On a Legendary Tribe

The ancient Greeks firmly believed that they existed, beyond a doubt. Classical Greek stories, poem, plays, and art all portray or depict them. And, yet, modern historians and archaeologists can find little trace of this legendary warrior tribe. However, because of the amount of art and literature surrounding their descriptions, we can get an idea of what the Greeks knew or believed that they knew about this group of warriors.

To begin with, the ancient texts aren’t quite sure where they originated, but while some sources point to the northern shore of the Black Sea, in the area that is now part of modern Ukraine, most of them say the tribe was from the southern, opposite coast. This area is now the northern part of Turkey. From this flat and fertile land, the tribe raided all along the Black Sea coastal areas and even ventured into the coasts of the Aegean Sea. This is where they encountered the ancient Greeks. Themiscyra, a Greek city in northern Turkey, is supposed to have originally been the capital city of the group. It was here that a supposed series of queens ruled over the people, most notably the legendary Queen Hippolyta. And, to be fair, modern archaeologists have found there some evidence of tombs that have contents and bodies that match the ancient Greek descriptions of the group.

The primary characteristic of the tribe was their war-like abilities. While we think of Greece being the home of arts and architecture, philosophy and learning, this other group was known as the “slayers of men” according to the so-called first historian, Herodotus. They were renowned for their abilities with the bow and the spear, and the idea of fear was not found among them, apparently. One of these warriors would gladly enter a fight with several enemies, and, more often than not, put them to rout. Thus, the tales of their bravery and their prowess preceded them. Their reputation was so fierce that, in battle, it was said that if the enemy found out that they were facing this particular group, they would often leave the battlefield rather than fight them. In fact, such an encounter with them is included in an obscure passage in Homer’s Iliad.

By the time of Alexander the Great, the tribe seems to have largely vanished except for the stories still told in that culture. One contemporary of Alexander supposedly wrote a story about Alexander fighting the tribe in an effort to show how mighty Alexander was, but, when the story was read the young Macedonian conqueror, he is supposed to have said, “Oh? Where was I when this battle was won?” The Roman poet, Vergil, writing over 250 years later, referred to the tribe, but, again, as only the stuff of legend.

Their name as it comes down to us today is also somewhat of a mystery. One legend said that the warriors cut off their right breast muscles so that their bows could be steadied next to their bodies. However, there is also no evidence that this was true even if the warrior tribe had existed. At any rate, that’s one source of the name that we know them by today: Those without breasts.

In Greek, the word is Amazon.

On a Lack of Decay

The body had been declared dead six days earlier. Yet, it showed no signs of decay or decomposition. The weather had been warm and moist. Any normal body would begin to show signs of death. Yet, nothing seemed changed despite the passage of time. People began to talk and speculate as to why there was such a lack of decay.

You may well be wondering why someone would allow a body to lie uncovered and unburied for almost a week after a declaration of death. Well, the situation was complicated. There was some considerable conflict over exactly who would take possession of the corpse. That question had to be answered before the authorities would release the body to be interred. The young man was indeed loved, had a mother and siblings. His mother, well, the young man once said that she was so nosy in his life that she charged high rent for only 9 months of occupancy. Also, the young man had a large a coterie of friends who all felt that they should be the ones tasked with the embalming and burying of him. In fact, some unseemly fights broke out between some of those who claimed to be the ones who loved the young man more than the others.

His own wife and child, however, weren’t considered, oddly enough. They were more, well, ornamental than practical to the man. His life was his career, his work, and everyone who knew him understood that. We don’t talk much these days of destiny and fate, but people around this particular young man certainly saw him as being fated for success. And, indeed, he was successful in his chosen career. Maybe too successful.

The young man worked extremely hard, often worked harder and longer than others who were under him, but then, when work was over, he also partied hard, longer and later, than any others, too. That was part of the reason there was some dithering over the body. Nobody, including the doctors, were sure what he died of. Could it be that the excesses of his hard drinking and partying caught up with him? We still don’t know. We do know that he was cut down at the young age of 33 after rising to the top of his profession.

What most people today think is that, whatever he died from, quietly and in his own bed, we have an idea why his body didn’t decay. The best theory is that the young man wasn’t, in fact, dead at all. He may have had an auto-immune condition named Guillain-Barre Syndrome. That can manifest itself by extreme muscle paralysis–the patient mimics death by having such shallow breathing that he may seem to not be breathing at all.

And that’s why it only seemed that his body didn’t decompose. Oh, all those around him thought that the lack of decay meant that he was a god. But now we know the truth.

In other words, it might well be that Alexander the Great didn’t actually die until his friends had him cut open and disemboweled in preparation for his embalming.

On an Unknown Assassin

The list of recent famous assassins is long. Sirhan Sirhan. Mark David Chapman. John Wilkes Booth. James Earl Ray. Lee Harvey Oswald. And those are only the ones associated with American assassinations. Famous historical assassins from other cultures include Brutus, Gavrilo Princip, and Charlotte Corday.

Someone once said that you can either be a famous person or the murderer of a famous person to be remembered in history. This is the story of an assassin we don’t remember, but history felt the effects of his murderous act. What’s interesting about this particular assassin is that we indeed remember the person killed.

Historians familiar with his story have circumstantial evidence that the murdered man’s wife and or son had a hand in hiring this unremembered assassin. Believe what you will. I happen to think the killer acted on his own. The main reason for this is, I feel, that the murdered man publicly embarrassed his killer, and, since the man’s pride was so wounded, he took his revenge by murdering the man who had shamed him.

To make matters even more, well, almost incestuous, is that the murderer had been hired as a bodyguard for the man he killed. That gave him access. The old police trope that murder requires means, motive, and opportunity is certainly in play here. The murderer had the motive (the public embarrassment), the opportunity (as a bodyguard, he had access), and as for the means, well, he chose to thrust a blade into the ribcage of his boss right before a public event–the marriage of the man’s daughter.

There is a problem with the motive part of the equation, however. It seems that eight years passed between the time of the humiliation and the murder. That is quite the long time for someone to wait for revenge. I can’t often remember what happened to me eight days ago, much less something that happened almost a decade in the past. Yet, we are supposed to believe that this eight year span was a time of waiting for the right moment. And the wedding was it.

The act was premeditated. The escape after the murder was clearly planned. Accomplices (who were later tried and executed) aided the attempted flight of the killer. Oh, and the killer himself was quickly caught and killed before he could testify as to his true motive and/or if the murdered man’s wife and/or son had anything to do with the murder.

That proved quite convenient. One reason historians suspect the wife as an accomplice in the murder is that, shortly after her husband’s death, she paid for a large memorial to be placed in the city where the murder took place honoring…the murderer.

You see, when her husband died, the now-widow’s 20-year-old son became king. This young man (who may or may not have been involved as well) went on to conqueror the known world over the next 13 years. You know her husband as Philip of Macedon.

You know her young son as Alexander the Great.