Re: [tied] Re: Amazon Graves Found in Kazakhstan

Steve, I fear you misunderstood a badly written quote from "vishalsagarwal",
when he said >"... Amazons cut their right breast off and then burned

> the wound with hot iron in order to prevent them from hunting and drawing

a

> bow in battle."

I think he meant "them" to be the removed right breasts.

It is rather more likely that the whole story is a false etymology to
explain the name Amazon as a-mazon: "breast-less." The operation would in
any case be unnecessary. I have taught archery to both males and females,
and females have no special difficulties in drawing the bow!

Peter

>
> What convoluted reporting is this? The traditional explanation is that the
> Amazons "got rid of the right breast [<mazos>, breast] that it might not
> interfere with the use of the bow." (Lidell-Scott) And Herodotus

exlicitly

> says that the Amazons DID hunt and DID use the bow. And I'm not sure he

even

> ever reported on the breast fable.
>
> I hope this misreport is not meant to rewrite the old texts to make them

jive

> with finding swords and not bows in the graves.
>
> <<"If we find in a grave weapons beside a men's skeleton, we are sure that

he

> was a warrior. So a similar conclusion is logical when we deal with

women's

> remnants,"...>>
>
> We don't know the specific rationale in any such prehistoric culture for
> putting weapons in graves or not putting weapons in graves. There is no

way

> to be "sure" of anything. For all we know, weapons were simply valuable

and

> they were meant to be something to trade with on the other side - what

else

> was found in these and other graves is probably just as or more relevant.
>
> Steve Long