Author Interview & Book Giveaway: Judith Starkston on HAND OF FIRE

This week, we're pleased to welcome author and Unusual Historicals contributor JUDITH STARKSTON with her newest novel, HAND OF FIRE. One lucky visitor will get a free copy of Hand of Fire. Be sure to leave your email address in the comments of today's author interview for a chance to win. Winner(s) are contacted privately by email. Here's the blurb.

The Trojan War threatens Troy’s allies and the Greek supply raids spread. A young healing priestess, designated as future queen, must defend her city against both divine anger and invading Greeks. She finds strength in visions of a handsome warrior god. Will that be enough when the half-immortal Achilles attacks? Hand of Fire, a tale of resilience and hope, blends history and legend in the untold story of Achilles’s famous captive, Briseis.

**Q&A with Judith Starkston**

Tell us about Hand of Fire and why you chose to write about Briseis?

Hand of Fire tells the story of Briseis, the captive woman from Homer’s Iliad who caused the bitter conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon during the Trojan War. She has practically no voice in the male-centered epic; I wanted to discover her as a flesh and blood woman.

I was asked a really good question at my book launch: does a reader need to be familiar with the Iliad to read my book? Absolutely not! My primary critique partner has never read the Iliad, and she was invaluable for keeping me true to that goal.

Hand of Fire is partly a romance—Briseis and Achilles fall in love but in an unconventional manner that includes a mystical element. Achilles is half-immortal and I made full use of that half of his conflicted personality.

In addition to the romantic element, Hand of Fire explores why some people, women especially, can survive great tragedy and violence against them, even managing to experience joy in what life still has to offer.

It is a coming of age tale featuring a smart, strong-willed young woman in an ancient culture (Trojan/Hittite) that, counter to our modern stereotypes of the past, expects Briseis to be powerful, literate and a leader. Briseis succeeds in rising to those expectations despite the circumstances arrayed against her—and she’s strong enough to take on the mightiest of the Greek heroes.

How did you research the historical background to the story and did you discover anything surprising along the way?

The Trojans and their allies (such as Briseis’s city of Lyrnessos) are culturally and politically related to the powerful empire of the Hittites that ruled what we think of as Turkey throughout the Late Bronze Age (around 1250 BCE). Troy was a semi-independent kingdom of the Hittites. As a classicist, I knew a fair amount about the Mycenaean Greeks when I started writing, but the Hittites were a delightful new realm of exploration for me—and that’s Briseis’s world.

I spent a lot of time at university libraries, pouring through dry stuff like archaeological site reports (which produce both an urgent need for napping and great juicy details if you stick with it—fortunately for my readers, I do the culling). I also travelled extensively in Turkey and Greece, meeting with archaeologists at key sites and examining museum collections.

The big surprise for me was the Hittite culture that has come to light in the last couple decades, especially as the recently excavated cuneiform clay tablet libraries have been translated. We have a rich historical record of these people—including details very handy for a historical fiction writer like political intrigues, treaties, religious practices, magical rites and customs of daily life. I found Briseis’s “job description” right there in the tablets. It was a joy that these authentic sources described a role so perfect for the woman I had imagined confronting the war and Achilles and finding love and joy in life no matter how hard the Greeks made that for her.

What do you hope readers take away from your book?

Despite being a book about war with a lot of death and violence, the fundamental theme of Hand of Fire is one of hope. I think people will come away with a renewed sense of the resiliency of humanity and of women in particular.

Also, my aim was to build the Bronze Age world of these Greeks and Trojans vividly enough that readers feel like they’ve lived there. For most people, that’s a new and exotic world and yet it will feel surprisingly familiar in some ways. I guess you could call Hand of Fire historical escapism with a positive message.

Can you tell us what you are writing next?

I’m in the middle of a historical mystery featuring the Hittite Queen Puduhepa as “sleuth.” She would be as famous as Cleopatra if she hadn’t been buried by the sands of time. Her seal is on the first extant peace treaty in history next to her foe, Pharaoh Ramses II. Now that both her world and her correspondence have been excavated, I’ve started a series about her. She ruled from her teens until she was at least eighty, so I think this series may outlast me!

I’m also outlining a sequel to Hand of Fire—and Briseis may make a move to Cyprus. It’s such a gorgeous and intriguing island, covered in Bronze Age ruins, with several qualities that make it perfect for her. But as readers of Hand of Fire will realize, Briseis has got some business to take care of nearer to home before that happens. 

Learn more about author Judith Starkston

Website: JudithStarkston.com

Twitter: @JudithStarkston

Facebook: JudithStarkston

Google+: +JudithStarkston

Current Book List

Hand of Fire, (Fireship Press, 2014)

SoWest: Desert Justice, story entitled “Season for Death” (Desert Sleuths Sisters in Crime Anthology)

Excerpt Thursday: HAND OF FIRE by Judith Starkston

This week, we're pleased to welcome author and Unusual Historicals contributor JUDITH STARKSTON with her newest novel, HAND OF FIRE. Join us again on Sunday for an author interview, with more details about the story behind the story. One lucky visitor will get a free copy of Hand of Fire. Be sure to leave your email address in the comments of today's post or Sunday's author interview for a chance to win. Winner(s) are contacted privately by email. Here's the blurb.

The Trojan War threatens Troy’s allies and the Greek supply raids spread. A young healing priestess, designated as future queen, must defend her city against both divine anger and invading Greeks. She finds strength in visions of a handsome warrior god. Will that be enough when the half-immortal Achilles attacks? Hand of Fire, a tale of resilience and hope, blends history and legend in the untold story of Achilles’s famous captive, Briseis.

**An Excerpt from Hand of Fire**

That’s what it’s come to, Briseis thought, women defending the palace with cooking pots. She reached up to the burning places on her cheek and chest where Mynes’s whip had struck her.

She sent Eurome to warn Maira and prepare Hatepa, though they would keep what was happening from the queen for now. Then Briseis started up the ladder to a defense tower.

A tremendous crack rang out and the ground shook beneath her. It felt like a lightning strike, dangerously close, but the sky was clear blue. What had happened? She climbed to the top and looked toward the Great Gate of Lyrnessos. Where the wooden beams and stone supports should have been, a cloud of dust and debris arose.

What force could have pulled down the massive gate in so little time? The men, few as they were, could harry the attackers from above the gate, inflicting enemy losses so great most leaders would choose to withdraw.

She saw a huge warrior standing on the rubble, his sword held high, the morning light reflecting fiery gold off his full-length shield. She knew then. Nothing stood between Achilles and her city.

She raced down the ladder.

As she reached the ground she yelled to the servants hurrying to their posts. “The Great Gate is down. We must gather everyone and escape from the city and head to the sheep camps. No point defending the palace. Achilles knocked down the city gate as if it were a pile of kindling.”

Servants ran to call the others from the walls. Briseis hurried inside to get Eurome, Maira and Hatepa. She tried to appear calm. The less frantic Hatepa became, the faster they could escape.

Briseis pushed aside the door curtain. “Lady Hatepa, your son has asked you to come with me quickly outside the city.”

The queen fidgeted in her chair. “Mynes? Outside the city? What are you saying? What is that noise I heard? What is that cut on your face?”

“Your son commanded me to take you to safety.” They pulled the queen to her feet, ignoring her protests. Eurome handed Briseis her healing satchel.

Hatepa began to cough. “I must sit down. Why are you dragging me around?” She batted at Maira and Eurome.

Eurome looked the queen in the eye. “Queen Hatepa, unless you wish to be skewered by a Greek spear, you’d better walk. There are no servants left in the palace. Come with us or stay alone to greet the Greeks.”

Hatepa’s eyes bulged wider than usual. Her mouth opened and closed like a fish stranded on the shore. For a moment Briseis wondered if she was unable to breathe, but then she squawked, “How dare you—”

“Eurome is right, Queen Hatepa,” Briseis interrupted. “We wish no disrespect, but you can come now or be left behind. We cannot endanger others to suit you.” Hatepa stopped resisting.

Outside in the main courtyard, the remainder of the household staff had gathered, men and women with some children. Such a large group would have trouble getting through streets jammed with fleeing townspeople. She could hear screams rising from the lower city. They had to get out. Greek warriors could be climbing the hill toward the palace right now. Everyone looked at her.

“We must leave the city. Go from the back of the palace away from the fighting that is centered on the Great Gate. We’ll escape the other way, out the Stag Gate.”

She hoped that by starting their journey on the steep backside of the palace hill, well above the packed neighborhoods, they could avoid both Greeks and crowds. By the time they dropped into the populated area, they would be near the Stag Gate.

The menservants had knives, clubs and other weapons snatched from the work sheds or kitchens, but she said a prayer that enough of the guard had survived to keep the Greeks busy so that her household and the townspeople could escape without a fight. The shrieks from the battle kept increasing. Had the fighting spread this far? As they unbarred the gate, Briseis held her breath.

The street lay empty. They hurried along the road that hugged the back of the palace. The children held tight to their mothers and moved silently with the adults. All went well until they reached a side road with houses and shops on either side.

Other fleeing people crowded in so that she lost sight of the servants at the front of her group. Family groups trying to stay together got pushed to the sides by faster moving men. Briseis glanced behind and saw Hatepa stumbling forward, her eyes wide with terror.

Maira walked next to the queen, holding her arm, but Briseis couldn’t find Eurome. She tried to go back to look for her, but the flow of the crowd made it impossible, and in the confusion her old nurse could have passed her. Briseis pressed on, fighting back tears.

Other paths and alleys led to the gate, but she stayed on the main road, hoping her household and Eurome had also. The crowd pushed her faster, and she could no longer see Maira. A few of her servants ran near her. Two of the men, armed with a club and a butchering knife, stayed on either side of her. How had they clung to her when she had lost both Eurome and Maira?

Suddenly she heard screams. The crowd in front turned back, driven by something. The serving man with the knife took her arm. “Down this alley.”

She ran up several stone steps and into a narrow passage between the buildings. Some of her serving women ran after her in single file, the men behind them. She heard a man bellow in agony and looked back. The man with the club was on the ground. Close behind she saw the horsehair plume of a Greek helmet.

Learn more about author Judith Starkston

Website: JudithStarkston.com

Twitter: @JudithStarkston

Facebook: JudithStarkston

Google+: +JudithStarkston

Current Book List

Hand of Fire, (Fireship Press, 2014)

SoWest: Desert Justice, story entitled “Season for Death” (Desert Sleuths Sisters in Crime Anthology)

Medicine & Folklore: Agnodice - The first woman physician

By Mirella Patzer

I was born in 300 BC in ancient Greece, and in today's world, you know me only as a legend. Did I exist? Or did I not? I shall leave it to you to decide. Here is my story:

I was a noblewoman who dreamed of becoming a healer. More than anything, I wanted to practice medicine in an era when women were legally prohibited from the healing arts. The only way I could achieve my dream was to cut my hair and wear men's clothing. Encouraged by my father, I dressed thusly and soon become an avid student of the famous Alexandrian physician, Herophilus where I earned the highest marks.

After I finished my studies, as I walked the streets of Athens, I heard the screams of a woman in the throes of labor. I rushed to assist her. The woman, believing me to be a man, refused to allow me to touch her. Desperate to convince her otherwise, I lifted up my clothes and revealed that I was a woman. She allowed me to deliver her baby. Women everywhere soon flocked to me. To evade the authorities, I dressed as a man, not only during my studies but also whenever I practiced.

When my male colleagues discovered that requests for their services were dwindling, while mine were increasing, they accused me of seducing and raping the women patients.

I was subsequently arrested and charged. At my trial, the leading men of Athens condemned me. To save myself from the death penalty, I revealed I was really a woman. A crowd of my patients declared in front of the temple that if I were executed, they would die with me. The wives of the judges argued, "You are not spouses, but enemies since you are condemning her who discovered health for us."

Under pressure by the crowd, the judges acquitted me and allowed me to continue practicing medicine.

I continued to work mostly with women and have been credited with being one of the first women gynecologists in history.

Whether or not the legend of my life is true, it is a story which the world of medicine has long cherished.


Agnodice
B.C. 300

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History and Women Blog

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Good Times: Drinking Games of the Past

By Jeannie Lin

"Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness." ~ Seneca, Roman philosopher and statesman (3 BC–65 AD)

What are good times without a small discussion of drinking and the games that people play while drinking? A brief survey of the drinking games of old reveals that alcohol and the revelry in its presence is a humble yet universal link across different times and cultures.

One of the earliest written records of a drinking game was in Plato's Symposium where a group of men attend a drinking party and deliver speeches about Eros, love. The game there was simple as drinking games tend to be: fill a bowl with wine, drain it, slap it down, pass it on.


The ancient Greeks also played a game called kottabos, which involved flinging dregs of wine from their bowls onto a target at the center of the room, with prizes or penalties designated for making or missing the mark. Then there was an even simpler drinking game--endurance drinking. The host would designate a number. Anyone who couldn't hang would be banned from future games.

The ancient Chinese also had a host of drinking games to liven an evening. The basic game had an appropriately descriptive name, "Bottoms Up." The elite and educated would often play drinking games that involved spouting poetry or guessing riddles. Less literate games involved drinking based on the roll of a dice or drinking contests with referees and governors. One game involved setting up a series of puppets of dolls dressed as Westerners in the center of the room. When one fell over, whoever it pointed to had to drink.

A famous Chinese drinking game involves both coordination and rhythm. Tiger, Chicken, Worm, Board is believed to have been around since medieval times and is variant on Rock, Paper, Scissors:

• chicken eats worm
• tiger eats chicken
• board hits tiger
• worm eats board

It involves a chant, pounding out a rhythm on the table, and then shouting out of one of the items. Missing a beat or losing the battle results in a penalty drink.

A variant of the "Tiger, Chicken, etc" or "Rock, Paper, Scissors" drinking game became a popular staple of the geisha drinking culture, which flourished in 17th and 18th century Japan. Geisha were trained in the exquisite arts of dance, music, and conversation. They also had a range of parlor games and drinking contests in their arsenal to keep their guests entertained.


Sometimes simple is best. A drinking game that originated in 14th century France involved a special drinking vessel--the puzzle jug. The contestant was given a jug with holes built into the design. The goal was to tilt it just right to get to the alcohol. My guess is most of the players must have already been inebriated to start with as most of the drink inevitably poured out of the holes onto the victim to the enjoyment of all onlookers.

The pinnacle of special drinking vessels has to be the yard of ale, a one yard long glass that holds 3 pints. Most likely this practice originated in 17th century England. John Evelyn, a Fellow of the Royal Society, records the practice of toasting James II with a yard of ale in Kent in 1683. Drinking a yard of ale became a traditional pub game. As with all classical games, the rules were easy. Drink the entire yard without pausing.

The still popular "yard of ale"

In more recent history, the popular game of "beer pong" is believed to have originated in the 1950s at Dartmouth College and morphed from the practice of playing ping pong and drinking beer at the same time. The origin of the popular game of "quarters" is unknown. It belongs to antiquity.

Good times to all and remember to drink responsibly!

Disasters: Santorini

By Lindsay Townsend

In 1613 BC, give or take a couple of decades (scholars lock horns over the dates), the circular Aegean island of Thera (now Santorini) was almost obliterated from the earth. With the force of many Krakatoas, the volcano which lay beneath it blew its top in an explosion which threw most of the island into the sky and scattered it over and beyond the sea. The lava thrown out of the volcano with such force fell back already aerated, as a thick layer of light pumice which lies over the remains of the island to this day and can be seen in the curved cliffs like a thick pastry crust on a pie bitten by a giant. The town of Aktoriri, once a Minoan settlement, lies excavated from the ash, a Theran Pompeii.

The collapse of the sea floor beneath Thera produced a tsunami that swept across the Aegean. The north coast of Crete was devastated, with coastal towns like Palaikastro completely inundated, the palace at Amnisos damaged and pumice falling on Mallia. Molten lava thrown out of the crater flowed out across the sea, cooled and sank, leaving over five hundred square miles of the sea floor around Santorini covered in a thick layer of volcanic rock.

The Mediterranean is in constant geological turmoil. Think of Etna and Vesuvius, the earthquakes which are slowly unzipping the crust of northern Turkey towards Istanbul. There are seething thermal vents on the seafloor a few miles from Santorini now, and the Aegean itself will disappear one day, crushed between Africa and Europe in the relentless dance of tectonic plates. This was the largest volcanic eruption in human history until Tambora exploded in Indonesia in 1815, and its after-effects are still not yet understood.

As for the date of 1613 BC: two olive branches, the remnants of a walled olive-grove alive on Thera when the eruption blasted away the land next to it, were found intact under the pumice by archaeologists and radiocarbon-dated. Olive trees are survivors.

Two of Lindsay Townsend's books, BRONZE LIGHTNING and BLUE GOLD, are set in the Bronze Age Mediterranean and ancient Egypt. Her latest medieval, A KNIGHT'S ENCHANTMENT, will be published in June.

Thursday Excerpt: Jennifer Mueller

Thursdays on Unusual Historicals mean excerpts, and this week we're featuring one of our long-time contributors, Jennifer Mueller. Her latest is THE MOUNTAINTOP.

In ancient Greece men marry for money and land while finding their pleasure elsewhere. When Orestes saves a captured woman from slave traders, just what is she supposed to do when she doesn't feel like sharing?

Especially when she's literally ready to fight him over the matter.

***

Tericles grinned at the irony of the situation as he walked off. Soon Orestes stood face-to-face with the woman. With her this close, he could see her olive skin tanned darker by the sun. Her clear eyes, rimmed by thick black lashes and framed by sharp cheekbones, looked back unashamed. She was indeed beautiful. A veil of diaphanous yellow covered her from head-to-foot. Although interspersed by red glass beads, in no way did they disguise her nakedness. Under that light and filmy garment, Orestes could see she wore nothing. The veil wrapped around her and only her face remained bare.

Tericles grabbed the veil and ripped it from her body. Her eyes glared at the slave trader, but she still looked proud and stood tall as if dressed as a queen, making no attempt to hide herself. Long hair, black as night, flowing down her back was the first thing Orestes noticed.

Walking around her as if surveying the goods, like any buyer, he couldn't help but take in her stunning features. The woman should have been a model for the statues of Athena, goddess of war. Nothing of her figure spoke of idling around a house. She bore scars like his, from fighting. Spartan perhaps, as he reached the far side of her, he caught sight of her arm covered by a winding tattooed vine. The marks of a soldier, but not a Greek one; they used no such markings.

Above and below the elbow, fine gold bracelets decorated her arm, mimicking the winding tattoo. They were all she had been left with, and were delicate enough that they would have been destroyed in their removal. Tall and lean, her rope like muscles betrayed her active lifestyle, but the exercise didn't diminish the size of her breasts. No archer then; they would have gotten in the way.

Ilias, Orestes' youngest brother at sixteen-years-old, stopped behind him. "Help her, Orestes." His whisper low so no one else heard him.

"A younger brother, I take it. She would be a fine teacher before he marries and a fine mistress for you," Tericles announced.

"Give her back her clothes. I've seen enough, but if I’m buying her for my brother, can you assure me that she is untested by the likes of you? I would hate to think of my brother getting whatever you have picked up on your travels."

They feigned shock at the accusation. Orestes heard his brother gasp behind him. "I assure you we have not touched her since she came into our possession. Before that we will make no claims since she wasn't under our control. You never know about those Politicians' daughters, anything to cause trouble."

Orestes looked over at the woman as she finished covering herself. "What price are you asking?"

"Only the debt her father sold her for." They announced a sum. Orestes frowned. No shame showed on her face, only hatred. He didn't blame her.

"Which I assume was quite great and then of course, there is your fee for handling the deal."

Tericles and Herakles looked at each other for a moment. Perhaps realizing Orestes wasn't as naïve as they thought. "Are a Politician's debts ever small? She is more than worth the price we ask," Herakles answered, a slight waver to his voice.

"Oh, by the looks of her, she is worth more than the two of you put together. But do tell me, why is such a man selling off his daughter? He may have to pay her dowry, but there is prestige to gain in marrying her to a good family. There are other ways to pay off a debt, especially for the rich."

Orestes saw a slight grin appear on the face of the girl. She obviously enjoyed watching her captors squirm.

"We are selling quality goods, I assure you. You will be the envy of all your neighbors with a Greek slave that was once rich."

"And why would such an important, influential Athenian man tattoo his daughter in the manner of the Phrygians? You are not a Greek Politician's daughter are you?" Orestes asked her directly. The quick movement of her head to look at Orestes showed him she didn't expect to be spoken to.

"Of course not," she answered.

Greatest Hits: Sappho & Co.

By Lindsay Townsend

Sarmatia in my BRONZE LIGHTNING, which begins in the Mediterranean of 1652 BC, would surely have known of the the Muse. Homer called her 'Daughter of Zeus' in The Odyssey, but the poetry we have left from ancient Greece comes much later and mostly from men: Alcman, Pindar, Theocritus, and the great playwrights of the fifth century BC, Callimachus of Alexandria.

The sources for women's writing in ancient Greece at first appear to be much more scarce. Women do appear in Greek plays: Klytemnestra, Antigone, Lysistrata. In these works they have lively voices but their words have been written by men. Where is the literature written by women? Where do Greek women speak directly to us?

Sadly, little has survived. Manuscripts were copied by men and they selected what to copy. It could be there are more papyri in the Egyptian desert--thousands of them still remain in the ancient rubbish dump still being excavated at Oxyrhynchus after a hundred years--or in some yet undiscovered cache that will give us more authentic women's voices. So far the pickings are thin, but there's real quality there.

Foremost amongst the poets is Sappho, whose life on Lesbos in the early sixth century BC, at the centre of a group of girls worshipping Aprodite and the Muses, gave her material for nine books of poems full of affection, admiration and longing. Only a few poems have survived, but their directness is appealing. 'As pale as summer grass,' she (or her narrator) describes herself, a flame playing under her skin, as she gazes hopelessly at one of her girls chatting with a man. Another fragment:

The moon has set, and the Pleiades.
The night is half gone.
Time passes, and here I lie alone.

Later in the century came Korinna, who lived in Boiotia and wrote in the local dialect. One poem talks of her own voice, 'as clear as a swallow's', which gave delight to the 'white-robed ladies of Tanagra', her home town. The ancient world thought she was a rival of the great Pindar himself.

Some, like the fifth-century poets Praxilla of Sicyon and Telesilla of Argos, have left so little writing intact that we can hardly judge their work. Another, Erinna, lived on Telos, an island near Rhodes, and died before she was twenty, leaving us a reputation based on The Distaff, a tribute to her dead friend Baukis, whose father lit her funeral pyre with the torches intended to light her wedding. Only a few tantalising lines remain out of three hundred.

We have more complete poems by Anyte, who lived in Tegea on the Greek mainland in the third century BC, than by any other Greek woman, even Sappho. Even so, there are just eighteen certainly by her, a poor legacy for a poet very highly regarded in her day and for long afterward. One tells of children playing with a billy-goat, one of the sadness of a small girl, Myro, at having to make graves for her pet cricket and cicada. Here’s another, describing a statue of the goddess Aphrodite:

This is the place of the Cyprian, where she fulfils her pleasure
Looking out for ever from the land over the shining sea,
To make voyaging kindly to sailors. All around the ocean
Trembles, staring at her image of oil-glistening wood.

There's a useful anthology here which only underlines the scarcity of ancient Greek women's writing which survives. Maybe one day the papyrus mounds of Oxyrhynchus will give us more.

Places you've never heard of: Chaeronea

Chaeronea is a municipality in the Boeotia Prefecture, Greece and north west of Thebes. It is here that an elite force of soldiers, reknowned and famous for being 300 men comprised entirely of 150 pairs of lovers were wiped out. The Sacred Band of Thebes was the undefeated band of the Theban army, formed in 378 BC by the Theban commander Gorgidas who rationalised that men fighting side by side with thier lovers would fight more fiercly than ordinary men.

And if there were only some way of contriving that a state or an army should be made up of lovers and their loves, they would be the very best governors of their own city, abstaining from all dishonour, and emulating one another in honour; and when fighting at each other's side, although a mere handful, they would overcome the world. For what lover would not choose rather to be seen by all mankind than by his beloved, either when abandoning his post or throwing away his arms? He would be ready to die a thousand deaths rather than endure this. Or who would desert his beloved or fail him in the hour of danger? -- Plato - Symposium

In 338 BC Philip of Macedonia (Alexander the Great's father) failed to achieve an alliance of the Boeotians, and decided to fight the Athenians and Boeotians together. Philip marched into Boeotia, with more than 30,000 infantry and no less than 2,000 cavalry.

Alexander himself led the charge against the Sacred Band, which broke, for the first time ever, being unable to withstand the new long spears of the Macedonians. Broken, but refusing to surrender, they fought on, and were annihilated, and it was thought, to the very last man.

Philip himself, so impressed by the loyalty and bravery of the Band of lovers, acknowledged their valour:

"Perish any man who suspects that these men either did or suffered anything unseemly"

A few years later, around 300 BC the town of Thebes erected a monument at the battlesite, and early in the 20th century the monument was rediscovered and re-erected -- and it still stands today. A lasting reminder through history for men who loved so much to die for each other and their country.

It seems the Band was not entirely wiped out, however--excavation was done in 1890, and the Band was found buried - 254 bodies, side by side in seven neat rows.

Literature & Education: Sappho and Co.

By Lindsay Townsend

Sarmatia in my BRONZE LIGHTNING, which begins in the Mediterranean of 1652 BC, would surely have known of the the Muse. Homer called her 'Daughter of Zeus' in The Odyssey, but the poetry we have left from ancient Greece comes much later and mostly from men: Alcman, Pindar, Theocritus, and the great playwrights of the fifth century BC, Callimachus of Alexandria.

The sources for women's writing in ancient Greece at first appear to be much more scarce. Women do appear in Greek plays: Klytemnestra, Antigone, Lysistrata. In these works they have lively voices but their words have been written by men. Where is the literature written by women? Where do Greek women speak directly to us?

Sadly, little has survived. Manuscripts were copied by men and they selected what to copy. It could be there are more papyri in the Egyptian desert--thousands of them still remain in the ancient rubbish dump still being excavated at Oxyrhynchus after a hundred years--or in some yet undiscovered cache that will give us more authentic women's voices. So far the pickings are thin, but there's real quality there.

Foremost amongst the poets is Sappho, whose life on Lesbos in the early sixth century BC, at the centre of a group of girls worshipping Aprodite and the Muses, gave her material for nine books of poems full of affection, admiration and longing. Only a few poems have survived, but their directness is appealing. 'As pale as summer grass,' she (or her narrator) describes herself, a flame playing under her skin, as she gazes hopelessly at one of her girls chatting with a man. Another fragment:

The moon has set, and the Pleiades.
The night is half gone.
Time passes, and here I lie alone.

Later in the century came Korinna, who lived in Boiotia and wrote in the local dialect. One poem talks of her own voice, 'as clear as a swallow's', which gave delight to the 'white-robed ladies of Tanagra', her home town. The ancient world thought she was a rival of the great Pindar himself.

Some, like the fifth-century poets Praxilla of Sicyon and Telesilla of Argos, have left so little writing intact that we can hardly judge their work. Another, Erinna, lived on Telos, an island near Rhodes, and died before she was twenty, leaving us a reputation based on The Distaff, a tribute to her dead friend Baukis, whose father lit her funeral pyre with the torches intended to light her wedding. Only a few tantalising lines remain out of three hundred.

We have more complete poems by Anyte, who lived in Tegea on the Greek mainland in the third century BC, than by any other Greek woman, even Sappho. Even so, there are just eighteen certainly by her, a poor legacy for a poet very highly regarded in her day and for long afterward. One tells of children playing with a billy-goat, one of the sadness of a small girl, Myro, at having to make graves for her pet cricket and cicada. Here’s another, describing a statue of the goddess Aphrodite:

This is the place of the Cyprian, where she fulfils her pleasure
Looking out for ever from the land over the shining sea,
To make voyaging kindly to sailors. All around the ocean
Trembles, staring at her image of oil-glistening wood.

There's a useful anthology here which only underlines the scarcity of ancient Greek women's writing which survives. Maybe one day the papyrus mounds of Oxyrhynchus will give us more.