrior Giev how to beat her that she finally marries. On the wedding night she attempts to kill Giev but Rostam interferes and saves Giev. Giev and Goshnasb have a son called Bijan who figures in several of Shahnameh’s best stories. However, Goshnasb is not directly referred to in Shanameh. Only that Bijan is son of Giev and grandson of Rostam, therefore, Rostam’s daughter had married Giev. Goshnasb has her own epic called “Goshnasbnameh” or “Book of Goshnasb”, written about 100 years after “Shahnameh” by an unknown poet.
Another famous warrior was Thomyris, Queen of the Massagetae, known for killing Cyrus the Great of Persia. She's something of a folk hero in Khazakstan.
Egyptian history knows several queens leading troops in the war. Some Ahmosidic queens Tetisheri and Ahotep (17th/18th dynasty) have been buried with weapons (golden stride axle, dagger). The last Ahmosidic queen was Hatshepsut who was also depicted with the blue crown (war crown) and seems to have lead some military excursions until her nephew Thutmosis III became the warlord.
Но они изображались в мужской одежде и с мужскими париками, чтоб ассоциироваться с мужчиной. Просто в тот момент не было супруга-мужчин. При его появлении, вся клоунада закончилась
@@СергейСмирнов-ю2п There is a temple where Thutmosis III is depicted with the civil double crown of both Egypts, whereas Hatshepsut wears the military blue crown.
@@gottfriedheumesser1994 это разовые исключения из 3000 лет истории Египта. Как женщины-войны. Это факт исторический. А про корону может быть много версий. Там же нет надписей конкретизирующих событие
This is a great topic! I know you focused on European and Eurasian ancient history in this video but I'd love for a part 2 and 3 and 4 even! In part 2 you could cover these other ancient women of martial renown::: - Rome during the second Punic War (according to Livy) had many female auxilliaries doing camp duties but who were expected to fight alongside the men in the case of emergency for defense - Queen Amanirenas of Kush who led from the frontlines of the battlefield in a campaign to stop Roman Emperor Augustus and after a bloody war of attrition was successful in negotiating a peace treaty - The Spartan women; according to Plutarch, when King Cleomenes III was away from Sparta, his mother and sister organized the defense of the city and led the women in battle - The Trojan War story of Epipole of Carystus who snuck into the war dressed as a man but upon being revealed as a woman was stoned to death; thus showing the ancient Greeks' admonition of the practice of women participating in war (or at least the Euboeans') - Artemisia I of Caria, another Boudicca type example of leader of armies who actually participated in the battles, had a complete set of armor given to her by Xerxes, and was mentioned by Herodotus - Tomyris of the Massagetae who led her army into battles and personally beheaded Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid Empire after defeating him in battle - The 3 Macedonian royal women recorded to fight on the front lines including Cynane, half-sister of Alexander the Great who personally slew the Illyrian queen Caeria while defeating their army - Lady Fu Hao, notably from the steppes was one of the three wives of King Wu Ding and a general of the Shang dynasty who waged war against all the neighboring enemies of the Shang. Her tomb was found to have 16 human sacrifices and was filled with weapons from China and the Steppes. - The Qin Dynasty, according to historian Sima Qian, "In the army of the First Emperor [Qin Shi Huang], there were many women who had earned the title of 'swordsman'. They fought alongside men and were known for their bravery and skill in battle." - I was actually going to list more from China but apparently there are hundreds of examples of lady warriors on the battlefield from the different dynasties of ancient China In part 3 you could cover women warriors from the Middle Ages: - Dihya or Al-Kahina a possibly Jewish charismatic leader who united the Berber tribes and fought against the Muslim expansion into North Africa at Numidia before dying in battle at a well that still bears her name near the El Djem Roman amphitheater - Rani (Queen) Durgavati of Gondwana who rode an elephant into battle and sustained many arrow injuries defending against the Mughal invasion and killed herself rather than surrender when defeat was imminent - laqa Beki, Chinggis Khan’s daughter, inherited troops from her father and had “several thousand women serving her. Whenever they go campaigning, they behead and kill,” - Khutulun, Chinggis Khan's great-great-granddaughter was actively involved as a warrior in battle and was noted for her battle prowess and being her father Kaidu’s best warrior - Shazhi, who was ethnically Chinese but fought for the Mongol Empire, galloped into battles alongside her 10,000 troops earning the Mongol Empire’s highest military and civilian position - Queen Isabella I of Castile who showed up to personally command sieges in full armor to rally her troops - Countess Caterina Sforza who personally trained her troops and was noted to fight weapons in hand until her capture by Cesare Borgia - The scandinavian shield-maidens including the famed Lagertha - The Norman Lady Sichelgaita of Salerno who personally led sieges, was wounded by an arrow, and charged at her own men with spear on horseback to stop them from fleeing - Jeanne Laisne and the women of Beauvais who helped fight off the Burgundians - Isabel of Conches who was known to command battles armed in full knight's arms and armor - Countess Joanna of Flanders who saved the town of Hennebont in Brittany, riding in arms and armor rallying the townspeople to defense before finally leading 300 men out of the town to burn down the enemy camp - The Italian artist Onorata Rodiani who dressed as a man and served in a mercenary band as a cavalryman before dying defending her hometown of Castelleone - 'Big Margot', the Flemish standard-bearer who died in the Battle of Westrozebeke in 1382 - Women from Western Japan were noted to often join cavalries during the Kamakura and Sengoku periods - During the Ōnin War of the Sengoku period many Japanese women, both noble and peasant, joined armies and fought in battles - Tomoe Gozen, onna-musha samurai who served under lord Minamoto no Yoshinaka was noted as killing several other samurai in battle. - Lady Hangaku Gozen, onna-musha samurai of the Taira clan who commanded 3,000 warriors and personally defended the castle at Tossakayama, killing many enemies until she was shot by an arrow and captured and kept in the Shogun Minamoto no Yoriie's court where she met and married Asari Yoshitō, one of his retainers, later bearing him a daughter - Lady Chacha/Yodo-dono, concubine of Toyotomi Hideyoshi who got caught up in the succession war after his death, actively defended Osaka Castle with several of her maids also dressed in armor and forced a treaty (it was later betrayed and she committed suicide with her son) - Yoshioka Myorin-ni, onna-musha warlord of the Otomo Clan whose battlefield exploits defending her territory became legendary to the point Toyotomi Hideyoshi offered her to be Guardian of Tsurusaki as a retainer but she turned him down to live a quiet life - Ōhōri Tsuruhime, a priest's daughter who took up the mantle of onna-musha to defend her island against an invading samurai fleet. Known as the 'Joan of Arc of Japan' she claimed divine inspiration to lead the defense and even supposedly dueled and killed the enemy commander Ohara Takakoto on his flagship - Triệu Thị Trinh from Vietnam who freed them from Chinese invader control in the battles of Lang Bac and Hanoi; she was specifically noted to bind up her large breasts for battle to be a more effective warrior In part 4 you could cover right before the modern era::: - All the pirate queens/captains of the pirate era during the age of sail (too many to list) - Queen Suriyothai who fought atop her elephant during the Burmese-Siamese War and died in a duel with the Viceroy of Prome who was chasing her husband down after his elephant panicked - Queen Hangbe and the Dahome warrior women of Benin - Empress Yaa Asantewaa of the Ashanti who upon being invaded by the British who demanded the royal golden stool she waged war on them, saying "I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight until the last of us falls in the battlefields" and she was very successful until the British brought in heavy artillery to defeat her whereupon she was exiled to the Seychelles - Queen Nzinga Mbande of the Mbundu who personally led her forces into battle against the Portuguese, even all the way into her 60s, after a slave trade deal went wrong and successfully fought them off for her entire life - The Cheyenne warrior women - Otazu no kata, one of the last onna-musha samurai who personally died fighting to defend her home, Hikuma Castle, and after being offered a peaceful surrender when they were overwhelmed with a promise for the women and children's safety Otazu rejected it by saying: "Women we may have, and they are born samurai. None who live here would dare submit their home to their enemy" - Ikeda Sen, onna-musha samurai and lord who fought in several battles with her army in a Teppō unit (matchlock rifles) - Ueno Tsuruhime, onna-musha samurai who led 34 women in an ill-fated charge out of Tsuneyama Castle against the Mōri army during the Bitchū Conflict - Nakano Takeko, martial artist and leader of the Jōshitai (Girls’ Army) who fought with naginatas against the Meiji regime for the Ainu - Niijima Yae, last onna-musha samurai of the Hoshina clan who fought as a gunner in the Boshin War before serving as a nurse in later wars - Maharani Tarabai Bhosale, regent of the Maratha Empire personally led her cavalry charges and movements against the Mughals - Rani (Queen) Velu Nachiyar and her commander Kuyili fought against the East India Company with Kuyili dying in a suicide attack which won Velu's throne back - Uda Devi Pasi, Indian freedom fighter killed as a sniper in the Battle of Sikandar Bagh - Rani (Queen) Lakshmibai Of Jhansi, Indian freedom fighter who fought several battles but died to a sabre wound while charging the Irish hussars as cavalry - Lakshmi Sahgal, Indian freedom fighter who was an active fighter in the Indian National Army where she was known as Captain Lakshmi and formed a women’s division called the Rani of Jhansi Regiment - Onake Obavva of Karnataka who fought the forces of Hyder Ali when she saw them trying to sneak in a hole in the rocks of her fortress home she used her Onake pestle as a bludgeon and killed many of them as they tried to enter 1 by 1 - Rani (Queen) Kittur Chennamma of Kittur, fought alongside her lieutenant against the British East India Company until her capture
*Fun fact:* Boudica was played by Sîan Philips in the 1978 miniseries "The Warrior Queen". Pretty crazy that roman Empress Livia and barbaric queen Boudica were played by the same actress 😅
I knew about the Sarmatians, but it was a surprise how this tradition remained for so long in pretty much the same area despite the seemingly constant dramatic changes of new ethnic groups moving in and taking control.
The practice was for sure abandoned among Western Sarmatian tribes after they became Romanized Foederati. No sources indicate their (I mean Amazons) presence at all in the armies of Alans of the 5th century, like the ones who fought at the Catalaunian plains. Generally, the tribes who migrated to the and bordered Rome would have phased the practice out, because only male warriors would have been able to serve Rome as mercenaries / Auxilia, and service with Rome was quite a lucrative prospect. I suspect it may have remained in practice longer among the Alan tribes of the East (near the Caucasus, which lasted much longer into history than the Western Alans, although there is no evidence for them after the 3rd century.
The Indo-Iranian steppe nomad warrior women make sense because the presence of horses might balance out the physical advntage of men. The added power and momentum of the horse.
This is why I'm shocked we are an anti weapon culture, and then complain that women are victimized daily. Women benefit most from weapons. @@elivenya-theautisticbookwy9638
The Amazons were known for their mounted archers. The bow and the horse are both tremendous equalizers, and horses are at their best when used by lighter riders.
@@bob7975 Bows are not good equalizers. The Romans had their strongest men trained as archers. Mounted archers like the Amazons use small bows for ambushes and hit-and-run tactics.They were famous for ambushing the Greeks in the forests. The crossbow is a good equalizer because it requires less training.
I think there would have been many incidents in wich trained soldiers invaded towns or settlements who's ferocious women would risk eveything protecting what they had. A powerful aspect of humanity brought forth in combat that would inspire myths and legends.
Jeanne Louise de Belleville, de Clisson, Dame de Montaigu the Lioness of Brittany, was a French/Breton noblewoman who became a privateer to avenge her husband after he was executed for treason by King Philip VI of France. She crossed the English Channel targeting French ships and often slaughtering their crew. It was her practice to leave at least one sailor alive to carry her message of vengeance.
It would've been interesting to see your perspective on the Dahomey, who were female African warriors infamous for contributing to the transatlantic slave trade, according to some European sources I've found in the past.
The use of women warriors among the izayges calvary makes sense. Since the weight of a horse is the primary force driving lances and to a lesser extent swipes from swords and picks. As archers most eastern war bows were not at the great draw weights like the English longbow. While women CAN march in kit they CANNOT march as well as proven by marine Corp studies. So the physical disadvantages become severe for heavy infantry such as used in Roman Legionares and Greek Hoplites. Without armor bladed weapons are great equaliser as a knife will kill a 220# man just as quick as a 100# man or woman. I think with modern combat we need to separate reality from ideology. Soviet women were fantastic snipers and pilots, but do not make sense as infantry were they have to run carrying a kit that weighs as much as they do. The soviets did not use them as shocktroops, paratroopers, tankers. A woman is just as capable of valor as a man. But valor does not make doctrine. Combat Effectiveness makes doctrine. In bringing women into combat arms we should acknowledge the differences and play to their strengths instead of lowering the standards which also headway for weaker men as well. If we are to utilize women as snipers today we need to tailor the kit to a specialized unit based on what they can carry and still be mobile. I hope this video adds to more practical consideration. Because the battlefield is amoral and apathetic. It either works or doesn't.
@@paulodelima5705 Actually despite not having stirrups spears were used on horse back going back to the ancient assyrians. And the Romans themselves had calvary using akontes (short spear), contarri calvary (who used lances), and cataphractarii who used the Contus (heavy 2 handed lance) Also pikes were used by Hoplites throughout that era. Even though I had never mentioned pikes.
The difference in strength is probably not even the main reason why most warriors were men, and women warriors were exceptions. It's the demographic impact : a country can lose most of its men and bounce back in one generation through polygamy, Paraguay in the 1860s for example. Can't do that if you lose most of your women, how many children each can have is much more limited. As a result, with the exception of individual volunteers, women were only pressed into combat as a last resort, if a defeat would be total so there was nothing to lose.
@@ClockworkGearhead no, do ants use their queens as shock troops ? Strength is incidental. Men definitely were naturally selected for strength (as they were doing all the hunting and fighting) but even without that, the army would still be mostly men.
That may have been so initially, but in a logical world, this stops being an issue once a nation's population gets over a certain threshold. In the real world, for the past millennium or so, aside for a few particularly bad exceptions (like WWII), no country ever dedicates even close to 1% of its total population to an army, so the impact of losing much of would be minor to none for most populations. So while that may have been the initial reason, most armies only continued to do so for the simple reason of tradition, i.e. "because that's how it's always been". In a more logical nation, and one which has no concern in demographic loss were a whole army wiped out (such as most countries in the modern world), if conscripting, rather than automatically just taking all of a certain gender, they would analyse potential on a case by case basis, and conscript those. For example, just from a physical perspective, it makes more logical sense to conscripting everyone who fits into a certain height and weight range as opposed to haphazardly based on gender alone, which would not only be fairer, but also in fact result in a higher quality army. This sort of methodology has been practiced in the past by the way (and sometimes in the present), but usually only for certain specialised branches of military, as opposed to whole armies. Never the less, my point is, regardless of the origin, the true reason most have operated this way for the past millennium or 2, has been as arbitrary as "because that's how we've always done it", and not much beyond that.
As a woman myself, once I think about things like raping and looting, being taken hostage, and the numbers of women who die in childbirth.. Can societies really afford to lose women on the battlefield? If you just look at the math of how many people the population can grow by, just with a few extra women, after 2 generations, the exponents are crazy
I've heard that logic but I feel it really only is a concern for small tribal societies. For kingdoms and empires you have such a large population you can more than the women who want to fight fighting. Most women are not going to want to fight and most are not going to want to join armies. It's always going to be a minority. Letting women fight won't risk the population to a kingdom or empire with that context. It's not like anyone is arguing 100% of women should join the army, most men would never fight as well.
@@Fordo007 Yeah but one woman can have 10 kids and each of those 10 kids can have ten kids... The reason why they don't want the women to go in fight, is if they lose a lot of their men, they're able to use those women to make up the numbers quickly, but if you just lose 1% of women that's a large result of future population, it's just about exponents, exponents get big.. And also I think it's a hierarchy type of thing, like what do you value as a society, the safety of your women and children, or people having decisions and freedom
@@Fordo007 So I can see a handful of women serving, but no society could afford to have an institution that supports or encourages the idea... Unless they are stories about women warriors that have different metaphors and motivations for the story
@@claudeyaz I really think the population angle is overblown. I don’t see civilizations at kingdom or empire or even large cities viewing their women as a crucial resource with how frivolous they were treated in every other context. It’s supply and demand, if women were a finite resource then they’d be valued and protected and vaulted. Most cities and kingdoms protected their men and women the same. Men fought sure, but I doubt protecting women for population growth was a major concern beyond typical conquest consequences. Steppe tribes had women very much in combat alongside men and triode societies did quite well for themselves. Seems sensible to increase the amount of warriors you have by using your women. If your foes are going to kill you all or take your women from you, why make it easier for them? If the women die then the consequences would be no different then if they did not.
There are two main reasons women generally don't compose the main forces of battle. The first is that we tried letting the men stay home to nurse the babies, but that didn't work so well. The second is that a civilization can afford to lose the vast majority of its men and still retain a viable breeding population. A society that loses most of its men can fully regenerate itself within a generation. A society that loses most of its women is doomed to a swift extinction. Men don't fulfill the role of warriors because we're more important, we do the most dangerous jobs because we're expendable. Women keep the hearths because they're more valuable. That's not an opinion, it's a biological fact of life.
Very true. But imagine a battle where both armies are equal in number and roughly equal in weapons/gear and fighting styles. One army is half women, the other is all men. No other than a fool would expect the first army to win.
Pretty much. There is a reason there's no surviving people who have had a hundreds of years long tradition of mainly female warriors. It's simply not sustainable.
Did it happen? Yes. Was it the exception and not super common? I would say yes. Does this mean that men would always win? No. Do men have an advantage and would they probably make for better warriors than women? I would say yes.
@@nocomment6421 Depends, what caliber is the gun? If she is 6 not going to be that high. Is he enraged? Is she able to aim in the time alotted? Variables sir, variables.
@@als3022 na bro, even a tasergun is enough. in Reality there is no berserk mode or power of freindship. you get shot? You are done. No anime stuff happens afterwards,
@@nocomment6421 nope... not unless she is well trained and can even pull the slide back. My 9 year boy old travel soccer team, 5th in state baseball team, struggles to pull the slide back on my glock. in fact I dont think he could do it in a stressful situation... Guns are not one shot one kill unless you hit the heart of the brain, most men can survive multiple gun shots. For instance in WW2 my Grandfather got a purple heart for and bronze star for dragging 2 soldiers out of the front lines (at the same time), and he was shot multiple times in the process. His twin brother (who was 1 of the 2 he dragged out, different unit, that happened to end up on the same battlefield), was shot MANY times by a German machine gun also lived, though he never truly recovered from in injuries and died 25 years before my grandfather did at age 84.
fun fact! Cu Chulainn once defeated a giant who was supposedly stronger than all men in the world combined, but Scatach thought he was too weak to fight her younger sister (Aife).
You should look up Indian queens (not mythology ) who fought against the British and Portuguese .They were trained in warfare and actually went on the battlefield leading armies .Rani Laxmibai ,Kittur Chenamma ,Abbakka Chowta ,Velu Nachiyar are few of the examples .
I have some input for the women as a warrior or queen from India 1. Jijabai Shahaji Bhonsale, 12 January 1598 - 17 June 1674, also known as Rajmata, was one of the best Mothers who raised Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, the king who is the Idol of India. 2. Punyashlok Ahilyabai Holkar May 1725 - 13 August 1795 She was one of the queens who fought and sustained Swaraj and Building temples: She built hundreds of Hindu temples and Dharmashalas across India, including the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi and the Gauri Somnath Temple in Chola. 3. Maharani Tarabai Bhosale As the regent, Tarabai took charge of the war against the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's forces. Tarabai was skilled in cavalry movement and made strategic movements herself during wars. She personally led the war and continued the fight against the Mughals. A truce was offered to the Mughals in such a way that the Mughal emperor promptly rejected it, and Tarabai continued the Maratha resistance.
But one thing is important, when women fight, they do with spears, ranged weapons that makes a good use of distance with the attacker (very useful if you are physically weaker), and horses that enhances the power of any weapon if you attack.
Cú Chulainn Is pronounced Ku-Kull-ain. Just an fyi. Also Scathach is the woman’s name in the myth not part of Cú Chulainna name. Not sure where you got Dornolla from?
the i is not pronounced. There are 3 accepted Irish pronunciations of Cú Chulainn depending on dialect (such as Ulster, Leicester, and Connacht dialects): ku kull-an, ku hull-an and ku [x]ull-an. [x] is called a voiceless velar fricative is it like the j in ojo the Spanish word for eye. ku [x]ull-an is what most people I've spoken to prefer. ku [x]ull-an is also how my Irish mythology book has his name pronunciation written in the name guide at the back of the book.
I wonder if some of these accounts were the writers trying to emasculate enemy warriors and bolster their own. . “Their men are so weak they had to send women to fight us!”. Aside from that, it’s clear professional female warriors were the exception, rather than the rule. Also women taking up the sword to fight when faced with being conquered makes total sense. To borrow a line from Éowyn “those without swords can still die upon them.”
Whenever I dig into this topic, I notice a lack of "female warrior culture" and more like "tolerant females in warrior cultures." While each culture has it's own unique quirks, there tends to be commonalities among the women we find in these groups. Such as: 1) their higher tolerances in general for violence and aggressive behavior, 2) pair bonding and breeding behaviors geared to creating physical superiority in their offspring, 3) and the caregiving and rearing of children to be physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially primed for a warrior based lifestyle. It seems to me that the women in these groups tend to not be warriors themselves, but rather have adjusted to the culture they exist in making them more warrior-like than women outside of these groups. The proverbial "know how to use a sword, but have never picked one up" situation. Which means while they might not have been warriors themselves, if needed they had the ability to become one more easily and quickly.
There was an interesting example in Sparta, as compared to Athens. While Athenian women were locked indoors and basically used as breeding material, Spartan women were raised to be independent and strong. Spartans even had their own variant of "olympic games" where women competed - which was looked upon with horror by other parts of Greece. Women needed to do everything, because men were mostly training to be warriors. Women were also trained to be physically strong, because they had a belief that only a strong woman can give birth to a strong man. To provide strong warriors, both sexes had to show that they were strong.
@@MagdalenaBozyk That's true, but we also have to be careful here. I hope Metatron will agree with what I am saying because I don't want to speak for him incorrectly, but from this video, I feel he's doing a very good job at saying that we have to separate the truth from the desire to 'romanticize' the female warrior. Just as with men, since the beginning of time all women have had to 'defend' themselves. All women were, are, and will be capable of defending themselves in a bad situation from their primal survival instincts to the actual learning of self-defense strategies and tactics. While this means they can defend themselves, and might suggest they know how to fight if they need to....this doesn't make them warriors. To be a 'warrior' even in the historically warrior culture is a way of life, a unique mindset. Warriors were, and still are, usually always a subset or sub-culture within the group. The best way I can describe this is the difference between a person who trains in martial arts vs a person who trains in combat arts. Both arts will teach fighting skills, weapons training, and provide excellent physical and mental conditioning. But when it comes down to actually being a real fighter...well...while both people can say they 'know' how to fight, we have to be honest, one of these people is actually training to be a real 'fighter' and who is preparing for, and will actually be in, a real fight soon were it's them against an real opponent, and there is only going to be one winner. And this is why I say that women in warrior cultures probably were more 'warrior-like' than women in non-warrior cultures; but this doesn't mean they themselves were actually warriors. These women would be like those people doing martial arts. By being surrounded by and immersed in a warrior culture, they absorbed fighting knowledge and experiences, but for the most part, never actually fought themselves. Instead they acted as a support force to their warrior culture. Now obviously there were female warriors. We have found graves with females in both the West and the East indicating that they were buried with the honors of a warrior. These people wanted to be buried as a warrior, and the people who buried them agreed that they deserved a warrior's burial. We have records and stories of female warriors both fighting and supporting in battles, wars, and defense actions. I find these things wonderful and it shows how able women can be in a fight. But we also have to calm our passions and accept these women are not the norm. When we look at the actual evidence for female warriors...even in warrior cultures...these women were not common. I think the point of Metatron's video is that if we examine a lot of the evidence for female warriors, the evidence is being misunderstand or skewed by modern filters and might actually suggest that the women we think of as 'warriors' were not really warriors but rather women in who a bad situation rose above it, and did what they had to do to overcome it. But we need to ask ourselves was this them being a warrior in the moment, or were they really always warriors and the moment showed us who they really were. Both options are possible, so we need to accept both realities can exist and not say one is truth over the other.
The fact that they had women in armor within some of those units says otherwise. But yes, it wasn't that common is what the point is. They didn't have entire units of only female soldiers just units thay included women.
@@iateyursandwiches Well that's just it, we have to be mindful that a handful of one-off situations only means that we have a handful of one-off situations. At the end of the day, it might not actually "say otherwise." What I often encounter on this topic, is a modern desire to create a historical reality that's not being proven (and is often directly contradicted) in the actual historical record itself. The problem with these types of forums is that they allow generalizations to skip over a lot of very important details and nuances. A great example of this, I recently saw a video here about Maltida...now here's a lady who we can prove 1) Did have armor made for her. 2) Was extremely active in the military campaigns. 3) Was on the battlefronts and in the camps before major battles both victories and losses. This video clearly wanted to paint the picture that she was a 'warrior queen.' The problem is that there is no proof she actually fought, trained, or did anything in these battles to suggest being a warrior other than be there. In fact most of the first-hand sources suggest that she was kept specifically from the fighting, and we have letters from some of her own army commanders who were complaining that her being there was a drain on their time, resources, and man power to protect her in her tents during the battles. Suggesting that she wasn't actually fighting, but rather acting as a commander or maybe mascot role...which the armies don't really seem to appreciate when she was around. So the question becomes, does wearing armor, commanding, and being present at a battle make one a 'warrior'. Some will say yes, some will say maybe, some will say not really. I suppose all are justifiable, but what we must be mindful of is that we cannot say she WAS a warrior, or a warrior queen, as if it is an absolute truth. Which is what I see happening quite a lot on YT these days. I mean it's like saying that a person who dresses up like a firefighter and goes to burning buildings MUST BE a firefighter. Well...no....they don't HAVE TO BE a firefighter. They could just be a normal person doing something abnormal and getting noticed for their abnormality.
Very interesting. A supplementary note if I may. The woman at Argos was on the roof oh a house and hurled a roof tile against Pyros. Actually that was a common practice in ancient Greece when the enemies entered the city. That was another contribution of women to a battle within an urban environment
That's what religion of peace does to a country. But I can guarantee you it's not gonna stay like this for long. Edit: I want to add that the culture of people is good but the government is still Islamic. Anybody who's been to Iran knows that people and government are 180 degrees apart.
@satana8157, are you trying to do the islqm bad Christianity good argument cause swissztland a Christian nations had womans rights in 1972 to vote while turkey , predominantly a islamic nations was thr first of its kind in 1930
@@satana8157 Timurids, Mongols, Macedons, Arabs, Russians, Brits With all of their glory came and went but Persia remained, a bunch of brains dead terrorists won't be a match for the land of the kings
Milunka Savic- female soldier of Serbian army in WWI, most decorated female warrior. She was known in the Europe at the time. She was awarded the French Légion d’Honneur (Legion of Honour) twice,[4] as well as the Russian Cross of St. George,[3] the British medal of the Most Distinguished Order of St Michael, and the Serbian Miloš Obilić medal.[6] She was the sole female recipient of the French Croix de Guerre 1914-1918 with the gold palm attribute for service in World War I.
@@RLDragonStrider Yes, exception. But Serbia didn't conscript girls. She went in the army instead of her sick brother. She pretended to be him. When they found out that she is woman, they let her stay in the army. Point is, that she was a very good soldier.
My issue is the potrail of women warriors as common in TV. It was rare and thats why it was such a big deal when their was a woman warrior. Vikings the TV show is bad about this with an entire army of women. We should treat women warriors in TV as the rarity that they where. Give them the respect they deserve
And also give the women who pulled it off their due. Saying they were common undermines the women who did it. They had a ton of get through and they pulled it off. That is a credit to their efforts. To say it was common spits in their face and their efforts.
How about not portraying women as "warriors" at all. If they did exist, they'd be done in quickly by other male warriors who would 10 times stronger than her.
@@LalaDepala_00 Should we put in child soldiers in every TV show about war to satisfy women's narcissistic need for representation? Because I'm pretty sure more male children fought in war than women did
Also probably worth noting, that in media skilled male warriors are almost always depicted as big and strong. Where as the female warriors are almost always depicted by short skinny women. With notable exceptions like Brienne of Tarth from game of thrones. A woman who can hold her own with a man, is gonna be fairly tall and bulky as far as women go.
I enjoyed this a lot, and particularly appreciated the discussion of warrior women in Irish myth, even if the conclusion that they are allegorical figures was a bit deflating having grown up on tales of Cú Chulainn. Not unexpected though. By the way, it is pronounced koo-KUL-in. I thought your "I don't know how to say that, so I'm just going to show it" quite charming.
"Could be effective to a certain extent?" - due to "to a certain extent" the answer to such a question is always yes. For there is always at least a nanoscopic extent.
Hey Metatron. There were some notable female warriors in Ethiopian history: - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gudit - Is said to have laid waste to the Axum empire after it's long decline following the loss of control over the Red Sea and possibly other environmental issues. - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_expedition_to_Abyssinia - Two Oromo queens, Werkait and Mostiat, were crucial in helping the British lay siege to emperor Theodore. - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furra - Might not have existed, but was supposed to have ruled for 7 years. Notorious for oppressing men, particularly the short, old and bald ones.
Singular exceptions, which will always exist, are not the point. I think he is trying to deal with the modern lefty notion that women were commonly warriors who simply haven't been given the credit they are due.
There are the Agoji of the Dahomey kingdom known as the Dahomey Amazons too. Along with a few other less known examples like Rozvi women were said to have been involved in battle.
Splendid video! Really impressive in terms of depth, yet in could compress all of that in just a 30 min video and without it ever feeling tedious or like it stretches for too long. :D I could add to that the account of the famous story about Kan Krum of Bulgaria and the Cup made of Nikephoros I's skull. This practice is possible to have stemmed from older Scythian traditions, but the main point here is that after Nikephoros burned Pliska (the Bulgar empire's capital city, which was actually larger than Constantinople btw) after a successful sneak attack on his way back he was ambushed and killed. The important part in relation to the video however is, that due to his army sustaining heavy casualties, Krum went and called for every Man and Woman, anyone that could bear arms to following him in pursuing Nikephoros. And among them were a significant portion of women as well. There are also some instances in Bulgaria (like those mentioned in the video) of women warriors (which they initially thought were Asian/Mongoloid males until they sequenced their DNA and looked at their chromosomes). Another aspect hinting at a potential link with the Sarmatian culture and traditions is the Artificial Cranial Deformation which was typical for the Bulgars, in addition tot he mounted horse archery among others.
Another note that is worthy to be made, is that according tot he latest genetic data from various studies it may not be certain whether those tribes like the Kutrigurs and the Utigurs, altho at the current this is still the postulate about them, but in regards to their relation to the Bulgars it may hint otherwise. The latest data regarding the Bulgars shows they were not Turkic as far as the genetic aspect is concerned. The cultural aspects topic will likely be reopened after the latest studies are published, but considering the tribes like the Kutrigurs and others are thought to be predecessors of the Bulgars and if the Bulgars are not Turkic. it's quite possible the Kutrigurs were not either. Now I know that many ppl will try to point to the "Slavic Sea" hypothesis, theorizing that "the Bulgars were a small Turkic minority elite, which got assimilated by the numerous Slavs ans other local populations", but the data from all the various genetic studies shows that wasn't actually the case. On the contrary, the Bulgars turned out to be the prime component among the modern Bulgarian population's genetic admixture with more than 40% on average. Further more, the sequenced Bulgar samples (including elites) even from the early Danube Bulgaria period all showed the same general lack of both Turkic and Slavic DNA. In fact, we also know exactly when the intermixing with the Slavic populations happened, it was shortly after the Christianization of Bulgaria around the 9-10 century AD and since then the Bulgarian genetic admixture hasn't changed that much as far as the ancestral aspect is concerned. Btw props on your pronunciation of Kutrigurs and Utigurs. :D
Man. You come in at the best of times with this subject. As I am a writer working on a book and I have a culture that has both men and women participate in war. (their society being more equitable than ours if you will) I'll definitely enjoy this. (And hey! 10 mins in and I already learned a thing or two which could help in my own book.)
As a fellow writer, I wish you the best of inspiration and courage in your writing. I like the topic myself and am always curious to see example of it done right.
I taugh a lot about this tipes of fictional society and I never found a good answer for this problem. Can you answer me how this society deal with the atrition and recovery of numbers since women are dying in greater numbers then other societys? How they haven`t been eliminated?
With the controversies in the female boxing competitions at the Olympics still very fresh, it would of course be possible that women with birth defects giving them extra testosterone would have lived 2000+ years ago as well and would be quite a bit stronger than a normal woman. Furthermore, there are several occupations. Depending on your job you would gain more or less strength. Which untrained conscript would have a better chance in a fight: a blacksmith or a scribe? It's not too too hard to imagine that there were women doing hard work that would have built up some muscular strength. And finally, it's not too hard to imagine that if the men of a small, primitive village left their village for war and left the women behind with only a handful young boys and old men behind, that the women would have been learned a trick or two by their husbands or fathers to defend themselves in case of an attack (not necessarily to fight, but maybe to shoot a bow, use slingshots, etc. Anyway, keep up the great work! I truly love these videos!
We should however remember. Modern sports, especially at high levels such as the olympics. Are plagued with performance enhancing compounds that did not exist historically. A woman on Anavar has much better odds than a woman not an Anavar when facing an un-enhanced male. Though she is still heavily disadvantages, the disadvantage is much smaller than it would naturally be.
Imagine the ferocity and viciousness of those Women protecting their village. Willing to die to protect their children, I can see why the Romans were shocked
Men have upper body strength and women have lower body strength. Men VS. Woman with a spear, all a woman has to do is piss off the man enough to come charging at her, then kneel down, with a tight grip of the spear and use her legs and the thrust of her arms to basically do an upper cut with the point of the spear to his gut and he is instantly dead.
I am an archery instructor teaching instinctive style with recurve bows, and i can tell you that women often learn archery more quickly because they often listen better and pay more attention. I have definitely had some male students who picked it up very fast. But as a generalization, it seems like women pick it up / improve quicker than men. Sure they can only pull 1/4-1/2 of the poundage that men can. But you could definitely have an effective contingent of women archers fighting alongside men, perhaps they would be better in a flanking manuever or ambush where they could get closer to the enemy to make up for their reduced range (due to lighter bows). They would be great for harassing the enemy.
I am a woman and if I was alive during those times and my children and husband had already been slain, I would absolutely go to battle. Why not? Literally nothing left to lose. Women weren't in battle because of the patriarchy but because they are important and protected to make the next generation. 😊
The Russian Chronicles tell us that the region of the steps was constantly being invaded due to its geography. It's not surprising then that they would have women along with the men as full time defenders of their cities. An invading force might be surprised to see well prepared female warriors in numbers coming out to meet them in battle beside the men.
To me it just wouldn’t make sense with how tough life was to just keep a population growing with birth mortality rates. If you have women risking their lives in battle along with child birth , you would have no chance with your civilization
Yeah. People are desensitized to how hard the world was to successfully bring children into. If you have to give birth to 5-10 babies for 2 of them to survive to adulthood. When exactly are you gonna have time to go off and be a warrior? And what responsible politician is even going to let you if you have the time, when the health of the society relies on populations self replacing/growing?
There's not an enlightened rational overseer optimally and correctly deciding what every single person does, maximising group benefit and utility. History is a mess of millions of individuals making choices. The evidence is very clear that as now some women have always served in combat roles. It doesn't have to be optimal for population growth, lol. It's also not optimal for population growth for women to become nuns instead of mothers, but plenty did just that.
Great video, and check out Milunka Savić of more recent times. Found out about her from a Sabaton song. 'Lady of the Dark'. As for the other side of the world, I saw a few youtube videos the implied you did NOT wanna mess with Comanche chicks, and the Cheyenne had a few warriors of female persuasion. Wish I had more time for your videos, being a history buff, but with job and much time spent on historical research. . . Stay awesome!
Really enjoyed your video but was a little disappointed that no mention was made of some of the burial site discoveries in Scandinavia where skeletons of a few high-status individuals, initially believed to be men because they had been buried with weapons, were in fact skeletons of women that bore obvious combat scars. Certainly not evidence of armies of shield maidens but also certainly reflective of the relative high status of viking-era women in contrast to the rest of the Europeans. It was an interesting video. Thank you.
Nowadays, in countries like Iran and Afghanistan there's a lot of girks who dress up like boys in order to help sustain their families. It happens in Asia too. And we're supposed to believe that didn't happen in the past. We remember the ones that got recognized, like Joan of Arc, but the vast majority of them probably didn't want to be noticed and burnt.
boudica was not a very good tactition. Her only success was when she had a full army against a virtually abandoned city. When the Romans found out about the attack they sent 2500 roman soldiers and 200 slaves. After they were easily defeated she went on to sack a couple other virtually undefended cities. During this time the Romans were scraping together an army of about 10 thousand men. half of which were veterans who were not in active service and would have been older than the average roman soldier. despite having more than 10x as many soldiers as the Romans she went on to lose decisively.
the things she did during her rule : attack defensless villages raze to ashes town (inculding the inhabitants male female children slaves) commit mass executions on civilians ambush small roman armies and finaly lose to an inferior force wow great job Boudica you killed more of your own ppl than romans woaw i wonder what the ppl of England are going to say about you thousands of years later : she was a strong independant women who led her ppl to freedom and victory... ah ok... well eeer no comment
As you were talking about the archaeological evidence, you mentioned how we can't know the women buried with weapons and armour actually used these in battle. While this kind of makes sense to me, as there are known instances of queens wearing ceremonial armour in more recent history, it also made me think: have there ever been cases where male burials have been questioned in a similar way? Like, if a skeleton of a teenaged boy was found with armour and weapons, would they consider that he was maybe a high-status leader's son who was buried with ceremonial armour although he had never seen battle, or would people just assume "oh, he was a bit young, but he was definitely a warrior"? There have also been cases of burials being mis-identified as male burials simply because of the weapons present. This doesn't mean that women warriors were common, but it seems to me that there was a time where archaeologists didn't even consider the possibility, which may have contributed to misinterpretation of data.
Because teenaged boys are more common in war than women were? I mean a teenage boy is stronger than a grown woman. One example is the US women's soccer team who were the champions lost to a bunch of under 15 teenaged boys 7-1 in a game. Biology itself debunks your arguement.
@@fyrdman2185 what argument? I know that male warriors were the norm on the battlefield and that in general, men have a physical advantage over women. I never disputed that, nor did I make an argument to the contrary. What I did say was that there might have been reasons for male non-combatants to be buried with weapons and armour, but that this may not be taken into consideration because it was so common for males to be warriors.
We have evidence of several female burials who were buried with weapon and showed clear signs of violent disorganized wounds that caused death(or would have caused their death). So plenty of these females burials with weapons have more evidence that, they were buried with weapon. Its true though, that in some cases we cant know if they ever fought, that is also true of graves with male skeletons. I think you are absolutely right that, we would almost never question why those graves contained weapons but we do almost every time its a grave with a female. To which degree is i think impossible to say. What we can say, and what is interesting, is that we have several cases from Scandinavia where a viking burial which have been considered a burial of a male warrior turned out to be female, and only after that discovery was the persons likelihood of being a warrior questioned. Took me a second to think of the article but i believe it was this one, though im not certain. It was however the same find they talked about. www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/viking-warrior-women-reassessing-birka-chamber-grave-bj581/7CC691F69FAE51DDE905D27E049FADCD
Fu Hao tomb of the Shang dynasty, other nearby tombs present her as a warrior queen using oracle bone script, her personal tomb is full of weapons and scripts mentioning her achievements.
Fun fact: the name Cú Chulainn means the Hound of Culann.. he was born Setanta but killed Culann's guard dog and the took the role of dog unto a new dog was old enough... The druid then rename Setanta to Cú Chulainn. A key player in his death, Queen Medb was later killed when she was hit in the head by a piece of cheese while bathing.
Actually Metatron in the 18th century in The Philippines, there was a female rebel warrior name Gabriela Silang who led a militia to fight against the Spanish Crown to seek revenge against the Spanish who they murdered her parents when she was a little girl.
@@pepita2437 yes she did. she assaulted the city of Vigan in 1763. the Spanish retaliated causing her and her troops to retreat back to Abra. they were eventually captured and executed by the Spanish but she did definitely participate in direct combat
I think part of the problem is people greatly overestimate the strength required to inflict a lethal blow with just about any weapon. For a variety of reasons we mostly don't see warrior women, but it shouldn't challenge your worldview to see women fighting under the right circumstances even if rare.
Exactly. For anyone who disagrees with this comment, go watch Skallagrim's latest video (for future readers: It's about the lethality of seemingly tame Kendo cuts) A skull can be cut into with just a structured tap from a sword. It's an edged bar of steel, it's gonna do some damage! The only time strength truly matters in weaponized combat is when it gets down to hand to hand, such as wrestling or hooking with your weapon. Striking with full force isn't something you often do with a weapon (outside of particular oprotune moments, of course) because you will gas yourself out and perish to a gentle jab in the face by a spear.
This. Some sad people really think the "physical stronger" thing is a valid Argument but it just simply isnt. If it would be we would be bulking all day and not invent more Dangerous weapons. Like Metatron saidein one of His last Videos this discussion is closed since stone age. A person with a knife wins against a strongman pretty fast or even If he does Go down the strongman wont live to tell the story either.
Armour didnt helped them to much in the arm race since we dont use them anymore or at least had to Change them completly and people still die on the Battlefield
I have a very scientific feeling that when a village / encampment would be attacked, every body would fight with all their might. That women in general would go to war as a regular business, well, women give and care for life, war is death.
Do you have any scientific or historical evidence other than your "scientific feeling"? Is your "scientific feeling" quantifiable such that you can, with statistical analysis, show the significance of veracity in your "scientific feeling"? If you understood the Socratic Method, then you would understand that there is nothing scientific about your feeling. Read any high school science book and learn about the Socratic Method. Learn what types of research are acceptable for providing scientific and historical evidence.
@@zuhlie Also be careful of context, the ability to do something does not mean it was done, or done regularly. It is certainly true that women of the Steppes Nomads learned to ride almost as soon as they were born, like the men. Its also probably true that the bow and sling were considered acceptable weapons for women. So it makes it attractive to think this is a potential military force.... Problem is most of these women would be using hunting bows, which are much lighter than war bows, with MUCH lighter draw weights. Even for large game in the USA hunters don't tend to use more than 60 lb draw bows, usually around 40 - 50. A War Bow would be 100 lb or greater. Its not about hitting power here, its about RANGE. So while its attractive to think such women could be used in war, the reality is the tribe or he clan would likely only do so if they literally had no other choice. Thats assuming you could prove it happened. While I think it probably did, I also think it was rare, but I make that statement KNOWING AND UNDERSTANDING the lack of proof behind it. Its like I firmly believe that part of the sorry of the process of man domesticating the wolves that eventually became dogs is a couple of kids coming back to their parents with some abandoned pup's they found, for the parents to hear that dreaded refrain.... 'Mum, dad, can we keep them? Why do I have that opinion? Because its exactly what I would have done as a child, and in fact DID, drove my parents insane! Again, I have no proof of this ever happening, but I am also convinced that humans have not really changed that much in the last 20,000 or so years...... To make a TLDR: Feeling is never scientific, but you CAN make such predictions IF YOU HAVE SOMETHING that can back such predictions up, and make them potentially feasible. But you can never argue them, and should evidence come to light that disproves them... well such feelings are to be discarded like the trash they have become.
Number 1 woman warrior is Queen Amanirenas , she killed off Rome and ran them out , as Rome ran from Her and the greatest warriors the kushites, they were able to kill them off and dropped all further Roman expansion plans. Kushites are a greatest warriors.
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Well as a leader you just need to inspire people not actually fight. When people point to the sexual dimorphism it's that they want to point out that an army consisting of women is not competitive in almost any circumstances. Not that there can't be a female leader who can score a win with the help of the mostly male army.
In times of crisis you want everyone to contribute. That is why in WW2 teenage boys would be sent to the front. Are they gonna be as effective as grown-up trained soldiers? No not even close. But it is better than not having no additional fighters at all.
Interesting fact about female soldiers (aka warrior women) from WW2: There where some female soviet pilots flying bombing runs against the German forces.
I also hate hypothetical comparison "man v Woman" as if war were a sport. War is not a sport because there are too many variables to consider such as weapons, formations, ambush or battle. I also found feminine armor ridiculous in movies
@@kinghenryxl1747is it because of limited movements from the armor?
Given the sheer number of human beings who have ever lived, the answer to almost any historical question is 'Yes, but'.
We have records of women dressing up as men and participating in modern wars. So it's not far-fetched to think that happened in the ancient ppl's wars as well. But as you said, it was more likely the exception rather than the norm.
US Civil War had the most of any US war before modern times. At about 700 to 800 women pretending to be men and fighting.
@@13thMaidenMulan
@@als3022 There was a 2.WW documentation with still living soldiers from that time. A german, who was in the Wehrmacht of that time described how those beside him were just shredded apart by anti air cannons at the eastern front, used against them. When they finally reached the position, those who had manned these anti air cannons had all been women.
@@miriamweller812 That's as they approached Stalingrad. And yup, Soviet AA unit (1077th Anti-Aircraft Regiment), so a unit that was supposed to be behind the lines, but pressed into frontline service to slowdown the German tanks. They fought to the last gun.
And you'll find plenty others serving in the Soviet military in combat roles in WW2 as well. The widow who bought and then drove a tank to avenge her husband's death. The Nightwitches. Various snipers. But even there, with the USSR , the female combatants are generally kept in "safer" positions... snipers rather than front line troops. Night ground attackers rather than fighter pilots or daytime bombers. And, of course, manning the AA guns. About 5% of their military was women. And they did suffer losses. For the women snipers, for example, about 80% didn't survive the war.
As an aside, there is a 2015 movie about one of those snipers: Battle for Sevastopol.
in Aztec mythology, Ilhuuicatl-Tonatiuh is the afterlife place where warriors would go when they die. It's also where women who died giving birth would go, symbolizing that they were equal to warriors as they died in the battle of childbirth.
Because both are among the greatest sacrifices that people make according to the natural role that a woman or a man has in the community.
Spartans were similar, male Spartans only got a gravestone for dying in battle, and Spartan woman only got a gravestone if they died in childbirth
very funny lol
it's to mention that 10% of woman died in childbirth back then, therefore the legends of woman who give a men many children without dying. With every child the risk of the woman dying increased therefore many men who had more as 4 or 5 children not only hoped for non additional kids bc of money but also to not lose their woman. Sure this isn't the total number of births cause 2 to 3 kids died during childhood which drives the amount of births to 6 to 8 which is a giant strain on the woman. Woman back then had to have their own heroism to make it back then. 2 to 3 pregnancies are considered today as straining it nothing against ancient times with 3 times the amount.
So back then woman were half of their life time between 15 and 30 years pregnant. After that many couldn't go on with giving births cause some exceeded over 10 pregnancies before they reached 30. Many knew back than that it's the semen of a men which gets the woman pregnant so a certain birth control was possible. But this didn't always worked out so even after 6 to 8 pregnancies of which 4 to 5 children reached adulthood, often additional non wanted pregnancies occurred, with high risk of stillbirths and/or the woman dying. Such circumstances of many woman have 10 pregnancies before reaching 30 in ancient times sound horrifying for today's 'modern' woman who have 1 kid between 30 and 35.
Based
This is one of my favorite videos, thank you :) I’m from North Caucasus and in our folklore there are still legends of female warriors that have survived till this day. In Chechen folklore they were exceptional mounted archers, usually first born daughters and unmarried. These legends are indeed remnants from the ancient world, as the Sarmation influence reached the North Caucasus but didn’t really go past to the South Caucasus. In Chechen language the word for dragon is Sarmak and since the word is so similar to Sarmat (Sarmation) and because of their Scale Armour (like a dragon) - we believe that our word for dragon was coined during that time :)
Also makes a certain amount of sense with the plains nomads like the Sarmatians. A huge portion of their method of war was in lightly armoured, fast moving horse archers, which the women of the tribe could manage given that even the women were trained to ride almost from birth, and in many cultures the bow was an acceptable weapon for women.
So essentially you have a pool of somewhat trained women that you can draw on if the tribe is in a really bad place and needs more bodies who can ride and shoot now, even if they are not capable of some of the more complex manoeuvres simply because of lack of practice. In the right situation those women could mean the difference between survival and death for the tribe.
Even with the Sarmatian's its probably not something they did very often, but the option was there if they needed it....
@@alganhar1 I think there's also something to be said for the lower carrying capacity of steppe nomad societies. One of the reasons women warriors are generally inefficient is because more warriors can be made if women don't fight (and die) as long as there's enough food to grow the population. If food is relatively scarce, there's more impetus to employ women in hunting, raiding, and expanding your territory. The horse as a force multiplier just meshes perfectly with this survival strategy.
Who do you think are the Sarmatians’ closest modern-day descendants?
@@Farlough1337 miqvars sakartvelo :)) 🤍❤️🤍 greetings from Chechnya
@@anastasiya256 Genetically speaking, the Sarmatians’ closest descendants are today North Caucasians, and the Ossetians even still speak an Iranian language that traces back to the Sarmatians. (Ossetians call themselves decendants of the Alans) You can also see some genetic Sarmation influence in southern Russia and Ukraine. Plus, the Alans (a Sarmatian subgroup) migrated west and mixed into populations in places like France and Spain. Even Polish and Hungarian nobles once claimed Sarmatian roots :)
No sexy waifus fighting in bikini armor, short skirts, while wielding a giant sword? Disappointing.
Indeed my friend
No, that was the Scottish! 😅
Hey at least you had celtic man fighting naked
@@Madonnalitta1 And if you swapped the giant sword for an axe or two, Vikings.
Personally I believe the reason there are so many female warriors in Dungeons And Dragons novels is actually to reference female players who don't want to play as a man. Though for the sake of story telling "Good character so who cares."
Only reason it stopped working in movies post 2008 is the "Good character" part was taken from us.
Strange Women Lying in Ponds Distributing Swords is No Basis for a System of Government! 2024!
To be fair, literary sources give it a higher success rate than any other system of choosing leaders.
Look if some moistened bink was lying in a pond and lobed a scimitar at me they’d put me away!😂😂😂
By Sigmar they don’t even worship a real god!
Please please people! I'm am in a haste, who lives in that castle?
No one does. We’re an anarcosyndiclist commune…🤣
I would like to say I really am refreshed by you. So much of stuff today is biased and so actually hearing a honest and realistic, impartial discussion is so nice. Thank you again.
I’m glad to hear that.
@@metatronyt Take it from a guy who constantly tries to do research into ancient history and keeps hearing modern talking points or biased views veiled as facts is like nails on a chalkboard after a time. Who knew you can have an interesting discussion on history without constantly bringing up your politics! Honestly its like we forgot how to think... Thank you for restoring my sanity!
I once had a Scottish friend tell me that inland/highland Scots never needed feminism because "have you ever tried telling a Celtic woman what she can and cannot do?". That is a woman who's competent in a donnybrook though and not a participant in warrior culture. The Japanese villager woman who learns Yari - because if the village is attacked everyone dies if not everyone participates - is a very different tale from a woman who leaves home and goes through trials and initiations into a warrior's subculture. Making the distinction between capable fighting and "a warrior" really changes how you would interpret the answer.
Your Scottish friend is bang on! Those ladies need to be so bold because of how particularly rowdy Highland men are! It's nice being told off once in a while, it keeps your ego in check :)
It doesn't necessitate that they are warriors, but if they needed to fight they certainly would. There is, as you mentioned, a difference between a warrior and a fighter. Warriors are trained to be violent by trade and are paid for their specialized focus on violence. They are usually not productive members of society in other ways.
A farmer, male or female, defending their home from invaders and winning doesn't make them a warrior. It makes them a hell of a good fighter, though!
In fantasy writing, there is an extremely justifiable case to be made for a woman to be a warrior. As Metatron showcased, there are genuinely documented cases of female warrior cultures. But the author needs to set up their societal structure and environment in a way that would actually encourage and produce such a culture.
@@necroseus Fight like a farmer. Win.
My Scottish clan has a saying here: There is no Gunn control in Texas, especially the women. 😉🤠😆
Bro, a small percentage of women were/are warriors, but not the majority or even half of them. Even among the Iranic nomads (not among all of them, for example, excluding Alans who didnt have such female warrior tradition) the graves with armed women were not so common, about 20% of all warrior graves*. Even in a modern Western armies women make up less than 20%. And even in Israel with a mandatory military service for women less than 40% of idf soldiers are females... Its just a biology, not a s exism or something.
*"About 20% of Scythian- Sarmatian “warrior graves” on the lower Don and lower Volga contained females dressed for battle as if they were men"
David Anthony. The Horse, the Wheel, and Language (page 329)
@@jus_sanguinisNoone in the comments or the video is argueing that "most women were warriors". It is your own head that does that.
Also, for nomadic or semi-nomadic populations like those in central Asia, the normality of camp life and frequent movement on horseback would suggest the necessity for both men and women to be proficient riders and archers.
When the men are away hunting or fighting it's the women who have to protect the herds & camps from bandits.
İndeed. İt's beyond silly that such nomadic people's females couldn't ride horses😅, and can't use a bow.... I mean, yes maybe (?) not for war but one must know archery at least for hunting, and protection from wildlife, like wolves etc...... They had family as everyone but additionally had herds to protect....
And knowing that is a good way to aid your men's army when needed too. Like as skirmish groups to rain down arrows from sides....
Nice informative video man!!
Please read about Indian female warriors and queens as well , just for an example start with ' Jhansi ki Rani - Rani Laxmibai '.
Come off it, Metatron: have you never watched Xena: Warrior Princess? 100% historical. 🗡
It’s like he has never watched game of thrones, also 100% historically accurate
Practically a documentary
Exactly! Don’t let those Xena-phobes tell you otherwise
And 100% awesome 🎉🎉😂❤
😂
As great as Boudica is, I hate how British propaganda became obsessed with depicting her revolt as one of the most important events in the history of the entire empire, even though her greatest achievement was committing a few massacres before being beaten in combat. Queen Zenobia literally took Egypt from the romans for years, and yet she gets much less recognition than Boudica.
100%
She fled the field and committed suicide. Top of the line female hero. I can't see modern women acting any differently.
She only lasted about 6 months and achieved nothing..
@@PentaRaus
Zenobia by the other hand accepted defeat and let herself be captured. Aurelian got so impressed he even let her live in Rome
Zenobia gets 0 attention. That's criminal. Of course, I doubt feminists would appreciate seeing her humiliated in chains, displayed as a captive in a Roman triumph.
Historically, men have been expendable; however, women weren't, as they were needed to maintain the population.
Not true
@bulletflight that's quite annoying misconception. Man is main food producer. You need more guys to feed population.
@@AaSs-ln9mm To say that men are the main provider of food, is probably only true in some societies.
And in those the lack of men, would not prevent women from providing food, a lack of women will at a point lead to the fall of a society.
@@AaSs-ln9mm Women can farm, but men can't have babies. Societies can survive with very few men, but would totally collapse without women due to the lack of population growth.
In raw terms, that's just how it is.
@@AaSs-ln9mmIn what fantasy world? In the real world men were constantly leaving for war or exploration. I'm Portuguese, during the Age of Discoveries, in the XV and XVI centuries there was only 1 million of us... For an empire that spanned the world. Many adult men left never to return, leaving mostly the very young, very old or very sick. Women held this country for centuries, often keeping the least desirable cuts from farmed animals (look up tripas à moda do Porto) so they could send the best cuts to the men.
I mean imagine that your tribal community is living on the middle of an open steppe in its yurts, without any fortification. For miles there are basicly no natural barriers like forests or rocky mountains, so when your enemies come for you there is literally no place to hide, the only option is to try and fight them back in the open with everything you got. Probably this is the main reason that in many central asian nomadic cultures women were also expected to learn atleast the basics of light cavalry warfare, they simply had to know how to defend themselves and their homes.
True but based on the evidence i could gather in this comment section fighting works like Videogames.
Man are physicly stronger than woman. So a woman can never defeat a man in physical Combat.
If she has a weapon, she can win but Not If the man has the same weapon too because of the physical Advantage. This even counts in a gun Fight. If a man and a woman use guns the man wins because of His physical stats.
Thats why only man can beat man but only when they are stronger of course. Rome for example never won because of weapon Advantages or tactical Advantages its because their man were able to lift much more than their enemies. Obviously thats why the germanic people overthrow rome because they were physicly stronger than the Romans.... seriously why do people argue like this?
Well actually women were mostly taught how to use war bows on horses since generally women are better at it than men.
It basically boils down to the fact that their type of warfare was based on horse archery. Both the horse and bow being equalizers.
Those who do not have swords may still die upon them
Another point is armies win and lose on logistics. Male biology is just better for logistical issues with stamina and hygiene differences. But if you are nomadic and bring everyone with you anyway... might as well have the women fight, you have already paid the logistical cost to get them there after all.
I don't know if it is general true, but the examples I know of for these nomadic steppe cultures seems more brutal as well. Could be that it takes a curtain level of callousness to send women into combat. Though this might be my bias as I personally think it is barbaric to put women in combat roles.
There were two great female generals in Iranian history. One is *Pantea Arteshbod,* who served under the army of Shahanshah Cyrus the Great and played a tide-turning role in the Battle of Opis in 539 BC, when the First Persian Empire defeated the Babylonian Empire, allowing Cyrus to enter Babylon.
The other is *Apranik,* a Sasanian military commander who led the army of the last Sasanian Shahanshah Yazdegerd III against the Arab invasion in 651 AD. After the Sasanian defeat at the Battle of Nahavand in 642 AD, she took command of many surviving forces and mounted an ongoing guerrilla war against the Caliphate, particularly in northern Iran.
Yeah, this is true. I have read about this. Women also had a bit more freedoms under the Achaemenids, they could enter the army, they could own businesses and be bosses of men.
There was also Artemisia, a Greek queen fighting as an ally to Xerxes I during the second Persian invasion of Greece, especially in naval battles
I'm not sure but I've heard that Persians had a woman Navy general who led the Persian fleet against the Greeks during the battle of Salamis
And than came Religion of Peace
@@CordeliaWagner1999 I hope you don't mean islam cuz that's anything but the religion of peace
Their campaigns is literally called the islamic conquest
P.S : Coming from someone grown in an islamic country
Just found your channel following the Yasuke debacle and loved how thorough you've been in your history video. I would highly appreciate a series of videos comparing the daily lives of regular people across multiple cultures, locations, and time periods. Keep up the great work!
I remember my grandma telling me, i dont care what they tell you in school all battles were fought by women
Granma is my nemesis
@@metatronyt XD same. I just had to make the joke dude
@@metatronyt She will meet you on the battlefield!
That's probably true if you replace "by" with "because of".🤠
lol, I get the reference.
Persian women back then: becoming a fighter and a general and had more rights than any woman at that time.
Persian women now: fights for her simple freedom because a bunch of turban wearers who are not even Persian, forcing them to wear head scarf.
@Monk_Chud no he's not. non of the rulers of iranians after the fall of the sassanids were iranian. in fact whoever wears turban is not an iranian/persian. All of them are legit enemies of persia.
@Monk_Chud islam is not Persian.
@Monk_Chud well iranian and persian are different things, I don't know about Khameini, but there are several etno-cultural groups in Iran, persians, kurds, buharis, baluchi, etc...
It wouldn't be so bad if Persia stayed sunni. Blame the Safavids.
@@aselliofacchio shia is not islam either . try again.
Having offered critique to your earlier video, I feel this went a good distance in addressing concerns I had. Good job.
During the Ottoman invasion women did help men defend their cities from the walls (At least in Hungary, the siege of Eger was famous for this reason). They threw stones, and boiling water on the head of the Ottomans.
But they didn't really participated in direct combat.
There's a much earlier reference from the Bible around 1300BC:
"But a certain woman dropped an upper millstone on the head of Avimelekh, and crushed his skull. He then immediately called the young man, his armour-bearer, and said to him, 'Draw your sword and kill me, lest men say of me, "A woman killed him." ' And his young man thrust him through, and he died." (Judges 9:53-54)
So what you said is that women will practice self-defense when attacked. So will a two year old and a dog.
Women TYPICALLY contributed to city and castle defense in the middle ages.
@@Sandlin22 So, you don't have kids, eh? Two-year-olds are pretty much incapable of self-defense. As for dogs, it depends on the dog.
That's direct combat.
Saying it's not is like saying a sniper, fighter pilot, submarine captain, or artillery man aren't martial artists.
The Art of War doesn't talk much about melee combat but rather overarching strategy.
Direct combat can be different than just close-quarter melee fights.
The more important question is - do women exist?
What is a woman? 🤷♂️
Don't be ridiculous man obviously they don't exist
Legend has it, tis said to be one of the most beautiful creatures on planet earth!
Sometimes
can you define a woman
Love your channel! I know a great deal about some portions of history, but you have taught me so much more than I thought possible. I keep looking for more to study, and always start here.
There are also stories from the Peninsular War of women taking up arms to defend themselves or their towns & country. With the attitude, "If I'm going to be raped and murdered anyway, I might as well put up a fight!" There were similar cases in WWII also. The Russian "Nacht Hexen" being a good example.
"Nacht Hexen" is German. So how's that Russian?
@@bigguy7353 USSR fighter squadron 588 during the Great Patriotic War (WW2) was manned by women, flying at night primarily as night fighters. The Wehrmacht called them "Nacht Hexen" or Night Witches. Sabaton did a great song about them.
@@danielseelye6005well they were very few though.
Well it was quite rare for women to succed, it had more to do with exploiting the weakness of men wanting to rape them by faking to seduce them.
Didn't end very well most of time for those women anyways though.
You are talking about wars with guns. That is a lot different than women warriors fighting hand to hand. The gun is the great equalizer, even an eight year old girl can kill a large man with a gun.
One of the only things I remember in “GI Jane” is Vigo telling Demi about the Israelis having female soldiers in the 1967 war: “the men couldn’t get used to the sight of women blown open… They would linger over wounded females - often to the detriment of the mission, often endangering their own lives”.
And that is the excuse for some defending not having women in the military and front lines?
@@Marta-zm8oe The natural protectiveness men have over women and how it can lower the effectiveness of male units? Or the fact that mixed units just don't work in combat situations based on mountains of modern evidence?
@@als3022 Natural?
IDF soldiers on the other hand cannot get enough of the sight of mutilated women and children.
.@@als3022 Not seeing a lot of natural male protectiveness ofwomen in most wars particularly the IDF against unarmed civilian women
@metatronyt, thank you for the work you have done! I didn't even realize that instances of women participating in wars were not rare and go far back in history. 👏
Absolutely and thank you for watching. There is more than people expect for sure and all you need to do really is to read the sources :)
@@metatronyt Of course, but as someone not specialized in historical science, I have three challenges:
1. Where can I find sources?
2. How can I find the right sources?
3. How can I find enough time to read all the sources?
😃
It’s always made me curious why some people thought women would never and could never pick up a weapon in defense of her home. Of course it was insanely rare to have an actual woman trained in the art of war, that has always been considered a man’s job, but women also lived in war torn areas. War doesn’t avoid towns and homes. If women didn’t raise arms, I feel like humanity would’ve died out long ago simply due to civilian casualties. What do these people think women did during war? Sit and wait to be r@ped and killed?
Unfortunately some men these days - actually - believe that women never did anything before 1960. They just sat inside and drank tea while the men were working and dying. That is how they view history.
You actully want an answer?
Yes.
Women did fight when the war came to their homes if they couldn't flee. But so did male children. Should we go around and say "look all these male pubescent and prepubescent children fighting"? Not really.
Also your last statement is just ridiculous. Women fought when the war came to their home but it wasn't an often occurrence. Usually, they were captured with little resistance and either became slaves, concubines or even weded by the soldiers that captured them. Most women tried to flee and then got r*ped and captured and sometimes even killed.
If male populations can be enslaved in masses, so do women. In fact it's far easier to enslave women. And no even if the few times women fought valiantly to defend their home didn't happen, virtually nothing would change.
If the invaders were in a mood to take slaves. They would likely be enslaved. That's it.
@@nocomment6421 you think women only recently began having fighting spirits?
Hey I was the one who left the comment on last video about the Bracari women. I'm glad they're mentioned here. As I said oral tradition here in Portugal says that the bravery of the Bracari women led to the Lusitanian women also picking up arms in defensive situations to defend their villages. I never implied they were a fighting force and if it came across that way I apologize. Again, based on oral tradition which should be taken with a grain of salt, Viriatus, leader of the Lusitanians, during the war of fire, told the women under his command (Lusitani, Bracari and Vettone) to bear arms and defend their children and their homes when the time comes, instead of being taken as sex slaves or taken advantage of by the enemy, or have them and their children be enslaved.
"For he was (Viriathus), as is agreed by all, valiant in dangers, prudent and careful in providing whatever was necessary, and that which was most considerable of all was, that whilst he commanded he was more beloved than ever any was before him."
- Diodorus Siculus
"And, in fine, he (Viriathus) carried on the war not for the sake of personal gain or power nor through anger, but for the sake of warlike deeds in themselves; hence he was accounted at once a lover of war and a master of war. "
-Cassius Dio
"And yet the country north of the Tagus, Lusitania, is the greatest of the nations in Hispania, and is the nation against which the Romans waged war for the longest times."
- Strabo, Geography (Book III Chapter 3 is all about the Lusitanians and how they waged war, a topic you should one day cover since Viriathus gave the Romans more problems than Boudica and a lot more names that are sung throughout history but didn't put such a fierce resistence nor were they as highly acclaimed as masters of war as Viriathus Edit: By the Romans themselves, who as you know is an extremely high honour)
PS: Please leave a heart on my comment if you read it Metatron, no need to reply, just the acknowledgement you saw it would be a great favour
That's really interesting! Thank you for this.
Agree. Women's oral tradition is important.
Thank you very much for this video, especially the part about burial in Brougham was really fascinating.
You're absolutely right, and your points highlight the physical realities that contributed to the disadvantage women faced in melee combat throughout history. Here's a more detailed breakdown based on what you've mentioned.
1. Height and Reach: On average, men are taller and have longer limbs than women, giving them an advantage in reach during combat. This longer reach is crucial in melee combat, particularly when wielding weapons like swords or spears, as it allows one to strike or defend from a greater distance.
2. Muscle Mass and Force: Men generally have more muscle mass, especially in the upper body, which translates to greater strength and the ability to deliver more forceful blows. This physical advantage is significant in combat, where striking power and the ability to wield heavy weapons effectively can determine the outcome of an encounter.
3.Armour Design: Armour was historically designed with the male body in mind, as men were the primary combatants. This meant that armour might not fit women as well, potentially reducing its effectiveness. Poorly fitting armour can hinder movement, leave gaps in protection, or be uncomfortable, all of which would put a female warrior at a disadvantage in battle.
4. Shield Wall Tactics: In historical warfare, battles were often fought in formations like shield walls, where soldiers would stand shoulder to shoulder to create a solid defensive front. The effectiveness of a shield wall depended on uniformity and strength across the line. If some soldiers were shorter or less physically capable, it could create gaps or weak points that enemies could exploit. Women's generally shorter stature and different body proportions could have made it more difficult for them to integrate seamlessly into these formations.
In summary, the physical differences between men and women played a significant role in the dynamics of historical melee combat. These differences were not just about individual combat but also about how well one could perform in a tightly coordinated group, such as in a shield wall, where uniformity and strength were essential to maintaining the line and ensuring collective survival.
He made an entire video about historical references and you're whining about advantages over disadvantages
Stfu
Add :
Larger average heart which means greater oxygen circulation and thus activity energy.
Pound for pound more efficient muscle.
The ability to put on muscle at a significantly faster rate (in response to demand) due to testosterone.
Hip design. Women involved in rigorous activities that involve heavy use of the hips and legs (ex: soccer) are about 5 TIMES more likely to sustain injury due to their hip structure.
Male mental compartmentalization.
If you look at physical performance levels within the American military, the biggest cross-sex overlap is best performing females and worst performing males.
The physical performance potential between the sexes is HUGE.
For every single woman that qualifies for SOF (Special Operations Forces) within the US Military, literally thousands of men do. And within 3 years, almost NONE of those women that qualified are SOF involved due to injury.
The BEST performing female tennis players in the WORLD (within the top 10), can be easily beaten by very low ranking (200th for example) male tennis players.
A number of years ago the US Women's Soccer Team was beat by a all male high school team.
I would like to add pregnancy to the list.
@@Amy_the_Lizard Not to mention periods. Which for most of history where not within a womans control.
We are build differently and that’s ok. There are and there were exceptions, but frankly this 1-1 warrior capabilities are only true in fiction or if the female character has extra powers. 😂
Before watching
The most prominent ones i can think of from the top of my head were the Scythians, certain female warriors in Japan and women dressing up and pretending they were men to fight like in the 80 years war.
It's also not hard to imagine that women although not actively going out participating in wars were still there defending their towns if they were getting attacked.
even then horse archers werent in direct melee combat if they could help it
@@cal2127 Archery takes more strength than melee combat actually. War bows require more raw strength to use than swinging swords, a weapon that is generally on the lighter side. Though admittedly, Scythian warbows probably had lower poundages than say Mongol ones due to the lack of advanced armor during their time period.
@@Cherrywick76 Horse archers, such as the Mongols, used bows that had just over 100 pounds of draw weight. That is a hefty bow, _however,_ you need to consider that humans who live and work hard for a living and eat well become _really_ strong. For example, today's farmers are stronger than the vast majority of bodybuilders.
Nomadic societies have a distinct and reoccurring aspect: men and women had far more equal respect for one another than in farming societies. This is because a nomadic person, no matter their sex, needed to know how to tend to, ride, and control a horse, as well as herd their animals and perform all the necessary manual labour for that lifestyle.
The women could probably handle a 100lb bow given how much manual labour they did all damn day
@@Cherrywick76 I think a woman that spent her life doing hard manual labor could draw a 100 pounds bow. That was a harsh life they had to live.
@@Cherrywick76 The bows used for horse Archery is smaller, requeires less strength to use.
It makes me so happy listening to your videos, knowing that there is someone who is historically objective and straight up scholarly and not influenced by contemporary fluctuations in opinions
The heroic figure of my home town of Nice is a heroine; Catarina Segurana. To be honest, she's become more of a myth than a truth, as many women helped defend the town against the invader alongside men and not all names were recorded. She was a professional washerwoman. Do you imagine the shoulders on that broad? She beat up a soldier with her board and stole his flag.
I'm eager to watch your video. I expect you'll be talking about Boudicca and the Shield Maidens.
in defense of settlements everyone useful is needed regardless of fitness. in some cases people that arent useful would get eaten or thrown out by the defenders
Oh the recurring theme of "but, but women helped defend the village!"
Dude, chill with the copium for a minute and think rationally.
If a city is put into the position where it is forced to use women to defend, do you think it's doing so out of desperation or choice?
@@Crimea_River dude, there's no need to pick fights here. they weren't on copium or anything like that, hell they even said that most of the stories about her were more myth than truth. they were just sharing something interesting about their home town.
@@Crimea_River Chill bro they literally just gave a cool example
Badass washerwomen. Nice.
You know,this has been an awesome video to watch,thank you very much!
Love this evaluation of the situation. And as always, thank you for going to original sources.
One correction I really think should be made is regarding your use of the phrase "go to war". What you mean is that men were overwhelmingly engaged in combat, however women DID go to war throughout history including in Antiquity where they served as camp followers, cooks, wives, prostitutes and all other manner of roles that allowed an army to function.
We often ignore or dismiss these kinds of roles as our understanding of military history tends to focus exclusively on battles and politics, but they are essential to successful military campaigns. As the saying goes: "amateurs study tactics, experts study logistics", and women played a central role in logistics throughout history.
"central" is a stretch.
Humans are sexually dimorphic for a really good reason. We are honed by evolution to function as a team, and a team of specialists is ALWAYS more effective than a team of generalists. Generalists, while having no strong weaknesses, also can't have any notable strengths. On the other hand, specialists have specific weaknesses and specific strengths, and in a group the strengths of one covers the weaknesses of another, allowing for the group to be far stronger than one of generalists.
Men and women have specialized traits that allow us to function really, really well as a team when we work together.
Our bodies are obviously dimorphic, but less obviously _so are our brains!_ The male brain has specializations for task completion. It is readily able to compartmentalize emotional turmoil and strife with others in order to focus solely on the task at hand until it is done to help their group stay productive. The female brain has specializations for political organization. It is finely attuned to the emotional states of all other people around them and organizing logistical information in order to maintain a productive and healthy family group.
The Indigenous societies of the Americas, which were still stone/copper age when their societal structure was documented, reflected this dimorphism advantage. (The reason their technological age is relevant is because humans evolved the above mentioned traits during the stone age. Modern societies are structured in a way that actively hinders us from utilizing our specializations properly)
Tribes were ruled by one of their female elders, and the chief was the leader of the tribe's men. The elder would know the history of the tribe and had observed its triumphs and failures. She would also know all of its occupants and their relationships well. The Chief would organize and lead the men of the tribe to complete necessary tasks such as hunting, warring, building, or moving their camps. He would seek the council of the eldest woman as for what those tasks needed to be. They didn't always agree and would need to work it out or call for the rest of the tribe's opinions to settle disputes. The elder would handle all of the internal disputes between members of the tribe to ensure nothing festered and caused the tribe to fail. Both the Chief and Elder were integral positions to their societies and are a good example of a strategy that utilizes each sex's strengths to their fullest advantage.
Having women accompany armies, even if they aren't fighting, was definitely a huge asset due to their ability to keep morale high and maintain the order of the group by tamping down infighting.
Genetics isn't black and white, however. There are plenty of men who are more emotionally/ politically attuned than the average, and there are plenty of women who are more task oriented and practical than the average. These more 'male brained' women would be the type that could make for female warriors, and they certainly do exist.
@@necroseusyin and yang.
@@Madonnalitta1 Exactly! Women and men are equally as valuable to society as each other for reasons that aren't apparent to many, unfortunately.
Because a lot of our modern societies are male dominated, with women purposefully pushed down, their inherent strengths are rendered invisible to many. We live in an unbalanced world right now :(
@@Madonnalitta1 Exactly! Women and men are just as important in a society as the other.
Unfortunately many of our societies are male dominated and render the strengths and roles of women invisible. We live in an unbalanced world right now...
In Iranian mythology, women warriors are mentioned and are not treated strictly as magical. Two examples are Gordafarid and Banu Goshnasb (banu is Persian term for lady). Gordafrid is mentioned in the history of “Rostam and Sohrab” where she dons armor and combats Sohrab in a one-on-one combat. She gives Sohrab, who has supernatural strength and is a great warrior. She gives trouble to Sohrab but is eventually defeated. when Sohrab takes of her helmet to cut her head off, he is struck by her beauty and let’s her go (some lesser poems say that she has a son by Sohrab called Borzu).
Banu Goshnasb is the daughter of the mythical Scythian warrior, Rostam (he is referred to as “Sagzi” which is a variation of Saka which is the Persian word for the Scythians, and he rules his fief of “Sistan” which is a corruption of the original word “Sakastan” or the “Land of the Saka” or essentially “Scythia.”) She like her father is an immensely strong and a skillful warrior. She proclaims that she would only marry a man who could defeat her in combat. She kills the losers and it is only when her father tells the warrior Giev how to beat her that she finally marries. On the wedding night she attempts to kill Giev but Rostam interferes and saves Giev. Giev and Goshnasb have a son called Bijan who figures in several of Shahnameh’s best stories. However, Goshnasb is not directly referred to in Shanameh. Only that Bijan is son of Giev and grandson of Rostam, therefore, Rostam’s daughter had married Giev. Goshnasb has her own epic called “Goshnasbnameh” or “Book of Goshnasb”, written about 100 years after “Shahnameh” by an unknown poet.
Wow, Goshnasb must have been a Brunhild in her previous life.
Thank you for such an insightful post. I'll have to do some reading on these figures :)
@@AntediluvianRomancebrunhild was Goshnasp in her previous life
Another famous warrior was Thomyris, Queen of the Massagetae, known for killing Cyrus the Great of Persia. She's something of a folk hero in Khazakstan.
@@DTavona fake woman nice try
Egyptian history knows several queens leading troops in the war. Some Ahmosidic queens Tetisheri and Ahotep (17th/18th dynasty) have been buried with weapons (golden stride axle, dagger). The last Ahmosidic queen was Hatshepsut who was also depicted with the blue crown (war crown) and seems to have lead some military excursions until her nephew Thutmosis III became the warlord.
Но они изображались в мужской одежде и с мужскими париками, чтоб ассоциироваться с мужчиной. Просто в тот момент не было супруга-мужчин. При его появлении, вся клоунада закончилась
@@СергейСмирнов-ю2п There is a temple where Thutmosis III is depicted with the civil double crown of both Egypts, whereas Hatshepsut wears the military blue crown.
@@gottfriedheumesser1994 это разовые исключения из 3000 лет истории Египта. Как женщины-войны. Это факт исторический. А про корону может быть много версий. Там же нет надписей конкретизирующих событие
@@СергейСмирнов-ю2п You are always right!
This is a great topic! I know you focused on European and Eurasian ancient history in this video but I'd love for a part 2 and 3 and 4 even!
In part 2 you could cover these other ancient women of martial renown:::
- Rome during the second Punic War (according to Livy) had many female auxilliaries doing camp duties but who were expected to fight alongside the men in the case of emergency for defense
- Queen Amanirenas of Kush who led from the frontlines of the battlefield in a campaign to stop Roman Emperor Augustus and after a bloody war of attrition was successful in negotiating a peace treaty
- The Spartan women; according to Plutarch, when King Cleomenes III was away from Sparta, his mother and sister organized the defense of the city and led the women in battle
- The Trojan War story of Epipole of Carystus who snuck into the war dressed as a man but upon being revealed as a woman was stoned to death; thus showing the ancient Greeks' admonition of the practice of women participating in war (or at least the Euboeans')
- Artemisia I of Caria, another Boudicca type example of leader of armies who actually participated in the battles, had a complete set of armor given to her by Xerxes, and was mentioned by Herodotus
- Tomyris of the Massagetae who led her army into battles and personally beheaded Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid Empire after defeating him in battle
- The 3 Macedonian royal women recorded to fight on the front lines including Cynane, half-sister of Alexander the Great who personally slew the Illyrian queen Caeria while defeating their army
- Lady Fu Hao, notably from the steppes was one of the three wives of King Wu Ding and a general of the Shang dynasty who waged war against all the neighboring enemies of the Shang. Her tomb was found to have 16 human sacrifices and was filled with weapons from China and the Steppes.
- The Qin Dynasty, according to historian Sima Qian, "In the army of the First Emperor [Qin Shi Huang], there were many women who had earned the title of 'swordsman'. They fought alongside men and were known for their bravery and skill in battle."
- I was actually going to list more from China but apparently there are hundreds of examples of lady warriors on the battlefield from the different dynasties of ancient China
In part 3 you could cover women warriors from the Middle Ages:
- Dihya or Al-Kahina a possibly Jewish charismatic leader who united the Berber tribes and fought against the Muslim expansion into North Africa at Numidia before dying in battle at a well that still bears her name near the El Djem Roman amphitheater
- Rani (Queen) Durgavati of Gondwana who rode an elephant into battle and sustained many arrow injuries defending against the Mughal invasion and killed herself rather than surrender when defeat was imminent
- laqa Beki, Chinggis Khan’s daughter, inherited troops from her father and had “several thousand women serving her. Whenever they go campaigning, they behead and kill,”
- Khutulun, Chinggis Khan's great-great-granddaughter was actively involved as a warrior in battle and was noted for her battle prowess and being her father Kaidu’s best warrior
- Shazhi, who was ethnically Chinese but fought for the Mongol Empire, galloped into battles alongside her 10,000 troops earning the Mongol Empire’s highest military and civilian position
- Queen Isabella I of Castile who showed up to personally command sieges in full armor to rally her troops
- Countess Caterina Sforza who personally trained her troops and was noted to fight weapons in hand until her capture by Cesare Borgia
- The scandinavian shield-maidens including the famed Lagertha
- The Norman Lady Sichelgaita of Salerno who personally led sieges, was wounded by an arrow, and charged at her own men with spear on horseback to stop them from fleeing
- Jeanne Laisne and the women of Beauvais who helped fight off the Burgundians
- Isabel of Conches who was known to command battles armed in full knight's arms and armor
- Countess Joanna of Flanders who saved the town of Hennebont in Brittany, riding in arms and armor rallying the townspeople to defense before finally leading 300 men out of the town to burn down the enemy camp
- The Italian artist Onorata Rodiani who dressed as a man and served in a mercenary band as a cavalryman before dying defending her hometown of Castelleone
- 'Big Margot', the Flemish standard-bearer who died in the Battle of Westrozebeke in 1382
- Women from Western Japan were noted to often join cavalries during the Kamakura and Sengoku periods
- During the Ōnin War of the Sengoku period many Japanese women, both noble and peasant, joined armies and fought in battles
- Tomoe Gozen, onna-musha samurai who served under lord Minamoto no Yoshinaka was noted as killing several other samurai in battle.
- Lady Hangaku Gozen, onna-musha samurai of the Taira clan who commanded 3,000 warriors and personally defended the castle at Tossakayama, killing many enemies until she was shot by an arrow and captured and kept in the Shogun Minamoto no Yoriie's court where she met and married Asari Yoshitō, one of his retainers, later bearing him a daughter
- Lady Chacha/Yodo-dono, concubine of Toyotomi Hideyoshi who got caught up in the succession war after his death, actively defended Osaka Castle with several of her maids also dressed in armor and forced a treaty (it was later betrayed and she committed suicide with her son)
- Yoshioka Myorin-ni, onna-musha warlord of the Otomo Clan whose battlefield exploits defending her territory became legendary to the point Toyotomi Hideyoshi offered her to be Guardian of Tsurusaki as a retainer but she turned him down to live a quiet life
- Ōhōri Tsuruhime, a priest's daughter who took up the mantle of onna-musha to defend her island against an invading samurai fleet. Known as the 'Joan of Arc of Japan' she claimed divine inspiration to lead the defense and even supposedly dueled and killed the enemy commander Ohara Takakoto on his flagship
- Triệu Thị Trinh from Vietnam who freed them from Chinese invader control in the battles of Lang Bac and Hanoi; she was specifically noted to bind up her large breasts for battle to be a more effective warrior
In part 4 you could cover right before the modern era:::
- All the pirate queens/captains of the pirate era during the age of sail (too many to list)
- Queen Suriyothai who fought atop her elephant during the Burmese-Siamese War and died in a duel with the Viceroy of Prome who was chasing her husband down after his elephant panicked
- Queen Hangbe and the Dahome warrior women of Benin
- Empress Yaa Asantewaa of the Ashanti who upon being invaded by the British who demanded the royal golden stool she waged war on them, saying "I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight until the last of us falls in the battlefields" and she was very successful until the British brought in heavy artillery to defeat her whereupon she was exiled to the Seychelles
- Queen Nzinga Mbande of the Mbundu who personally led her forces into battle against the Portuguese, even all the way into her 60s, after a slave trade deal went wrong and successfully fought them off for her entire life
- The Cheyenne warrior women
- Otazu no kata, one of the last onna-musha samurai who personally died fighting to defend her home, Hikuma Castle, and after being offered a peaceful surrender when they were overwhelmed with a promise for the women and children's safety Otazu rejected it by saying: "Women we may have, and they are born samurai. None who live here would dare submit their home to their enemy"
- Ikeda Sen, onna-musha samurai and lord who fought in several battles with her army in a Teppō unit (matchlock rifles)
- Ueno Tsuruhime, onna-musha samurai who led 34 women in an ill-fated charge out of Tsuneyama Castle against the Mōri army during the Bitchū Conflict
- Nakano Takeko, martial artist and leader of the Jōshitai (Girls’ Army) who fought with naginatas against the Meiji regime for the Ainu
- Niijima Yae, last onna-musha samurai of the Hoshina clan who fought as a gunner in the Boshin War before serving as a nurse in later wars
- Maharani Tarabai Bhosale, regent of the Maratha Empire personally led her cavalry charges and movements against the Mughals
- Rani (Queen) Velu Nachiyar and her commander Kuyili fought against the East India Company with Kuyili dying in a suicide attack which won Velu's throne back
- Uda Devi Pasi, Indian freedom fighter killed as a sniper in the Battle of Sikandar Bagh
- Rani (Queen) Lakshmibai Of Jhansi, Indian freedom fighter who fought several battles but died to a sabre wound while charging the Irish hussars as cavalry
- Lakshmi Sahgal, Indian freedom fighter who was an active fighter in the Indian National Army where she was known as Captain Lakshmi and formed a women’s division called the Rani of Jhansi Regiment
- Onake Obavva of Karnataka who fought the forces of Hyder Ali when she saw them trying to sneak in a hole in the rocks of her fortress home she used her Onake pestle as a bludgeon and killed many of them as they tried to enter 1 by 1
- Rani (Queen) Kittur Chennamma of Kittur, fought alongside her lieutenant against the British East India Company until her capture
I think you need to make this video. Seriously. You know a lot about this! Do it!
All exaggerated and some just myths
Thats a great list. Also don't forget the Sikh women and Mai Bhago in the 17th century India.
*Fun fact:* Boudica was played by Sîan Philips in the 1978 miniseries "The Warrior Queen". Pretty crazy that roman Empress Livia and barbaric queen Boudica were played by the same actress 😅
If anyone could pull that off, it would be Sîan Philips!
She pulled a David Warner
@@melenatorr My Welsh dad named our cat after her. 'I, Claudius' was compulsory viewing in our house.
Loved this! Very insightful review.
I knew about the Sarmatians, but it was a surprise how this tradition remained for so long in pretty much the same area despite the seemingly constant dramatic changes of new ethnic groups moving in and taking control.
"I'll have your land, and I'll have that cultural element too."
The practice was for sure abandoned among Western Sarmatian tribes after they became Romanized Foederati. No sources indicate their (I mean Amazons) presence at all in the armies of Alans of the 5th century, like the ones who fought at the Catalaunian plains. Generally, the tribes who migrated to the and bordered Rome would have phased the practice out, because only male warriors would have been able to serve Rome as mercenaries / Auxilia, and service with Rome was quite a lucrative prospect.
I suspect it may have remained in practice longer among the Alan tribes of the East (near the Caucasus, which lasted much longer into history than the Western Alans, although there is no evidence for them after the 3rd century.
The Indo-Iranian steppe nomad warrior women make sense because the presence of horses might balance out the physical advntage of men. The added power and momentum of the horse.
Shadiversity made a video how weapons are underestimated as equalizers. Also women have better long term endurance than men and can recover faster...
This is why I'm shocked we are an anti weapon culture, and then complain that women are victimized daily. Women benefit most from weapons. @@elivenya-theautisticbookwy9638
The Amazons were known for their mounted archers. The bow and the horse are both tremendous equalizers, and horses are at their best when used by lighter riders.
No No guys. Im a man and a woman can never defeat a man (i mean me) my Superior complex needs this so stop spiting facts
@@bob7975 Bows are not good equalizers. The Romans had their strongest men trained as archers. Mounted archers like the Amazons use small bows for ambushes and hit-and-run tactics.They were famous for ambushing the Greeks in the forests. The crossbow is a good equalizer because it requires less training.
"When wars comes to the houses door, the woman goes to war" More or less saying in completely different countries such as Vietnam or Russia.
And only then
True. Women are the last defense. They have to save their children. Men who have zero knowledge how war works think warring is male.
@@Liztastaney7Because it has been 99.9% male. That would be like men saying “women commit violence too!” But the feminists shoot that down real quick
I think there would have been many incidents in wich trained soldiers invaded towns or settlements who's ferocious women would risk eveything protecting what they had.
A powerful aspect of humanity brought forth in combat that would inspire myths and legends.
Jeanne Louise de Belleville, de Clisson, Dame de Montaigu the Lioness of Brittany, was a French/Breton noblewoman who became a privateer to avenge her husband after he was executed for treason by King Philip VI of France. She crossed the English Channel targeting French ships and often slaughtering their crew. It was her practice to leave at least one sailor alive to carry her message of vengeance.
Yarr maties! We been bested by a girl! 😂
nothing is more cruel and deadly than a women who was given power to kill
That's a good one! One of my female warrior noblewomen is Caterina Sforza Countess of Forlì and Lady of Imola.
One Jeanne trying to destroy France and another coming in later to save it. You can't make this up
It would've been interesting to see your perspective on the Dahomey, who were female African warriors infamous for contributing to the transatlantic slave trade, according to some European sources I've found in the past.
The use of women warriors among the izayges calvary makes sense. Since the weight of a horse is the primary force driving lances and to a lesser extent swipes from swords and picks.
As archers most eastern war bows were not at the great draw weights like the English longbow.
While women CAN march in kit they CANNOT march as well as proven by marine Corp studies. So the physical disadvantages become severe for heavy infantry such as used in Roman Legionares and Greek Hoplites.
Without armor bladed weapons are great equaliser as a knife will kill a 220# man just as quick as a 100# man or woman.
I think with modern combat we need to separate reality from ideology.
Soviet women were fantastic snipers and pilots, but do not make sense as infantry were they have to run carrying a kit that weighs as much as they do.
The soviets did not use them as shocktroops, paratroopers, tankers.
A woman is just as capable of valor as a man. But valor does not make doctrine. Combat Effectiveness makes doctrine.
In bringing women into combat arms we should acknowledge the differences and play to their strengths instead of lowering the standards which also headway for weaker men as well.
If we are to utilize women as snipers today we need to tailor the kit to a specialized unit based on what they can carry and still be mobile.
I hope this video adds to more practical consideration. Because the battlefield is amoral and apathetic. It either works or doesn't.
lances and pikes were not used by the cavalary during the Roman period.
@@paulodelima5705 Actually despite not having stirrups spears were used on horse back going back to the ancient assyrians.
And the Romans themselves had calvary using akontes (short spear), contarri calvary (who used lances), and cataphractarii who used the Contus (heavy 2 handed lance)
Also pikes were used by Hoplites throughout that era. Even though I had never mentioned pikes.
@@punteroism you know there is a diference between lances pikes and spears right?
@@laisssemoi I take it reading comprehension isn't your strong suit?
@@punteroism I take it reading comprehension isn't your strong suit?
The difference in strength is probably not even the main reason why most warriors were men, and women warriors were exceptions. It's the demographic impact : a country can lose most of its men and bounce back in one generation through polygamy, Paraguay in the 1860s for example. Can't do that if you lose most of your women, how many children each can have is much more limited.
As a result, with the exception of individual volunteers, women were only pressed into combat as a last resort, if a defeat would be total so there was nothing to lose.
What? It's absolutely about strength. Even today.
@@ClockworkGearhead no, do ants use their queens as shock troops ?
Strength is incidental. Men definitely were naturally selected for strength (as they were doing all the hunting and fighting) but even without that, the army would still be mostly men.
That may have been so initially, but in a logical world, this stops being an issue once a nation's population gets over a certain threshold. In the real world, for the past millennium or so, aside for a few particularly bad exceptions (like WWII), no country ever dedicates even close to 1% of its total population to an army, so the impact of losing much of would be minor to none for most populations. So while that may have been the initial reason, most armies only continued to do so for the simple reason of tradition, i.e. "because that's how it's always been". In a more logical nation, and one which has no concern in demographic loss were a whole army wiped out (such as most countries in the modern world), if conscripting, rather than automatically just taking all of a certain gender, they would analyse potential on a case by case basis, and conscript those. For example, just from a physical perspective, it makes more logical sense to conscripting everyone who fits into a certain height and weight range as opposed to haphazardly based on gender alone, which would not only be fairer, but also in fact result in a higher quality army. This sort of methodology has been practiced in the past by the way (and sometimes in the present), but usually only for certain specialised branches of military, as opposed to whole armies.
Never the less, my point is, regardless of the origin, the true reason most have operated this way for the past millennium or 2, has been as arbitrary as "because that's how we've always done it", and not much beyond that.
Fascinating deep dives man, super super cool.
As a woman myself, once I think about things like raping and looting, being taken hostage, and the numbers of women who die in childbirth.. Can societies really afford to lose women on the battlefield?
If you just look at the math of how many people the population can grow by, just with a few extra women, after 2 generations, the exponents are crazy
I've heard that logic but I feel it really only is a concern for small tribal societies. For kingdoms and empires you have such a large population you can more than the women who want to fight fighting. Most women are not going to want to fight and most are not going to want to join armies. It's always going to be a minority. Letting women fight won't risk the population to a kingdom or empire with that context. It's not like anyone is arguing 100% of women should join the army, most men would never fight as well.
@@Fordo007 Yeah but one woman can have 10 kids and each of those 10 kids can have ten kids... The reason why they don't want the women to go in fight, is if they lose a lot of their men, they're able to use those women to make up the numbers quickly, but if you just lose 1% of women that's a large result of future population, it's just about exponents, exponents get big..
And also I think it's a hierarchy type of thing, like what do you value as a society, the safety of your women and children, or people having decisions and freedom
@@Fordo007 So I can see a handful of women serving, but no society could afford to have an institution that supports or encourages the idea... Unless they are stories about women warriors that have different metaphors and motivations for the story
@@claudeyaz I really think the population angle is overblown. I don’t see civilizations at kingdom or empire or even large cities viewing their women as a crucial resource with how frivolous they were treated in every other context. It’s supply and demand, if women were a finite resource then they’d be valued and protected and vaulted. Most cities and kingdoms protected their men and women the same. Men fought sure, but I doubt protecting women for population growth was a major concern beyond typical conquest consequences.
Steppe tribes had women very much in combat alongside men and triode societies did quite well for themselves. Seems sensible to increase the amount of warriors you have by using your women. If your foes are going to kill you all or take your women from you, why make it easier for them? If the women die then the consequences would be no different then if they did not.
@@Fordo007 All you have is ridiculous fami ni ist talking points.
There are two main reasons women generally don't compose the main forces of battle. The first is that we tried letting the men stay home to nurse the babies, but that didn't work so well. The second is that a civilization can afford to lose the vast majority of its men and still retain a viable breeding population. A society that loses most of its men can fully regenerate itself within a generation. A society that loses most of its women is doomed to a swift extinction. Men don't fulfill the role of warriors because we're more important, we do the most dangerous jobs because we're expendable. Women keep the hearths because they're more valuable. That's not an opinion, it's a biological fact of life.
Very true. But imagine a battle where both armies are equal in number and roughly equal in weapons/gear and fighting styles. One army is half women, the other is all men. No other than a fool would expect the first army to win.
Don't wake up the redpillers. Women valuable? No way!
You're also better at it because you're larger and stronger.
@@Madonnalitta1Yes, but a horde of 500 women could also do a lot of damage. The main reason is that women and children need to continue society.
Pretty much. There is a reason there's no surviving people who have had a hundreds of years long tradition of mainly female warriors. It's simply not sustainable.
Good video!
Well done for not overdoing AI.😊
Yes and they all looked exactly like Kiera Knightly.
What a time to have lived!
Um…Time Machine please. NOW.
Never understood why a skinny girl like her ended up playing action roles.
Tablechest. Nice.
Did it happen? Yes. Was it the exception and not super common? I would say yes. Does this mean that men would always win? No. Do men have an advantage and would they probably make for better warriors than women? I would say yes.
Does my 6 years old daughter with a gun win against the strongest man ever in existance when He charges her with His Superior physical Power?
Yes.
@@nocomment6421 Depends, what caliber is the gun? If she is 6 not going to be that high. Is he enraged? Is she able to aim in the time alotted? Variables sir, variables.
@@als3022 na bro, even a tasergun is enough. in Reality there is no berserk mode or power of freindship. you get shot? You are done. No anime stuff happens afterwards,
@@nocomment6421does she have the strenght to pull the trigger? if you say no it's normal if your say yes you're lying to yourself
@@nocomment6421 nope... not unless she is well trained and can even pull the slide back. My 9 year boy old travel soccer team, 5th in state baseball team, struggles to pull the slide back on my glock. in fact I dont think he could do it in a stressful situation...
Guns are not one shot one kill unless you hit the heart of the brain, most men can survive multiple gun shots.
For instance in WW2 my Grandfather got a purple heart for and bronze star for dragging 2 soldiers out of the front lines (at the same time), and he was shot multiple times in the process. His twin brother (who was 1 of the 2 he dragged out, different unit, that happened to end up on the same battlefield), was shot MANY times by a German machine gun also lived, though he never truly recovered from in injuries and died 25 years before my grandfather did at age 84.
Well spoken, well researched and thoughtful as always.
fun fact! Cu Chulainn once defeated a giant who was supposedly stronger than all men in the world combined, but Scatach thought he was too weak to fight her younger sister (Aife).
I'm sure this was after his training with scathach
Una "amazona" me dijo lo mismo. Ahora son mis sumisas.
You should look up Indian queens (not mythology ) who fought against the British and Portuguese .They were trained in warfare and actually went on the battlefield leading armies .Rani Laxmibai ,Kittur Chenamma ,Abbakka Chowta ,Velu Nachiyar are few of the examples .
I have some input for the women as a warrior or queen from India
1. Jijabai Shahaji Bhonsale, 12 January 1598 - 17 June 1674, also known as Rajmata, was one of the best Mothers who raised Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, the king who is the Idol of India.
2. Punyashlok Ahilyabai Holkar May 1725 - 13 August 1795 She was one of the queens who fought and sustained Swaraj and Building temples: She built hundreds of Hindu temples and Dharmashalas across India, including the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi and the Gauri Somnath Temple in Chola.
3. Maharani Tarabai Bhosale As the regent, Tarabai took charge of the war against the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb's forces. Tarabai was skilled in cavalry movement and made strategic movements herself during wars. She personally led the war and continued the fight against the Mughals. A truce was offered to the Mughals in such a way that the Mughal emperor promptly rejected it, and Tarabai continued the Maratha resistance.
But one thing is important, when women fight, they do with spears, ranged weapons that makes a good use of distance with the attacker (very useful if you are physically weaker), and horses that enhances the power of any weapon if you attack.
Feels surreal to find this video posted 39 seconds ago. Can’t wait to listen to it
Cú Chulainn Is pronounced Ku-Kull-ain. Just an fyi.
Also Scathach is the woman’s name in the myth not part of Cú Chulainna name. Not sure where you got Dornolla from?
the i is not pronounced. There are 3 accepted Irish pronunciations of Cú Chulainn depending on dialect (such as Ulster, Leicester, and Connacht dialects): ku kull-an, ku hull-an and ku [x]ull-an. [x] is called a voiceless velar fricative is it like the j in ojo the Spanish word for eye. ku [x]ull-an is what most people I've spoken to prefer. ku [x]ull-an is also how my Irish mythology book has his name pronunciation written in the name guide at the back of the book.
Ku Kullan is the closest to how it is pronounced here In Leinster not Leicestershire which is in England.
I wonder if some of these accounts were the writers trying to emasculate enemy warriors and bolster their own. .
“Their men are so weak they had to send women to fight us!”.
Aside from that, it’s clear professional female warriors were the exception, rather than the rule.
Also women taking up the sword to fight when faced with being conquered makes total sense. To borrow a line from Éowyn “those without swords can still die upon them.”
Exactly, a Lot of female soldiers in modern history belonged to resistance or revolutionary guerrillas, like China, Vietnam and the Soviet Union.
Whenever I dig into this topic, I notice a lack of "female warrior culture" and more like "tolerant females in warrior cultures." While each culture has it's own unique quirks, there tends to be commonalities among the women we find in these groups. Such as: 1) their higher tolerances in general for violence and aggressive behavior, 2) pair bonding and breeding behaviors geared to creating physical superiority in their offspring, 3) and the caregiving and rearing of children to be physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially primed for a warrior based lifestyle. It seems to me that the women in these groups tend to not be warriors themselves, but rather have adjusted to the culture they exist in making them more warrior-like than women outside of these groups. The proverbial "know how to use a sword, but have never picked one up" situation. Which means while they might not have been warriors themselves, if needed they had the ability to become one more easily and quickly.
Yes
There was an interesting example in Sparta, as compared to Athens. While Athenian women were locked indoors and basically used as breeding material, Spartan women were raised to be independent and strong. Spartans even had their own variant of "olympic games" where women competed - which was looked upon with horror by other parts of Greece.
Women needed to do everything, because men were mostly training to be warriors. Women were also trained to be physically strong, because they had a belief that only a strong woman can give birth to a strong man. To provide strong warriors, both sexes had to show that they were strong.
@@MagdalenaBozyk That's true, but we also have to be careful here. I hope Metatron will agree with what I am saying because I don't want to speak for him incorrectly, but from this video, I feel he's doing a very good job at saying that we have to separate the truth from the desire to 'romanticize' the female warrior. Just as with men, since the beginning of time all women have had to 'defend' themselves. All women were, are, and will be capable of defending themselves in a bad situation from their primal survival instincts to the actual learning of self-defense strategies and tactics. While this means they can defend themselves, and might suggest they know how to fight if they need to....this doesn't make them warriors. To be a 'warrior' even in the historically warrior culture is a way of life, a unique mindset. Warriors were, and still are, usually always a subset or sub-culture within the group.
The best way I can describe this is the difference between a person who trains in martial arts vs a person who trains in combat arts. Both arts will teach fighting skills, weapons training, and provide excellent physical and mental conditioning. But when it comes down to actually being a real fighter...well...while both people can say they 'know' how to fight, we have to be honest, one of these people is actually training to be a real 'fighter' and who is preparing for, and will actually be in, a real fight soon were it's them against an real opponent, and there is only going to be one winner.
And this is why I say that women in warrior cultures probably were more 'warrior-like' than women in non-warrior cultures; but this doesn't mean they themselves were actually warriors. These women would be like those people doing martial arts. By being surrounded by and immersed in a warrior culture, they absorbed fighting knowledge and experiences, but for the most part, never actually fought themselves. Instead they acted as a support force to their warrior culture.
Now obviously there were female warriors. We have found graves with females in both the West and the East indicating that they were buried with the honors of a warrior. These people wanted to be buried as a warrior, and the people who buried them agreed that they deserved a warrior's burial. We have records and stories of female warriors both fighting and supporting in battles, wars, and defense actions. I find these things wonderful and it shows how able women can be in a fight. But we also have to calm our passions and accept these women are not the norm. When we look at the actual evidence for female warriors...even in warrior cultures...these women were not common. I think the point of Metatron's video is that if we examine a lot of the evidence for female warriors, the evidence is being misunderstand or skewed by modern filters and might actually suggest that the women we think of as 'warriors' were not really warriors but rather women in who a bad situation rose above it, and did what they had to do to overcome it. But we need to ask ourselves was this them being a warrior in the moment, or were they really always warriors and the moment showed us who they really were. Both options are possible, so we need to accept both realities can exist and not say one is truth over the other.
The fact that they had women in armor within some of those units says otherwise. But yes, it wasn't that common is what the point is. They didn't have entire units of only female soldiers just units thay included women.
@@iateyursandwiches Well that's just it, we have to be mindful that a handful of one-off situations only means that we have a handful of one-off situations. At the end of the day, it might not actually "say otherwise." What I often encounter on this topic, is a modern desire to create a historical reality that's not being proven (and is often directly contradicted) in the actual historical record itself. The problem with these types of forums is that they allow generalizations to skip over a lot of very important details and nuances. A great example of this, I recently saw a video here about Maltida...now here's a lady who we can prove 1) Did have armor made for her. 2) Was extremely active in the military campaigns. 3) Was on the battlefronts and in the camps before major battles both victories and losses. This video clearly wanted to paint the picture that she was a 'warrior queen.' The problem is that there is no proof she actually fought, trained, or did anything in these battles to suggest being a warrior other than be there. In fact most of the first-hand sources suggest that she was kept specifically from the fighting, and we have letters from some of her own army commanders who were complaining that her being there was a drain on their time, resources, and man power to protect her in her tents during the battles. Suggesting that she wasn't actually fighting, but rather acting as a commander or maybe mascot role...which the armies don't really seem to appreciate when she was around. So the question becomes, does wearing armor, commanding, and being present at a battle make one a 'warrior'. Some will say yes, some will say maybe, some will say not really. I suppose all are justifiable, but what we must be mindful of is that we cannot say she WAS a warrior, or a warrior queen, as if it is an absolute truth. Which is what I see happening quite a lot on YT these days. I mean it's like saying that a person who dresses up like a firefighter and goes to burning buildings MUST BE a firefighter. Well...no....they don't HAVE TO BE a firefighter. They could just be a normal person doing something abnormal and getting noticed for their abnormality.
Very interesting. A supplementary note if I may. The woman at Argos was on the roof oh a house and hurled a roof tile against Pyros. Actually that was a common practice in ancient Greece when the enemies entered the city. That was another contribution of women to a battle within an urban environment
Apparently Iranians had women in their ranks
Ahhhhh how hard iran has fallen from grace
That's what religion of peace does to a country. But I can guarantee you it's not gonna stay like this for long.
Edit: I want to add that the culture of people is good but the government is still Islamic. Anybody who's been to Iran knows that people and government are 180 degrees apart.
@satana8157, are you trying to do the islqm bad Christianity good argument cause swissztland a Christian nations had womans rights in 1972 to vote while turkey , predominantly a islamic nations was thr first of its kind in 1930
@@satana8157 Timurids, Mongols, Macedons, Arabs, Russians, Brits
With all of their glory came and went but Persia remained, a bunch of brains dead terrorists won't be a match for the land of the kings
@@cyancat8633 The Islamic Republic is a disgrace to Islam
As long as it remains Islam can't call itself the religion of peace
idf is full of women
Milunka Savic- female soldier of Serbian army in WWI, most decorated female warrior. She was known in the Europe at the time. She was awarded the French Légion d’Honneur (Legion of Honour) twice,[4] as well as the Russian Cross of St. George,[3] the British medal of the Most Distinguished Order of St Michael, and the Serbian Miloš Obilić medal.[6] She was the sole female recipient of the French Croix de Guerre 1914-1918 with the gold palm attribute for service in World War I.
Thats an exception and not the status quo. Serbia had it bad in WW1.
@@RLDragonStrider Yes, exception. But Serbia didn't conscript girls. She went in the army instead of her sick brother. She pretended to be him. When they found out that she is woman, they let her stay in the army. Point is, that she was a very good soldier.
@@bbbbbbbbb1974yeah very “good soldier” According to early feminists🤣🤣🤣
@@RussianOccupier190 You must be some kid. She was an outlier. I don't believe that women are good soldiers in general, but some of them are.
@@bbbbbbbbb1974Lot's of redpill kids in this comment section.
So far im loving your channel.
My issue is the potrail of women warriors as common in TV. It was rare and thats why it was such a big deal when their was a woman warrior. Vikings the TV show is bad about this with an entire army of women. We should treat women warriors in TV as the rarity that they where. Give them the respect they deserve
And also give the women who pulled it off their due. Saying they were common undermines the women who did it. They had a ton of get through and they pulled it off. That is a credit to their efforts. To say it was common spits in their face and their efforts.
How about not portraying women as "warriors" at all. If they did exist, they'd be done in quickly by other male warriors who would 10 times stronger than her.
@@fyrdman2185Because some female warriors existing = reality. Should we pretend that women never fought at all to save the egos of modern men?
@@LalaDepala_00 Should we put in child soldiers in every TV show about war to satisfy women's narcissistic need for representation? Because I'm pretty sure more male children fought in war than women did
Also probably worth noting, that in media skilled male warriors are almost always depicted as big and strong. Where as the female warriors are almost always depicted by short skinny women. With notable exceptions like Brienne of Tarth from game of thrones. A woman who can hold her own with a man, is gonna be fairly tall and bulky as far as women go.
Have you ever done a video on Olga the terrible? Or Olga of Kiev? I usually trust your sources so I’d like to see your video on her
I enjoyed this a lot, and particularly appreciated the discussion of warrior women in Irish myth, even if the conclusion that they are allegorical figures was a bit deflating having grown up on tales of Cú Chulainn. Not unexpected though. By the way, it is pronounced koo-KUL-in. I thought your "I don't know how to say that, so I'm just going to show it" quite charming.
"Could be effective to a certain extent?" - due to "to a certain extent" the answer to such a question is always yes. For there is always at least a nanoscopic extent.
True and good point but in this case is not nanoscopic as demonstrated by the sources.
Unless the effectiveness is negative, which is conceivable
Hey Metatron. There were some notable female warriors in Ethiopian history:
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gudit - Is said to have laid waste to the Axum empire after it's long decline following the loss of control over the Red Sea and possibly other environmental issues.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_expedition_to_Abyssinia - Two Oromo queens, Werkait and Mostiat, were crucial in helping the British lay siege to emperor Theodore.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furra - Might not have existed, but was supposed to have ruled for 7 years. Notorious for oppressing men, particularly the short, old and bald ones.
Singular exceptions, which will always exist, are not the point. I think he is trying to deal with the modern lefty notion that women were commonly warriors who simply haven't been given the credit they are due.
@@hooligan9794 sure 👍🏿
There are the Agoji of the Dahomey kingdom known as the Dahomey Amazons too. Along with a few other less known examples like Rozvi women were said to have been involved in battle.
Splendid video!
Really impressive in terms of depth, yet in could compress all of that in just a 30 min video and without it ever feeling tedious or like it stretches for too long. :D
I could add to that the account of the famous story about Kan Krum of Bulgaria and the Cup made of Nikephoros I's skull.
This practice is possible to have stemmed from older Scythian traditions, but the main point here is that after Nikephoros burned Pliska (the Bulgar empire's capital city, which was actually larger than Constantinople btw) after a successful sneak attack on his way back he was ambushed and killed.
The important part in relation to the video however is, that due to his army sustaining heavy casualties, Krum went and called for every Man and Woman, anyone that could bear arms to following him in pursuing Nikephoros. And among them were a significant portion of women as well.
There are also some instances in Bulgaria (like those mentioned in the video) of women warriors (which they initially thought were Asian/Mongoloid males until they sequenced their DNA and looked at their chromosomes). Another aspect hinting at a potential link with the Sarmatian culture and traditions is the Artificial Cranial Deformation which was typical for the Bulgars, in addition tot he mounted horse archery among others.
Another note that is worthy to be made, is that according tot he latest genetic data from various studies it may not be certain whether those tribes like the Kutrigurs and the Utigurs, altho at the current this is still the postulate about them, but in regards to their relation to the Bulgars it may hint otherwise.
The latest data regarding the Bulgars shows they were not Turkic as far as the genetic aspect is concerned.
The cultural aspects topic will likely be reopened after the latest studies are published, but considering the tribes like the Kutrigurs and others are thought to be predecessors of the Bulgars and if the Bulgars are not Turkic. it's quite possible the Kutrigurs were not either.
Now I know that many ppl will try to point to the "Slavic Sea" hypothesis, theorizing that "the Bulgars were a small Turkic minority elite, which got assimilated by the numerous Slavs ans other local populations", but the data from all the various genetic studies shows that wasn't actually the case.
On the contrary, the Bulgars turned out to be the prime component among the modern Bulgarian population's genetic admixture with more than 40% on average. Further more, the sequenced Bulgar samples (including elites) even from the early Danube Bulgaria period all showed the same general lack of both Turkic and Slavic DNA. In fact, we also know exactly when the intermixing with the Slavic populations happened, it was shortly after the Christianization of Bulgaria around the 9-10 century AD and since then the Bulgarian genetic admixture hasn't changed that much as far as the ancestral aspect is concerned.
Btw props on your pronunciation of Kutrigurs and Utigurs. :D
Man. You come in at the best of times with this subject. As I am a writer working on a book and I have a culture that has both men and women participate in war. (their society being more equitable than ours if you will)
I'll definitely enjoy this. (And hey! 10 mins in and I already learned a thing or two which could help in my own book.)
So you are wrong writing about a society that won't exist within a few generations. How fun
As a fellow writer, I wish you the best of inspiration and courage in your writing.
I like the topic myself and am always curious to see example of it done right.
Oh so how does that society keep itself from collapsing? Unless you're writing a fantasy novel...
I taugh a lot about this tipes of fictional society and I never found a good answer for this problem. Can you answer me how this society deal with the atrition and recovery of numbers since women are dying in greater numbers then other societys? How they haven`t been eliminated?
@@Crimea_River Fantasy novel. The setting being a bit dark but nothing to the extremes.
With the controversies in the female boxing competitions at the Olympics still very fresh, it would of course be possible that women with birth defects giving them extra testosterone would have lived 2000+ years ago as well and would be quite a bit stronger than a normal woman.
Furthermore, there are several occupations. Depending on your job you would gain more or less strength. Which untrained conscript would have a better chance in a fight: a blacksmith or a scribe? It's not too too hard to imagine that there were women doing hard work that would have built up some muscular strength.
And finally, it's not too hard to imagine that if the men of a small, primitive village left their village for war and left the women behind with only a handful young boys and old men behind, that the women would have been learned a trick or two by their husbands or fathers to defend themselves in case of an attack (not necessarily to fight, but maybe to shoot a bow, use slingshots, etc.
Anyway, keep up the great work! I truly love these videos!
We should however remember. Modern sports, especially at high levels such as the olympics. Are plagued with performance enhancing compounds that did not exist historically. A woman on Anavar has much better odds than a woman not an Anavar when facing an un-enhanced male. Though she is still heavily disadvantages, the disadvantage is much smaller than it would naturally be.
Absolutely love the no-nonsense analysis in your videos, presented strictly on a historically factual basis. Realism, not hyperbolic sensationalism.
Imagine the ferocity and viciousness of those Women protecting their village. Willing to die to protect their children, I can see why the Romans were shocked
Men have upper body strength and women have lower body strength. Men VS. Woman with a spear, all a woman has to do is piss off the man enough to come charging at her, then kneel down, with a tight grip of the spear and use her legs and the thrust of her arms to basically do an upper cut with the point of the spear to his gut and he is instantly dead.
This is true
I am an archery instructor teaching instinctive style with recurve bows, and i can tell you that women often learn archery more quickly because they often listen better and pay more attention. I have definitely had some male students who picked it up very fast. But as a generalization, it seems like women pick it up / improve quicker than men. Sure they can only pull 1/4-1/2 of the poundage that men can. But you could definitely have an effective contingent of women archers fighting alongside men, perhaps they would be better in a flanking manuever or ambush where they could get closer to the enemy to make up for their reduced range (due to lighter bows). They would be great for harassing the enemy.
Horse archers?
Argive Women: I also get a feeling they were manning the walls of the city. Walls & fortifications are great equalizers too.
but they also fought against forces whihc had already entered the city ... and won.
I imagine in war-torn countries, it would be common as a necessity, especially in defensive battles.
You are very good. I found you by accident but I need to check out more of your work.
I appreciate and welcome.
I am a woman and if I was alive during those times and my children and husband had already been slain, I would absolutely go to battle. Why not? Literally nothing left to lose. Women weren't in battle because of the patriarchy but because they are important and protected to make the next generation. 😊
After all, patriatchy is a standardization of historical gender rules
The Russian Chronicles tell us that the region of the steps was constantly being invaded due to its geography. It's not surprising then that they would have women along with the men as full time defenders of their cities. An invading force might be surprised to see well prepared female warriors in numbers coming out to meet them in battle beside the men.
Excellent, thorough, and impeccably objective analysis-as usual.
Bravo 👏🏻
No metatron you are wrong!
My grandma told me that all the battles in history were fought by women 🤣
LOL!
And they were all black.
I seriously doubt your misrepresentation of your "grandma"! :P
My grandmother said Xena Warrior Princess was black.
@@FrankinDallas You say that as if anyone ever thought otherwise?
To me it just wouldn’t make sense with how tough life was to just keep a population growing with birth mortality rates. If you have women risking their lives in battle along with child birth , you would have no chance with your civilization
That was one reason why female warriors were so rare. It’s not misogyny to try and keep your population from going extinct.
Yeah. People are desensitized to how hard the world was to successfully bring children into. If you have to give birth to 5-10 babies for 2 of them to survive to adulthood. When exactly are you gonna have time to go off and be a warrior? And what responsible politician is even going to let you if you have the time, when the health of the society relies on populations self replacing/growing?
There's not an enlightened rational overseer optimally and correctly deciding what every single person does, maximising group benefit and utility. History is a mess of millions of individuals making choices. The evidence is very clear that as now some women have always served in combat roles. It doesn't have to be optimal for population growth, lol. It's also not optimal for population growth for women to become nuns instead of mothers, but plenty did just that.
Great video, and check out Milunka Savić of more recent times. Found out about her from a Sabaton song. 'Lady of the Dark'. As for the other side of the world, I saw a few youtube videos the implied you did NOT wanna mess with Comanche chicks, and the Cheyenne had a few warriors of female persuasion.
Wish I had more time for your videos, being a history buff, but with job and much time spent on historical research. . .
Stay awesome!
Really enjoyed your video but was a little disappointed that no mention was made of some of the burial site discoveries in Scandinavia where skeletons of a few high-status individuals, initially believed to be men because they had been buried with weapons, were in fact skeletons of women that bore obvious combat scars. Certainly not evidence of armies of shield maidens but also certainly reflective of the relative high status of viking-era women in contrast to the rest of the Europeans. It was an interesting video. Thank you.
Nowadays, in countries like Iran and Afghanistan there's a lot of girks who dress up like boys in order to help sustain their families. It happens in Asia too. And we're supposed to believe that didn't happen in the past. We remember the ones that got recognized, like Joan of Arc, but the vast majority of them probably didn't want to be noticed and burnt.
well done, well presented, well researched.
Thank you
@@metatronyt No Thank YOU, I learned a lot that I did not know.
boudica was not a very good tactition. Her only success was when she had a full army against a virtually abandoned city. When the Romans found out about the attack they sent 2500 roman soldiers and 200 slaves. After they were easily defeated she went on to sack a couple other virtually undefended cities. During this time the Romans were scraping together an army of about 10 thousand men. half of which were veterans who were not in active service and would have been older than the average roman soldier. despite having more than 10x as many soldiers as the Romans she went on to lose decisively.
Or she ambushed an army on the march.
the things she did during her rule : attack defensless villages raze to ashes town (inculding the inhabitants male female children slaves) commit mass executions on civilians ambush small roman armies and finaly lose to an inferior force wow great job Boudica you killed more of your own ppl than romans woaw i wonder what the ppl of England are going to say about you thousands of years later : she was a strong independant women who led her ppl to freedom and victory... ah ok... well eeer no comment
As you were talking about the archaeological evidence, you mentioned how we can't know the women buried with weapons and armour actually used these in battle. While this kind of makes sense to me, as there are known instances of queens wearing ceremonial armour in more recent history, it also made me think: have there ever been cases where male burials have been questioned in a similar way? Like, if a skeleton of a teenaged boy was found with armour and weapons, would they consider that he was maybe a high-status leader's son who was buried with ceremonial armour although he had never seen battle, or would people just assume "oh, he was a bit young, but he was definitely a warrior"?
There have also been cases of burials being mis-identified as male burials simply because of the weapons present. This doesn't mean that women warriors were common, but it seems to me that there was a time where archaeologists didn't even consider the possibility, which may have contributed to misinterpretation of data.
Because teenaged boys are more common in war than women were? I mean a teenage boy is stronger than a grown woman. One example is the US women's soccer team who were the champions lost to a bunch of under 15 teenaged boys 7-1 in a game. Biology itself debunks your arguement.
@@fyrdman2185 what argument? I know that male warriors were the norm on the battlefield and that in general, men have a physical advantage over women. I never disputed that, nor did I make an argument to the contrary.
What I did say was that there might have been reasons for male non-combatants to be buried with weapons and armour, but that this may not be taken into consideration because it was so common for males to be warriors.
We have evidence of several female burials who were buried with weapon and showed clear signs of violent disorganized wounds that caused death(or would have caused their death).
So plenty of these females burials with weapons have more evidence that, they were buried with weapon.
Its true though, that in some cases we cant know if they ever fought, that is also true of graves with male skeletons.
I think you are absolutely right that, we would almost never question why those graves contained weapons but we do almost every time its a grave with a female. To which degree is i think impossible to say.
What we can say, and what is interesting, is that we have several cases from Scandinavia where a viking burial which have been considered a burial of a male warrior turned out to be female, and only after that discovery was the persons likelihood of being a warrior questioned.
Took me a second to think of the article but i believe it was this one, though im not certain.
It was however the same find they talked about.
www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/viking-warrior-women-reassessing-birka-chamber-grave-bj581/7CC691F69FAE51DDE905D27E049FADCD
@@Pawsk thank you for your reply, that's exactly what I was talking about!
Fu Hao tomb of the Shang dynasty, other nearby tombs present her as a warrior queen using oracle bone script, her personal tomb is full of weapons and scripts mentioning her achievements.
Tanais! I have a photo of myself standing on those ruins, long long ago. So nice to see it mentioned here!
Fun fact: the name Cú Chulainn means the Hound of Culann.. he was born Setanta but killed Culann's guard dog and the took the role of dog unto a new dog was old enough... The druid then rename Setanta to Cú Chulainn.
A key player in his death, Queen Medb was later killed when she was hit in the head by a piece of cheese while bathing.
Actually Metatron in the 18th century in The Philippines, there was a female rebel warrior name Gabriela Silang who led a militia to fight against the Spanish Crown to seek revenge against the Spanish who they murdered her parents when she was a little girl.
Didshe participtae in direct combat tho?
Military leaders/generals rarely participated in direct combat at least in Europe.
@@pepita2437depends on century, in medieval times military leaders often fought in first lines
@@pepita2437 yes she did. she assaulted the city of Vigan in 1763. the Spanish retaliated causing her and her troops to retreat back to Abra. they were eventually captured and executed by the Spanish but she did definitely participate in direct combat
@@datadeleted3245 But you're example was from the 18th century, no?
The exception, not the rule even if true.
Thanks for the good & informative show.
I think part of the problem is people greatly overestimate the strength required to inflict a lethal blow with just about any weapon. For a variety of reasons we mostly don't see warrior women, but it shouldn't challenge your worldview to see women fighting under the right circumstances even if rare.
Exactly. For anyone who disagrees with this comment, go watch Skallagrim's latest video (for future readers: It's about the lethality of seemingly tame Kendo cuts)
A skull can be cut into with just a structured tap from a sword. It's an edged bar of steel, it's gonna do some damage! The only time strength truly matters in weaponized combat is when it gets down to hand to hand, such as wrestling or hooking with your weapon.
Striking with full force isn't something you often do with a weapon (outside of particular oprotune moments, of course) because you will gas yourself out and perish to a gentle jab in the face by a spear.
This. Some sad people really think the "physical stronger" thing is a valid Argument but it just simply isnt. If it would be we would be bulking all day and not invent more Dangerous weapons. Like Metatron saidein one of His last Videos this discussion is closed since stone age. A person with a knife wins against a strongman pretty fast or even If he does Go down the strongman wont live to tell the story either.
@@necroseusThey weren't fighting naked, you know? There was this thing called armor.
Armour didnt helped them to much in the arm race since we dont use them anymore or at least had to Change them completly and people still die on the Battlefield
@@nocomment6421 What are you talking about?
I have a very scientific feeling that when a village / encampment would be attacked, every body would fight with all their might. That women in general would go to war as a regular business, well, women give and care for life, war is death.
Do you have any scientific or historical evidence other than your "scientific feeling"? Is your "scientific feeling" quantifiable such that you can, with statistical analysis, show the significance of veracity in your "scientific feeling"? If you understood the Socratic Method, then you would understand that there is nothing scientific about your feeling. Read any high school science book and learn about the Socratic Method. Learn what types of research are acceptable for providing scientific and historical evidence.
@@zuhlie Also be careful of context, the ability to do something does not mean it was done, or done regularly.
It is certainly true that women of the Steppes Nomads learned to ride almost as soon as they were born, like the men. Its also probably true that the bow and sling were considered acceptable weapons for women. So it makes it attractive to think this is a potential military force....
Problem is most of these women would be using hunting bows, which are much lighter than war bows, with MUCH lighter draw weights. Even for large game in the USA hunters don't tend to use more than 60 lb draw bows, usually around 40 - 50. A War Bow would be 100 lb or greater. Its not about hitting power here, its about RANGE.
So while its attractive to think such women could be used in war, the reality is the tribe or he clan would likely only do so if they literally had no other choice. Thats assuming you could prove it happened. While I think it probably did, I also think it was rare, but I make that statement KNOWING AND UNDERSTANDING the lack of proof behind it.
Its like I firmly believe that part of the sorry of the process of man domesticating the wolves that eventually became dogs is a couple of kids coming back to their parents with some abandoned pup's they found, for the parents to hear that dreaded refrain.... 'Mum, dad, can we keep them?
Why do I have that opinion? Because its exactly what I would have done as a child, and in fact DID, drove my parents insane! Again, I have no proof of this ever happening, but I am also convinced that humans have not really changed that much in the last 20,000 or so years......
To make a TLDR: Feeling is never scientific, but you CAN make such predictions IF YOU HAVE SOMETHING that can back such predictions up, and make them potentially feasible. But you can never argue them, and should evidence come to light that disproves them... well such feelings are to be discarded like the trash they have become.
Very fascinating.
Thank you Metatron
Number 1 woman warrior is Queen Amanirenas , she killed off Rome and ran them out , as Rome ran from Her and the greatest warriors the kushites, they were able to kill them off and dropped all further Roman expansion plans. Kushites are a greatest warriors.