WOMEN OF HISTORY | HYPSICRATEA (fl. 1st century BC) (Katee Sackhoff)

Wife of Mithridates VI of Pontus (in modern day Turkey), Hypsicratea loved her husband so much that she learned fighting skills, wore a male disguise, and accompanied him when he went on campaigns against the Romans. Her belief was that no one but herself could serve him as well as she could and strived to always be there when needed. She rode into battles, and was noted for fighting with ax, sword, and bow and arrow. When her husband was defeated by Pompey, Hypsicratea was one of the only three who remained at the king’s side.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | ENHEDUANNA (2285-2250 BCE) (Rachida Brakni)

An Akkadian princess and high priestess to the god Nanna, Enheduanna is one of the earliest women in history that we know the name of, and is regarded as the earliest known author and poet in the world.

Her father, King Sargon of Akkad, appointed her as High Priestess at Ur in an attempt to strengthen his rule in the south of Sumeria, and it was there that she began writing. Her Sumerian Temple Hymns (as one of her collections is now called) are regarded as one of the first attempts at creating a systematic theology. In one of these hymns she writes: “My king, something has been created that no one has created before.”

Long after Enheduanna’s death her hymns continued to be copied and used, and there is evidence to suggest that she took on a semi-divine role in the eyes of her people.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | BEGUM NUR JAHAN, MEHR-UN-NISAA (1577–1645)

Empress of the Mugjal Dynasty which ruled over the majority of the Indian subcontinent, Nur Jahan was the favourite wife of Emperor Jahangir on behalf of whom she displayed great authority. Jahangir, upon first meeting her, was so infatuated by her beauty that he proposed on the spot, and the deep affection between them coupled with Jahangir’s problems - he battled opium and alcohol addiction throughout his reign - meant Nur Jahan was give authority to make most of the decisions and became one of the most powerful woman in Indian history.

She was recognised by all as the true power behind the throne, giving audiences at the palace, being consulted by the ministers on most matters, and having coins minted with her image on them.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | QUEEN MARGUERITE D’ANJOU (23 March 1430 – 25 August 1482) (Gillian Anderson)

French-born Margaret married Henry VI and became queen consort of England at the age of fifteen, and was even at that age strong-willed, passionate, and aware that her duty as queen was to protect the interests of the crown at all costs. Henry was not a successful king, though, and had suffered mental problems his whole life that would only grow worse as time went on, leaving Margaret in true control of the country for much of the time. (Both her mother - Duchess Isabella of Lorraine - and grandmother -Yolande of Aragon - had been forceful figures in their own right and Margaret perhaps inherited much of her spirit from them.)

Margaret was vastly unpopular with the people of England, and was one of the key figures in the War of the Roses. When it seemed her husband’s place was being threatened it was she who called for the Great Council that would spark the whole conflict, and then led the Lancastrian faction.

She had a great love of learning, and was the patron of the Queens’ College at Cambridge University.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | AMANIRENAS QORE LI KDWE LI (‘AMERNIRAS, QORE AND KANDAKE’) (reigned 40 BC-10 BC) (Yasmin Warsame)

A warrior queen of the Kingdom of Kush that challenged the Roman rulers who took over Egypt after the death of Cleopatra VII. Originally queen consort, upon the death of her husband Amanirenas became queen in her own right. (Kandake was the titled used by both queens and queen mothers in Kush.)

She led her people in a five year war against Roman Egypt before finally negotiating a peace treaty with them that would see the two opposing forces remained peaceful until the end of the third century, but by this time the kingdom of Kush was much faded in power.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | BATHSUA MAKIN (1600-1675) (Vahina Giocante)

First published at the age of sixteen, the highly-educated Bathsua could read and write in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, German, Spanish, French and Italian, and was referred to by her peers as ‘England’s most learned lady’. Her main interest lay in the bettering of her gender’s position in society, and she argued vehemently for the equal rights of women to receive an education, writing “were women thus educated now, I am confident that advantage would be very great: the women would have honor and pleasure, their relations profit, and the whole nation advantage.”

Although well-born, she was plagued her whole life with money problems and sought employment after she was married. She gained a position in the court of Charles I as tutor to the princess Elizabeth, and after the princess’ death (and the death of her husband) she continued teaching and eventually set up her own school outside of London. (Records don’t remain of it though, and we have no idea how successful this venture was.)

“I expect to meet with many scoffs and taunts from inconsiderate and illiterate men, that prize their own lusts and pleasure more than your profit and content.”

WOMEN OF HISTORY | BRUNHILDA OF AUSTRASIA (543 – 613) [Nur Aysan] & FREDEGUND (died 597) [Asia Argento]

Visigoth princess Brunhilda married Sigebert I, king of Austrasia, while his brother Chilperic, king of Neustria, quickly made moves to marry her sister Galswintha. Low-born Fredegund was a mistress to Chilperic who had already encouraged him to have his first wife sent away, so when Galswintha was strangled to death only months after the marriage (quite possibly by Fredegund herself) she married Chilperic and became queen.

Brunhilda was furious and encouraged her husband to go to war. Fredegund, who loathed Brunhilda equally, encouraged it of her own new husband. The conflict would last for more than forty long years and Fredegund and Brunhilda were the true powers behind the throne throughout it all, ruling through their husbands and then sons.

During the war Chilperic was assassinated, and Fredegund died of natural causes. Brunhilda now took her revenge on those left of Fredegund’s family, sending her own sons against Fredegund’s. Hers sons instead battled each other and both died. Brunhilda was almost eighty when she took control of Burgandy and Austria on behalf of her great-grandson. The nobles were sick of Brunhilda’s control though and she was deposed. It was Fredegunde’s son Clotaire who took the throne and immediately ended his mother’s blood feud by having Brunhilda tortured and then brutally killed.

Both women had been ruthless in their pursuits of power and revenge - Brunhilda a dangerous adversary and Fredegund a sadistic murderer - and history would remember them as larger than life figures of cruelty. It has even been proposed that Fredegund - and the murderous hatred she bore her own daughter - is one of the sources for for the tales of Cinderella.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | SAINT PERPETUA (181 - 203) (Charlotte Casiraghi)

Perpetua was a young Roman woman of Carthage who was sentenced to “fight with the beasts of the arena” for her refusal to sacrifice to the Roman emperor Septimius Severus and renounce her Christian beliefs. 

Unlike other martyrs, Perpetua kept a journal during her last days. In it she records her emotions regarding her husband and worries about her child that she had still been nursing, the sufferings visited on her while imprisoned, the desperate and angry attempts of her pagan father to get her to give up her religion, and the visions she had during her final days.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | CHRISTINE DE PIZAN (1363 – c. 1430) (Tricia Helfer)

The first woman in Europe to be a professional writer, Christine wrote works challenging the age’s misogyny and stereotypes. Venetian-born, she lived most of her life in Paris and wrote only in Middle French.

At fifteen she married, but the death of her husband when she was twenty-four left Christine as the sole supporter of her mother, a niece, and her own two children. She turned to writing, and her love ballads soon caught the attention of members of the court, many of them entertained by the novelty of a woman writer. Between 1393 and 1412 she composed over three hundred ballads for paying clients and many more shorter poems.

Soon she had moved onto writing about the inequality present among the sexes. An assertive woman who debated openly with male writers, she argued that stereotypes about women could only be sustained as long as women were prevented from entering the male-dominated conversation. Her goal was to allow all women, regardless of their status, to undermine the control of male society. Her books offer advice to all sorts of women, from royal ladies, to widows, to prostitutes.

Simone de Beauvoir wrote that Christine’s work was “the first time we see a woman take up her pen in defense of her sex.”

WOMEN OF HISTORY | ISABELLA I OF CASTILE (22 April 1451 – 26 November 1504) (Julianne Moore)

The Queen Regnant of Castile and León who (with her husband and joint ruler Ferdinand II of Aragon) brought a stability to both kingdoms that would lead to the unification of Spain. Despite her noble birth, Isabella grew up in poverty and had to fight for her claim on the throne. Once Isabella was ruler she set about reorganizing the weak government to make it more beneficial to the people, dragged the kingdom out of the immense debt her brother - the previous king - had put it in, brought the soaring crime rate down to the lowest it had been in years, and financed Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the New World, leading Spain into their golden age of exploration and colonization.

She took an active and personal interest in her people, setting aside time once a week to meet with those that had grievances to be heard. On one occasion when a rebellion broke out in Segovia, she - against the desires of her male advisors - rode out by herself to negotiate with the rebels. (She was successful and the rebellion was brought to an end.)

Deeply religious, Isabella planned to bring her nation together further by aligning them all under Catholicism - whether they liked it or not. To this end she and her husband ordered the conversion or exile of tens of thousands of their Muslim and Jewish subjects, and established the Spanish Inquisition.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | ANYTE OF TEGEA (fl. early 3rd century BC) (Bridget Moynahan)

An Arcadian poet, Anyte was the leader of a school of poetry on Peloponnese and was greatly admired by both her contemporaries and later generations. Antipater of Thessalonica puts her amongst his list of the nine earthly muses and compares her skill to that of Homer.

Twenty-four surviving epigrams are attributed to her, with a the authorship of a few questioned. This means we have more complete poems by Anyte than any other ancient Greek woman.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | BLESSED HILDEGARD OF BINGEN, SIBYL OF THE RHINE (1098 – 17 September 1179) (Anna Silk)

Hildegard saw visions from an early age and was sent to a convent where she would eventually become abbess. She was outspoken and ill-willed when it came to the needs of the women under her care, and she more than once went against Church authorities to do what she believed was needed or disagreed with their actions.

She was was prolific composer and between seventy and eighty compositions have survived, one of the largest repertoires of any medieval composer. Along with this her other writings includes nine books, seventy poems, seventy-two songs, and a hundred letters. (Her books included not only writings about her visions, but also a text on the natural sciences.) She even invented her own alphabet, a modified Latin filled with invented and abridged words that was used among her nuns and in some of her books. She continued writing until her death at the age of eighty-one.

Despite being of the gender that was traditionally not allowed to interpret and question the scriptures, Hildegard’s writings often do so and there is little evidence of her being punished for it. She also traveled widely during her lifetime, preaching to other abbots and abbesses as well as the public - another taboo for women.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | ÆTHELFLÆD, LADY OF THE MERCIANS (869 / 870–918) (Lauren Cohen)

Eldest daughter of Alfred the Great, Æthelflæd ruled Mercia for eight years after the death of her husband. (While he was alive she signed documents and decrees, leading some to believe she was the true leader even then.) A brilliant military tactician and leader, she engaged in hostile expeditions into Wales, overtook enemy strongholds, captured Leicester, and helped push the advancing Danes back. She was responsible for the rebuilding of Gloucester from Roman ruins, including the layout of the core street plan which still exists today.

WOMEN OF HISTORY | GWERFUL MECHAIN (fl. 1462-1500) (Rebecca Mader)

A noble Welsh woman, Gwerful was an outspoken poet who wrote often on the subjects of religion and sex (sometimes simultaneously). She is most famous now for her erotic poetry, specifically ‘Cywydd y Cedor’, which in English is usually called ‘Ode to the Pubic Hair’. In it she praises the vulva and mocks the male poets who endlessly praise the female form but don’t give their attention to the genitals.

all you proud poets,
let songs to the quim circulate

a girl’s thick grove, circle of precious greeting,
lovely bush, God save it.