Re: AMAZONS: legend or history?

Italo wrote:

> Others explain it to come from [ama-zosai], "living-together" or the
> already mentioned [ama-zonais], "with girdles".

This one was a very early etymology, as it is already found in the
Labours of Herakles, where he had to obtain the girdle of Hippolyta,
the Queen of the Amazons. Different accounts of how he obtained it
are given, in one she offered it to the hero in love; in another, he
seized it and slew the queen; in a third it was provided for him by
his friend Theseus, who is reputed to have married Hippolyta.

It's also said they
had

> an ancestor by the name of Amazo, a priestess of Artemis.

The Ephesian-Tauride connection yet again.

> Some 'modern' explanations that I read, suggest it is related with ;
>
> Kalmuk "aeme" and "tzaine" (women and excellent),
> Tserkessian(Circassian?) "maza" (moon),
> Iranian "ha-mazan" (warrior),
> Hebrew "zouneh" (fallen woman) or "amatsah" (the strong),
> Kaukasian "amaze" (young man),
> Hittite "Mazaka" (name of a city),
> Berber "(T-)Amazigh" (as the Berber call themselves).

There is also the Armenian "moon-maiden" mentioned by Joao in his
earlier post. This is the one preferred by Robert Graves (and
produces the link to Artemis). Graves did his analysis of Greek
myths
before the discovery of women burried as warriors in Scythian
kurgans,
however. It is interesting that Amazon is presented in the Greek
stories as the Greek name for them, not their own name for
themselves, which is clearly Iranian (Perhaps the ha-mazan would thus
work).

Regards

John