02 - The Greek Stereotype of the Asian Matriarch: From Semiramis to Ada I

In his Anabasis of Alexander (1.23.8), the ancient historian Arrian describes how Alexander the Great made Ada I the governor of Caria, which he had conquered with her assistance: "He commanded Ada, the daughter of Hecatomnus and wife of Idreius, to be satrap over all of Caria. Idreius, when he died, had turned affairs over to her. For from the time of Semiramis, it had been the custom in Asia for women to rule over men." Not only does Arrian exaggerate here; he also stereotypes. Alexander ruled over Ada, not vice versa. Men and women shared power in ancient Caria, which was difficult for the Roman-era Greek author Arrian to fathom, so he turned Caria into a microcosm of a larger Asia where "women rule over men" (Penrose 174). Arrian borrows from a long line of earlier, Orientalist Greek authors who cast Asian men as weak in comparison to their womenfolk. In similar fashion, in his earlier history of Persia, Ctesias (FGrHist 688 F1b) creates a picture of the Assyrian queen Semiramis as omnipotent over men. Semiramis appears to be the Greek name for the Assyrian queen mother Sammuramat, who was powerful but did not rule independently (Gera 69). Nevertheless, Greek story motifs either cast Semiramis as an independent, great ruler and builder, or, as a woman who kills her husband, licentiously fosters "misrule," and, ultimately, is overthrown by her son, in what Froma Zeitlin elsewhere terms the "Amazon Complex" (Hyginus Fabulae 223.6, 275.7, 240.2, 243.8; Gera 65; Zeitlin 90). Similarly, Ctesias (FGrHist 688 F 15-29) portrays the Persian queen-mother Parysatis as vengeful, vindictive, and cruel, and - most crucially for this paper - as holding ultimate sway over first her husband Darius II and then her son Artaxerxes II. In Ctesias, Parysatis' rule over men consists of her influence over them; her power is indirect yet potent. Furthermore, whereas archaeological evidence from Pokrovka, Russia, suggests that Sauromatian women held some modicum of equality with Sauromatian men (Penrose 145-6; Davis-Kimball esp. 48-66), the ancient Greek historian Ephorus (FGrHist 70 F 160a) describes the Sauromatians as gunaikokratoumenoi, "ruled by women." Thus it appears that a range of Greek authors used the stereotype of matriarchy to describe Asian ethnic groups because they could not understand the complex reality of Asian societies where women held some political influence over or equality with men.

---

Presenters

Walter Penrose, San Diego State University

  SCS-22