Female Warriors Vol. I

The ancients were all familiar with the idea of women sometimes exchanging the spindle and distaff for the spear and shield. Not only did they believe their goddesses to take part occasionally in the battles of mortals but the supreme direction of military affairs was assigned to a female as Goddess of War; and this deity combining wisdom and courage frequently proved more than a match for the brutal if not blundering God of Battles. Which indeed observes Pope is no more than just since wisdom is generally averse to entering into warlike contests at all; yet when engaged it is likely to triumph over brute force and to bear off the laurels of the day. No general amongst the ancients would have dared to enter an enemys country besiege a city or risk an engagement without first sacrificing to the Goddess of War.All nations alike held the same belief. The Egyptians offered sacrifices to Neith the Goddess of War Philosophy and Wisdom to whom lions were subject and whose fitting emblem was the vulture. The Greeks and Romans adored Minerva the Thunderers armour-clad daughter: and Bellona sister or perhaps wife of Mars whose chariot she was said to drive through the din and tumult of the fight lashing the foaming horses with a bloody scourge. And Victoria whose name denotes her office was so greatly honoured both in Greece and Rome that Hiero King of Syracuse to flatter the Romans once sent them an idol figure of this goddess three hundred and twenty pounds in weight made of solid gold; while the Egyptians who worshipped her under the name of Naphte represented her in the form of an eagle because that bird is the strongest of aerial warriors and invariably victorious over all the feathered race. The Brahmins who claim an antiquity as great as or greater than Egypt worshipped and still worship Durga or Katyayini whose ten arms and hands each of which grasps a warlike weapon or emblem prove how formidable a foe she is believed to have been. Our ancient British forefathers prayed to Andate or Andraste Goddess of Victory and called upon her in their hour of need. The northern races Goths Vandals Germans who over-ran Europe during the decline of the Roman Empire assigned a somewhat analogous place in their mythology to the Valkyrias or Disas—Those dread maids whose hideous yellMaddens the battles bloody swell.