[tied] Re: Amazon Graves Found in Kazakhstan

Regarding the etymology of Amazons, I have seen that it has nothing
to do with the a-mazo, the loss of the breast, but due to the Greek
name for "girdle".

I have been chasing the reference but cannot find it anywhere - is it
Graves?

Regards

John

--- In cybalist@..., "P&G" <petegray@...> wrote:
> 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