THE EARLY AGE OF GREECE VOL.I by W.Ridgeway 1901

Herod,
l)iod. Sic. (III. ')'! H) sa\s tiiat there were .Vma/.uiis in Libya, who were
subjection, and also to the story that the male children were handed over to
more their
anciriit than those of Tontus, amoii^,'st whom he classes the (ior^^ons
fathers, whilst the females remained with their mothers.
against whom I'dseus fou;,'bt. He adds that in the weslei'ii ]iarts of Jiibya there
Diodorus was not fai' frdin the mark, when he cited an actual tribe from
was a nation ruled by women (((/I'us yivaiKOKparov^i.tvoi'). The women west Africa, the duiin^,'
women of which were Amazons. In our time the king of
their maidenhood performed military service, but on the t-xpiration of the ])eriod
Dahomey and the Hehr king (White Nile) had regiments of female warriors.
THE HOMERIC DIALECT. 651
652 THE HOMERIC DIALECT.
daurus' by the Dorian conquerors of Argos. The speech of this
" The Sauromatae speak the language of Scythia, but have
older stratum could well colour that of the new colonists.
never talked it correctly, because the Amazons learned it imperfectly
at the first."
Nor was it only in the East that Greek colonists got assimilated
to the aboriginal populations, among whom they settled.
In this story it is assumed that the children learned to
Thus at Emporiae in Spain, where once there had been distinct
speak from their mothers and not from their fathers. This
Greek and Iberian communities living side by side, later on
shows that the ancients held that foreign women, even when
there was but a common constitution in which Greek and
taken from their homes and settled in their husbands' country,
barbarian elements were combined, " a thing which (Strabo
had a greater influence than their husbands in shaping the
remarks) had occurred in many other tongue of their offspring.
places'-."
The ^
story of the Sauromatae illustrates the same These considerations
principle.
prove that the children of bodies of
They were said to be descended from certain Scythians who
conquerors who marry the women of the land, will have an
had married Amazons. The women of the Sauromatae continued
to observe the ancient customs of their Amazon mothers,
important factor is the isolation of the conquerors
inevitable tendency to follow their mothers' speech.
Another
" from their native land. For if communication with their old
frequently hunting on horseback with their husbands, sometimes
even unaccompanied
"
home
in war
; they took the field and
kept up and fresh bodies of the same stock arrive from
time to
wore the same dress as the men. Their marriage law ordained
time, the earlier settlers are likely to retain their own
that no girl should wed until she had killed a man in battle'*.
tongue and customs much longer than if they are completely
cut otf from their own race, and live uninterruptedly in alien
'
Paus. VII. 4, 2.
surroundings. We may therefore hold as a solid factor in the
160.
tendency of the conqueror to merge into the conquered, the
-
iv. 114.
isolation of the conquerors from their original homes and from
Tliis story gives us the true explanation of the myth of the Amazons, who
the great mass of those that speak the same language.
*
are so prominent in Greek Uterature and art. They were said to dwell near the
river Thermodon But even when the invaders in Cappadocia, their capital beini^ Tliemiscyra their
; territory
bring some women of their own
extended along the Euxine, and some of them were said to have settled beyond
stock with them, they are liable to drop their own language
the Tanais {Don}, and to have pushed their borders up to the Caspian.
and practically adopt that of the natives. Thus the Northmen
Homer calls them iiKtnli/ci' {avTiavfipas II. vi. 18C,). They sijcnt all their life in
war and manly pursuits. They allowed no men within their state, and their
children were the otfspring of the men of the adjoining districts. The male
married aud bore children :
they controlled the ollices of state, and their
children were handed over to their fathers (according; to Justin they were
husbands carried out their commands.
strangled), whilst the Kii'^ w'ere reared by their mothers. According to a
The myth lias probably arisen from the fact that the (i reeks had heard of
later le^'end tlu'ir lit^ht ijreast was burned off to enaiile tluMu to handle more
certain tribes in Scythia, Asia Minor, and Liliya, the women of which took their
dt.'ftly the bow and javelin, but this story is due to a false elynu)loj:y of their
part in war and the chase. The story of their putting their men to death
name from would arise from the /xai^os. Certaiidy Aesciiylus {Siii>j)l. "JiSli, ras di'di'(?pors Kptofiopoys
report of such a custom as that of the Sauromatae, that
'
Xfia^ovas) seems to kiu)w only the other etymology from /.id^'a, ralw, as no
is
j^'irl could marry until she had slain a man. Tlie custom of descent through
rendered jirol)al)le by the epithet tlcsh-eatin^r. Tbe "
works of art ac-cord with
women, and the regulations respecting the kiiishij) of the children, such as are
this, for it is only in the later jieiiiul that tlii' .\ma/ons are represented without
])ractise(l among many savages, would easily give rise to the belief that the
the Amazons eitlier allowed no male in their connnunities
rit-'ht l)reast.
kept them in complete