Adrienne Mayor

The Greek word automaton, "acting of one's own will," was first used by Homer (Iliad 5.749, 18.376) to describe ingenious devices built by the blacksmith god of invention and technology, Hephaestus. Hephaestus crafted a fleet of self-moving tripods, a set of automated bellows, a chair that trapped the sitter, automatic gates, automaton guard dogs, and a staff of female android servants made of gold. Hephaestus also fabricated the bronze robot Talos and the artificial woman Pandora, first described by Homer’s contemporary, the poet Hesiod, 750-650 BC. Notably, in some ancient descriptions, the Trojan Horse was portrayed as an animated, realistic statue. The oldest artistic representations of Talos and Pandora appear on Greek vase paintings of the fifth century BC. The earliest artistic representation of the Trojan Horse is on an archaic vase of about 670 BC. This paper demonstrates how the technological, crafted nature of these artificial replicas of man, woman, and horse were underscored in ancient writings and in related artworks depicting artisans and tools. The record of this literary and artistic evidence from more than two millennia ago is a milestone in the ancient history of technology.

In myth, Amazons were archenemies of Greek heroes such as Heracles and Achilles, but Greek and Roman historians also described historical, legendary, and contemporary warrior women of Eurasia with lives and exploits like those of Amazons. Greeks were not the only ancient culture to tell stories about warlike women and thrill to accounts of legendary and historical female warriors. The ancient Medes and Persians fought Scythians from the north and Saka tribes on the eastern frontiers of their empires. Beyond the Greek-influenced world, one can find intrepid horsewomen-archers in oral traditions, art, and literature of Egypt, Arabia, Persia, the Caucasus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Central Asia, and India.

In artistic illustrations of Amazonomachies, a few suspenseful scenes un vase paintings show Amazons overcoming Greek male opponents, but for the most part it is wounded and dead Amazons that abound in classical Greek and Roman art. This pervasive theme of killing Amazons in classical myth, art, and literature has received extensive theoretical attention. But another category has not attracted much attention: the captive Amazon. The rarity of Amazons and warrior women as prisoners of war makes the examples we find in myths, historical sources, and artistic representations all the more striking and worth discussing.

For centuries, dinosaur footprints have influenced popular legends and myths in the surroundings of important tracksites. In many regions of China, track-bearing slabs were utilized as building materials and integrated in houses, yards, or cave dwellings, often serving as auspicious symbols or aesthetic decorations. Special birds such as the golden pheasant, widely distributed in China, may have inspired people to consider them as mythic trackmakers. The Zizhou area in northern Shaanxi, China, is famous for tracksites in the lower portion of the early Middle Jurassic Yan'an Formation. Sandstones with dinosaur tracks from these localities have been collected since the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) and are used by villagers as cellar covers, stalls, or millstones. Besides their historical importance, the slabs are a valuable resource for ichnological research. Well-preserved theropod, ornithopod, and stegosaur tracks such as Kayentapus, Eubrontes, Anomoepus and Deltapodus incorporated into manmade structures can be seen while simply walking through some small villages of this area.

Abstract After his spectacular conquests from Persia to India in 334–24 BC, Alexander the Great died of mysterious causes after a heavy drinking party in Babylon (Iraq) in 323 BC, just before his 33rd birthday. Alexander’s untimely death aroused suspicions of poisoning among his closest companions; conspirators were accused of killing him with a mysterious toxin collected from the River Styx in southern Greece. Ancient historians were divided about the cause of death; some favored a plot, while others believed it was down to natural causes. Modern historians and toxicologists are also divided on whether Alexander died of disease or poison. Modern attempts to retrodiagnose Alexander’s fatal illness, by analyzing the detailed symptoms the king reportedly suffered in the 2 weeks before death, have resulted in many theories. Proposed natural causes include alcohol poisoning, malaria, typhoid fever, septicemia, and accidental physician error; deliberate murder theories focus on aconite, arsenic, fermented hellebore, and strychnine.

Abstract: Folk explanations of notable geological features, including fossils, are found around the world. Observations of fossil exposures (bones, footprints, etc.) led to place names for rivers, mountains, valleys, mounds, caves, springs, tracks, and other geological and palaeonto-logical sites. Some names describe prehistoric remains and/or refer to traditional interpretations of fossils. This paper presents case studies of fossil-related place names in ancient and modern Europe and China, and Native American examples in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. Evidence for the earliest known fossil-related place names comes from ancient Greco-Roman and Chinese literature. The earliest documented fossil-related place name in the New World was preserved in a written text by the Spanish in the sixteenth century. In many instances, fossil geonames are purely descriptive; in others, however, the mythology about a specific fossil locality survives along with the name; in still other cas...

Heracles’ ninth Labor, set by King Eurystheus and Princess Admete of Tiryns, was to obtain the war belt of Hippolyte, queen of the Amazons dwelling in Pontus on the Black Sea. Artistic and literary evidence suggests that his mission began peacefully but turned violent thanks to Heracles’ nemesis, the goddess Hera. The encounter between Heracles and his companions against the Amazons was one of the most popular subjects in ancient Greek vase painting and sculpture, second only to the Nemean Lion, with the earliest depiction on a terracotta shield of about 700 BC, found at Tiryns. The artistic and literary depictions reveal that Hippolyte and the Amazons were considered the equals of Greek males in courage and combat skills, although they were ultimately defeated and the Amazon queen’s precious war belt was won by Heracles.

The story of Camilla, the legendary warrior woman of Virgil's Aeneid, raises intriguing questions. Why did Virgil include an Amazon-like woman in his epic poem about the founding of Rome? Was Camilla Virgil's invention? Or was her story based on a lost Italian legend?

Abstract This article presents the English language collecting histories of seven legends of death by Poison Dress that were recorded in early modern India (set out in ª Killer Khilats, Part 1º ). The tales express fears of contamination, either symbolic or real, aroused by the ancient ...

A remarkable set of myths and art about biotechne, creating "life through craft," shows that the ancient Greeks imagined how one might fabricate automatons and self-moving devices more than 2,500 years ago. These myths were not simply tales of inert matter enlivened by magic or a god's command. They are some of the earliest-ever science fictions, envisioning what awesome results of artificial life could be achieved if only one possessed divine craftsmanship. One of the most striking examples of an ancient biotechne myth is the story of Prometheus making the first humans. Early Christian art in the Roman era conflated this story with god's creation of Adam. But the earliest known illustrations of this intriguing Promethean myth tell a surprisingly technological tale. A little-known group of exquisitely carved gems depicts Prometheus using various tools to assemble the proto-man. Skeletons were exceedingly rare in ancient Greek art, but these artists showed Prometheus beginning with the internal framework, the human skeleton. I show how this myth inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein tale, raising philosophical questions about human autonomy.

What did Plato have to say about Amazons? The  Athenian philosopher might seem an unlikely commentator on the fierce, barbarian warrior women of Greek mythology. How could Amazons or warlike females figure in the great thinker’s rigorous dialectical dialogues on politics, justice, love, virtue, education, laws, and metaphysics?

Fossilized footprints made by extinct creatures have captured the attention of humans worldwide. Many different prescientific cultures have attempted to identify the trackmakers and account for the tracks of unfamiliar species. In China, local folklore about dinosaur footprints is preserved in oral traditions of great antiquity, which persist today in at least five regions with conspicuous tracksites. Although folk explanations are expressed in mythological terms, they are based on careful observation over many generations. Ichnological myths often contain details that reveal attention to size, morphology, and sedimentology of tracks. Chinese folklore identified dinosaur tracks as those of divine or fantastic birds of various sizes, legendary large mammals, sacred plants, and deities or heroes. Popular knowledge of dinosaur tracksites and myth-based descriptions of mysterious footprints in stone could serve as a guide for paleontologists in East Asia, leading them to identify new trackways previously unknown to science.

Time-traveling back to antiquity to study the evidence for how people imagined making artificial life and human enhancements in mythology and actual prosthetics and other enhancements in historical accounts and archaeology might help us think about the human transformations of the future.

In artistic illustrations of Amazonomachies, a few suspenseful scenes un vase paintings show Amazons overcoming Greek male opponents, but for the most part it is wounded and dead Amazons that abound in classical Greek and Roman art. This pervasive theme of killing Amazons in classical myth, art, and literature has received extensive theoretical attention. But another category has not attracted much attention: the captive Amazon. The rarity of Amazons and warrior women as prisoners of war makes the examples we find in myths, historical sources, and artistic representations all the more striking and worth discussing.

Amazons of myth were fierce horsewomen-archers who gloried in war. Dwelling in exotic lands east of the Mediterranean, Amazons were the equals of men and the greatest Greek heroes proved their valor by defeating them. Archaeological excavations of armed women's graves on the steppes now suggests that real nomadic mounted archers influenced ideas and images of Amazons. Legendary enemies of the Greeks, Amazons of myth were fierce barbarian horsewomen-archers who gloried in war, hunting, and sex. Dwelling in exotic lands east of the Mediterranean, Amazons were the equals of men in combat and bravery. The greatest Greek heroes-Heracles, Theseus, and Achilles-proved their valor by defeating Amazon queens: Hippolyte, Antiope, and Penthesilea. As described by Homer, Herodotus, Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, Plutarch, Pausanias, Appian, and others, the Amazon lifestyle was a reverse image of Greek male-dominated society. The warlike women enjoyed the freedom of men and were depicted in literature and art as the equals of male warriors in skill and valor. According to pseudo-etymology, amazon was said to mean "one-breast" due to the need to remove a breast in order to draw a bow. But this claim was disputed in antiquity with others suggesting that it meant "not breast-fed." No ancient artists portrayed one-breasted Amazons. It is more likely that the non-Greek name derived from the Iranian word for "warrior." Some writers claimed that Amazons invented cavalry and iron weapons. Formidable with bow, sword, and battle-axe, Amazons w e r e featured as t h e w o r t h y opponents of the best Greek heroes, including Herakles, Achilles, and Theseus. Amazonomachies were popular in sculpture and vase paintings; Athens commemorated its mythic defeat of the Amazons in the Parthenon sculptures. In 2007, magnificent mosaics of four Amazon queens, Melanippe, Hippolyte, Penthesilea, and Antiope, were discovered in Urfa, Turkey. Alleged tombs of Amazons were revered in A n a t o l i a , where ma n y cities claimed Amazon founders. At Ephesos, it was said that Amazons worshipped Artemis and performed war dances. According to a romantic tale recounted by Herodotus (4.110-17), some young Scythian warriors fell in love with a band of Amazons and proposed marriage. The women insisted on independence. "Our business is with riding and the bow and javelin-we know nothing of women's work. We must be free to hunt and make war." The lovers formed a new tribe, vowing to raise girls and boys to hunt, ride, and make war. Thus originated the Sarmatians, a tribe of nomadic, warlike horse people of southern Russia. Ancient Greek historians, such as Herodotus, Strabo, and Plato, reported that real women lived the lives of Amazons in the vast territory stretching from the Black Sea to Central Asia, known as Scythia. Cyrus the Great and historical commanders such as Alexander the Great and Pompey encountered real women warriors in Eurasia (Plut. Alex. 46, Pomp. 35). Ancient historians linked the Amazons of myth with women of Scythian nomad cultures whose lives centered on horses, archery, and relatively egalitarian lifestyles. In the 1950s, Soviet archaeologists excavated burial mounds of Sarmatian-Saka-Scythian nomads who had traded with the Greeks in Herodotus' time. Similar fieldwork continued in the 1990s in Kazakhstan by Jeannine Davis-Kimball; she was t h e f i r st t o u se DNA a na l y si s t o d e te r mi ne t ha t so me o f t he a r med ske le t o n s we re fe mal e s. Since then, other archaeologists have identified about 300 graves of female warriors on the steppes. Of t o mb s containing warriors' weapons, armor, and horse trappings, nearly a quarter belonged to women, some showing evidence of battle wounds, skull injuries, and arrowheads e m b e d d e d in bone.

How ancient is the link between tyranny and technology? Autocrats have deployed automatons as weapons since antiquity--not just in Greek myth but also in historical times. This article describes automatons and machines deployed by tyrants in mythology and recounts how historical autocrats, from Sicily and Sparta, as early as the 6th century BC, also used actual animated statues and machines to exert power.

In myth, Amazons were archenemies of Greek heroes such as Heracles and Achilles, but Greek and Roman historians also described historical, legendary, and contemporary warrior women of Eurasia with lives and exploits like those of Amazons. Greeks were not the only ancient culture to tell stories about warlike women and thrill to accounts of legendary and historical female warriors. The ancient Medes and Persians fought Scythians from the north and Saka tribes on the eastern frontiers of their empires. Beyond the Greek-influenced world, one can find intrepid horsewomen-archers in oral traditions, art, and literature of Egypt, Arabia, Persia, the Caucasus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Central Asia, and India.

After his spectacular conquests from Persia to India in 334!24 BC, Alexander the Great died of mysterious causes after a heavy drinking party in Babylon (Iraq) in 323 BC, just before his 33rd birthday. Alexander’s untimely death aroused suspicions of poisoning among his closest companions; conspirators were accused of killing him with a mysterious toxin collected from the River Styx in southern Greece. Ancient historians were divided about the cause of death; some favored a plot while others believed in natural causes. Modern histor- ians and toxicologists are also divided on whether Alexander died of disease or poison. Modern attempts to retrodiagnose Alexander’s fatal illness, by analyzing the detailed symptoms the king reportedly suffered in the 2 weeks before death, have resulted in many theories. Proposed natural causes include alcohol poisoning, malaria, typhoid fever, septi- cemia, and accidental physician error; deliberate murder theories focus on aconite, arsenic, fermented hellebore, and strychnine.

Half-human soldiers, robot servants, and eagle drones – the ancient Greeks got there first. Could an AI learn from their stories? A recent international conference on Artificial Intelligence and the dire warnings by Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and others about the unintended consequences of AI sent me to my extensive files on ancient myths filled with surprisingly prescient forebodings about "biotechnology."

The exuberance--and the anxiety--aroused by blurring boundaries between biology and machine, natural and man-made, life and death, might seem to be a new constellation of human emotions, called into being by bio-technological advances. But the concepts of amplifying, replicating, extending, and even creating artificial life--and the ambivalence surrounding such issues—have very deep roots in classical antiquity.The cautionary narratives feature many famous figures of myth: the superman Hercules, the sorceress Medea, the engineer Daedalus, the inventor Hephaestus, Jason's skeleton army, the tragic bronze robot Talos, and the tragically curious girl-automaton named Pandora. These well-known mythic tales take on eerie new meanings when viewed together as critiques of what ancient Greeks would have called bio-techne (bios = life, techne = crafted through the art of science), foreshadowing the optimism that vies with alarm about bio-technological capabilities today.

In Greek myth, Amazons were fierce women of exotic lands who gloried in hunting and war. The greatest Greek heroes, Heracles and Achilles, proved their valor by killing Amazon queens. But were Amazons mere fantasy? Thanks to archaeology, we now know they were modeled on real steppe nomads of Eurasia. The Greeks were not the only ones to describe warlike females. Amazons appear in other ancient cultures, but with a twist. Non-Greeks desired the warrior women as allies and companions. This paper describes the archaeology of warrior women and recounts Amazon tales of the Caucasian steppes, Greece, Persia, Egypt, the Caucasus, and Central Asia featuring Penthesilea, Tirgatao, Tomyris, Sparethra, Amage, Zarina, Valdusa, Blue Lotus, Saikal, and Gulaim.

The sight of a Eurasian nomad hunting with swift horse, loyal dog, and powerful golden eagle is a majestic scene with ancient roots. For thousands of years this was how the nomadic peoples of the northern steppes from the Caucasus to Manchuria hunted for survival. This paper traces archaeological, literary, and historical evidence for women as eagle hunters in antiquity and presents the new generation of female eagle falconers in Mongolia, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan. This is a revised and expanded version of a two-part article that appeared April 5-6, 2016, ancient-origins.net and reprinted April 18, 2016, in BUST http://bust.com/feminism/16147-the-untold-history-of-the-eagle-huntress.html

The rich folk literature of the Caucasus is virtually unknown in the West because the ancient myths were preserved orally and the isolated region's cultures remain little-known today. In antiquity this territory—stretching 1,000 miles from the Black Sea east to the Caspian Sea—was part of Scythia-Sarmatia, home to nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples whose lives centered on horses and archery. John Colarusso's translations of Nart sagas from Circassian, Abkhazian, Abaza, and Ubkh bring to life a wonderful world of primeval giants, evil monsters, magnificent horses, wise elders, adventurers, magical spells, earthy humor, and colorful heroes and heroines. The sagas are filled with fantastic exploits as well as realistic details of daily life. Colarusso’s commentaries provide historical contexts, explain arcane meanings and local customs, and point out comparative folklore and fascinating mythic parallels.

Gender equality may have been advanced in steppe nomad tribes of antiquity where both men and women wore practical trousers, the first tailored garments created for riding horses, hunting, warfare, and other activities. According to the ancient Greeks, warrior women invented trousers and trousered Amazons were frequently portrayed in classical art, especially on vase paintings. The earliest examples of nomad horse people's trousers have been excavated in Scythian graves of 3,000 -2,500 years ago.

Greek myths about Amazons were influenced in part by real women of warlike nomads of the steppes. Greeks were not the only ancient people to tell stories about Amazon-like heroines. Warrior women were featured in ancient Egyptian, Persian, and Chinese narratives.