September 12, 2019 by AdamAH

Guest Post: Discovering The Queen of Warriors with author, Zenobia Neil

We’ve got something special for you this week on Writing the Past!

Eagles and Dragons Publishing is thrilled to welcome back historical fiction author, Zenobia Neil, to talk about her latest epic, The Queen of Warriors.

Some of you may remember Zenobia from her previous post here, ‘Love is a Monster’, about the Cupid and Psyche myth and her novel, Psyche Unbound. If you missed that, you can check it out HERE.

In her newest novel, Zenobia takes us into the Hellenistic world for an amazing, epic journey. We’ve read this book, and it’s fantastic.

So, without further ado, let Zenobia take you into the world of The Queen of Warriors.

Discovering The Queen of Warriors

When I started writing The Queen of Warriors over seven years ago, my characters, a Xena: Warrior Princess type Greek warrior woman and a royal Persian rebel, came to me fully formed. However, I had no idea where and when the story took place. In the beginning, I was content with a kind of Xena fanfiction (without knowing what fanfiction was.) I began writing the story in a pseudo Greco-Roman world. That was fun, but I wanted to write real historical fiction. After re-reading Mary Renault’s The Persian Boy (a novel about Alexander the Great told by his eunuch Persian lover, Bagoas) I decided to set my story in the war-torn remains of Alexander the Great’s Empire.

My first serious research for this book yielded a lot of information about Alexander the Great’s life. I read about the Diadochi, the war of his generals. An early timeline I looked at made it seem that the important events that occurred were the conquests of Alexander, the death of Alexander, the War of Succession and then centuries later, Rome. (Sorry, Parthian Empire.) I wondered what life was like for people living in the former empire of Alexander. Ancient history might be recorded in centuries, but people live in decades, in years and days.

What was this period after the death of Alexander like? Alexander’s generals Lysimachus, Cassander, Ptolemy, and Seleucus divided his empire and fought with each other, while struggling to maintain their claims to rule at all. What would this have been like for Persians and Egyptians at this time? Ptolemy was able to condense his power in Egypt, a fairly easy transition compared to the other generals. His line lasted for generations and ended with Cleopatra. But Seleucus attempted to keep the lands Alexander had conquered in Persia—a vast expanse of diverse countries.

Before Alexander came, the Persian Empire created a vast network of satrapies—local governors who ruled over each local kingdom and sent taxes and intel back to the king. The Persian Empire had provided infrastructure. Alexander the Great had largely continued this practice, and he had brought some perks as well. Those who were his friends prospered; those who fought against him risked being killed, enslaved, or crucified.

But what did Seleucus have to offer? Why would any Persian, Mede, Bactrian, or Babylonian bow to him? Who would fight for him and why? These are the questions I wondered while trying to decide where in the former Persian empire my story would take place.

I had a National Geographic map that showed Alexander’s route, which I stared at every day. I tried to imagine where in this great expanse my story could take place. Eventually, it became clear that the story was set in Rhagae, a city near the Caspian Sea in what is now Tehran. I could clearly picture this fortress, the crenelated walls set against the backdrop of the snowy Elburz Mountains. Even before I knew his name, I knew my character Artaxerxes’s personality. As a Persian royal, he had grown up rich. He had golden armbands decorated with lynxes with ruby eyes. He had also learned to ride and shoot a bow as a child. He had trained for war since childhood, and he held truth and integrity above all else.

Writing the character of Alexandra of Sparta was a bit more of a challenge. Although originally inspired by Xena, Alexandra had her own demons, ones that would not be acceptable for daytime TV.

Zenobia with the statue of Leonidas in Sparta

I needed to know Alexandra’s history and how she became a warrior. When I started brushing up on my ancient Greek history, the most recorded information came from Athens. It seemed impossible for an Athenian woman to learn to fight. I couldn’t help but be intrigued by the idea of Sparta, especially in juxtaposition with Persia. The classical age of Sparta was around 500 BCE. This made me wonder the same thing I did about Alexander’s empire after his death—what happened after?

There’s a tendency to think of Sparta as frozen in time, in the height of her power, with Leonidas as one of her two kings and every Spartan citizen a muscular warrior (Thanks, 300!). But that was just one period of time. History is many things, but it is always dynamic. We remember the highlights, but that doesn’t make up the time period of people’s everyday lives.

So what happened to Sparta? After the battle of Leuctra in 371 BCE, they lost their slave population, and with it their power. When he came to power, Alexander the Great forced them to join the League of Corinth. Later, some Spartans, like other Greeks, were offered land in Alexander’s former empire to help the Hellenistic culture continue. This, was how my main character, Alexandra and her friend Nicandor, the Little Red Fox came from Sparta to Asia Minor.

Sparta continued as a polis, though she lost her status as a major fighting force. Decades later when Sparta, like all of Greece and much of the ancient world was a part of the Roman Empire, Sparta became a tourist destination. Wealthy Romans came to watch a famous coming of age ceremony where boys were whipped at the temple of Artemis Orthia. What had once been a real rite of passage became a symbol of entertainment, and Sparta herself became a symbol of a classical strength that had once existed and then become nothing more than an idea of bravery and power.

The world of Sparta

This idea of Spartan hype stayed with me. Even if Sparta didn’t have the power it once did, being a Spartan carried weight and expectations. In The Queen of Warriors, Nicandor, The Little Red Fox, is Alexandra’s general, strategist, and advisor. He helps influence her power by spreading conflicting rumors that she’s an Amazon, a Spartan warrior, the Terror of the East. Being a woman warrior, a woman leader, she knows if she’s ever captured, terrible things will be done to her for daring to venture into a man’s world. So Nicandor makes her into a monster, too cruel to be crossed.

Once I figured out the time and place, I was able to let my characters really come through. I knew Alexandra of Sparta was a cursed warrior woman who wanted to atone for her crimes—I did not initially know what her crimes were—but it’s not hard to imagine a mercenary leader who hasn’t done terrible things. Using the Spartan angle, her advisor the Little Red Fox spreads rumors that she’s ripped out men’s tongues—when he actually finds people who’ve already lost their tongues.

There are no recorded documents of Spartan women warriors, only of the Spartans teaching girls as well as boys. Like any good ancient Greek education, this included physical activities. Unlike Athenian women, Spartan women knew how to manage their lands as well as households since Spartan men were often away. In certain situations, Spartan women could own land.

There have always been women warriors. Queen Tomyris of the Massaegetae, Artemisia I of Caria who fought for Xerxes, and Alexander the Great’s half-sister Cynane grew up in Illyria and was a warrior herself. And there have always been women who entered and competed in roles that were traditionally reserved for men. Readers of Adam Alexander Haviaras’s Heart of Fire will remember Kyniska, the Spartan princess who made Olympic history by winning a chariot race.

We’ve heard stories of women warriors from history, but there are also countless lives that were never recorded or whose positions were changed from leader to wife or concubine, or those whose histories were completely erased.

Alexandra of Sparta is not based on a real known person in history, but that doesn’t mean that someone like her never existed. In addition to learning about the past, imagining what could have been is one of my favorite aspects of writing historical fiction. More and more discoveries are being made showing how women were involved in roles that were traditionally thought of belonging solely to men. I’m delighted my characters came to me and demanded their story be told.

We’d like to thank Zenobia for a fascinating look at the history of this period and for sharing the inspiration behind The Queen of Warriors with us.

If you have any questions for her, please post them in the comments below.

We highly recommend this book, so if you would like to learn more and get a copy, just CLICK HERE.

Be sure to visit Zenobia’s website, and watch the book trailer at the bottom of this post as well.

Thank you, Zenobia!

Historical Fiction Author, Zenobia Neil

Zenobia Neil was named after an ancient warrior queen who fought against the Romans. She writes about the mythic past and Greek and Roman gods having too much fun. The Queen of Warriors is her third book. Visit her at ZenobiaNeil.com

Praise for The Queen of Warriors

“The Queen of Warriors is a full-blooded adventure into the ancient and mythological world of the warrior queen, Alexandra of Sparta. Imaginative, exciting, and alluring!” – Margaret George, author of Helen of Troy

“A sizzling epic that will tempt you into the Hellenistic age. Neil’s writing is smooth, and anyone would be hard-pressed not to fall in love with her kick-ass heroine, Alexandra of Sparta!” – Adam Alexander Haviaras, Eagles and Dragons Publishing

“Bold, unexpected, and immensely satisfying. The Queen of Warriors is a game changer.” – Jessica Cale, editor of Dirty, Sexy History

“A surprising tale of retribution but also of redemption. Sexy yet thoughtful . . . unexpectedly moving.” – L.J. Trafford, author of The Four Emperor Series

August 13, 2016 by AdamAH

The World of Heart of Fire – Part VIII – Kyniska of Sparta: The Woman who made Olympic History

SPOILER ALERT!

Before you read further…

If you have not yet read Heart of Fire – A Novel of the Ancient Olympics, and you are planning on doing so, you may wish to read the book first, before you continue with this blog post.

The events discussed here, in Part 8 of The World of Heart of Fire, involve the climax of the book, and so your experience in reading the story might be lessened somewhat if you continue.

However, if you have already read Heart of Fire, or are just here to read about the history, then please do carry on. I hope you enjoy it!

In Part 7 of this blog series, we discussed chariot racing at the ancient Olympics. However, we did not touch on why that event was so pivotal to the Olympiad of 396 B.C.

We have mentioned before how only men were permitted to compete in the Olympic Games in the ancient world. However, there was one event in which women were permitted to compete – the chariot race.

Though women were not allowed to enter the Olympic sanctuary during the Games, they were allowed to compete as the owners and trainers of horses in the chariot races.

It was in the year 396 B.C. that Princess Kyniska of Sparta exploded onto the scene and made Olympic history.

Goddess Artemis

Goddess Artemis

The very first time I read about Kyniska (also spelled Cynisca), I knew I had to write this book. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind. I was inspired by her story, though very little detail has come down to us about this fascinating woman who rocked the world of men.

You see, in 396 B.C. Kyniska was the first woman to compete in and win in the marquee tethrippon event at Olympia, the four-horse chariot race.

At this Olympiad, which came on the tail of several years of brutal civil war among the Greeks, and at a time when many Greek city-states reviled Sparta, Kyniska came forward like a force of nature.

But who was this amazing woman?

Kyniska of Sparta was the daughter of King Archidamus II of Sparta (476-427 B.C.), the Eurypontid King of Sparta. She was also the half-sister of King Agis, and sister to King Agesilaus II (444-360 B.C.) who waged war on both the Persians and his fellow Greeks.

Archidamus left sons when he died, of whom Agis was the elder and inherited the throne instead of Agesilaus. Archidamus had also a daughter, whose name was Cynisca; she was exceedingly ambitious to succeed at the Olympic games, and was the first woman to breed horses and the first to win an Olympic victory. After Cynisca other women, especially women of Lacedaemon, have won Olympic victories, but none of them was more distinguished for their victories than she.

(Pausanias, Description of Greece, 3.8)

Artist impression of Kyniska driving chariot

Artist impression of Kyniska driving chariot

It is believed that Kyniska was born sometime around 440 B.C. in Sparta and, unlike other Greek women beyond Sparta, she grew up training herself physically and mentally as was expected of strong, Spartan women.

In Sparta, it was believed the woman should be fit and healthy as well, and they trained naked at sports, riding and hunting, just like the men. In Sparta’s eyes, how else could they give birth to perfect Spartan warriors?

Young Spartans Exercising (Edgar Degas)

Young Spartans Exercising (Edgar Degas)

But Kyniska was destined for other things that giving birth to new Spartan warriors.

She was an expert equestrian, a sort of ancient horse-whisperer learned in the breeding and training of horses. As the wealthy daughter of a king, the rearing of horses would have been accessible to her.

After years of raising and training horses, Kyniska finally entered a team in the great four-horse chariot race of the 396 B.C. Olympics.

Sadly, the ancient sources mention Kyniska only in passing, and even then, with the exception of Pausanias, it is in relation to her brother, King Agesilaus II.

Xenophon, the great leader of the 10,000, and author of the ancient work On Horsemanship, mentions Kyniska in his work on his very good friend Agesilaus:

Surely, too, he [King Agesilaus] did what was seemly and dignified when he adorned his own estate with works and possessions worthy of a man, keeping many hounds and war horses, but persuaded his sister Cynisca to breed chariot horses, and showed by her victory that such a stud marks the owner as a person of wealth, but not necessarily of merit. How clearly his true nobility comes out in his opinion that a victory in the chariot race over private citizens would add not a whit to his renown; but if he held the first place in the affection of the people, gained the most friends and best all over the world, outstripped all others in serving his fatherland and his comrades and in punishing his adversaries, then he would be victor in the noblest and most splendid contests, and would gain high renown both in life and after death.

(Xenophon, Agesilaus 9)

We need to remember that in this man’s world, the men wrote the history, and as a friend of Agesilaus’, Xenophon would have sought to please the king in his writing.

It was said that Agesilaus told Kyniska to compete in the Olympics simply to win and then discredit the sport of chariot racing by showing that even a woman could win it. Given Agesilaus’ character, this seems more likely than a willingness to display his sister’s abilities, or to raise the status of women in general.

At this time in history, in Ancient Greece, even a Spartan woman was just a woman. Men ruled this world, and women had their place.

But that is why Kyniska’s story is so compelling!

Sure, it’s easy from our modern vantage point to romanticize Kyniska and her achievements, but let us remember that, even though she did not drive the chariot, she would have met resistance every step of the way.

In Sparta, the use of horses for war was not common, and chariot racing as a sport was frowned upon. Kyniska must have been quite determined to go to the Olympic Games if she raised and trained her chariot team.

If King Agesilaus was seeking to discredit the sport of chariot racing by having his sister compete, his attempts were in vain. At that time, chariot racing was the marquee event of the Olympiad, and it only grew in popularity over the years until it reached its peak as a sport centuries later in the hippodromes of Rome and Constantinople.

Roman Chariot Race in the Circus Maxiums

Roman Chariot Race in the Circus Maxiums

When Kyniska of Sparta arrived outside the sanctuary of Olympia in 396 B.C. to have her team compete in the Olympic Games, one can imagine the rich men of every other city-state, perhaps even her own, scoffing at the thought of such a thing, of a woman owning, breeding, and training horses.

But it seems the gods were with Kyniska of Sparta on that fateful summer day in 396. Her team drove to victory in the Olympic tethrippon, and surely, the shockwaves of such a triumph must have been felt across the Greek world, a world in which an Olympic victory could bring a mortal as close as possible to immortality.

Old print of Kyniska

Old print of Kyniska

As was the right of every Olympic victor, Kyniska was permitted to erect a victory bronze for herself in the Altis of Olympia, along with the images of the champions of ages past.

According to Pausanias, her statues included one of herself, and a bronze equestrian group. As fortune would have it, the statue base survived to give us this inscription:

Kings of Sparta are my father and brothers,

Kyniska, victorious with a chariot of swift-footed horses,

have erected this statue. I declare myself the only woman

in all Hellas to have won this crown.

Apelleas son of Kallikles made it.

From these few words, it seems obvious that Kyniska was proud, and well-aware of the enormity of her victory. She had previously been a winner in the foot race of the Heraian Games, and now she was an Olympic champion, the only woman ever to have won the sacred olive crown.

I have chills writing about this, to think that that was the moment in which the door to athletic competition had been opened for women, and in such a masculine world. It is humbling, and mind-blowing, and it reminds me of why I wanted to write Heart of Fire.

As if to solidify her immortality, Kyniska returned to Olympia in 392 B.C. to claim a second victory in the tethrippon.

After this Spartan princess, other women, not only of Sparta, entered and won in the chariot races of Olympia and other games, one of them Euryleonis, in 368 B.C., who makes an appearance in the story of Heart of Fire. The victors were not only women of Sparta, like Kyniska and Euryleonis, but women of other city-states, including Belistiche, Zeuxo, Encrateia, Hermione, Timareta, Theodota of Elis, and Cassia.

Inscribed base for the victory statue commemorating Kyniska's victory at the Olympic Games. It is now located in a small room at the Museum of the Olympic Games in ancient Olympia, Greece. It was amazing to see this piece of stone that represented such an earth-shattering change in Olympic history!

Inscribed base for the bronze victory statue commemorating Kyniska’s victory at the Olympic Games. It is now located in a small room at the Museum of the Olympic Games in ancient Olympia, Greece. It was amazing to see this piece of stone that represented such an earth-shattering change in Olympic history!

Kyniska had thrown open the gates of Olympic competition, in one event at least, and though other women also proved victorious, her hard-won victories remained the most distinguished.

Surely the shades of Pelops and Hippodameia would have been watching intently. Certainly, her feat was amazing, for even in Sparta, a shrine was erected to her. Pausanias describes it:

At Plane-tree Grove there is also a hero-shrine of Cynisca, daughter of Archidamus king of the Spartans. She was the first woman to breed horses, and the first to win a chariot race at Olympia.

(Pausanias, Description of Greece 3.15.1)

I hope you’ve enjoyed this post about Kyniska of Sparta, the heroine of Heart of Fire. I have certainly enjoyed writing about her, and even though the sources about her a few and far between, her legacy exploded onto the pages of my story.

olive crown

In the next part of The World of Heart of Fire, we will look at what exactly it meant to be an Olympic champion in Ancient Greece, and explore the immortality that was within grasp of a precious few.

Thank you for reading!

Heart of Fire is now available in e-book and paperback from Amazon, Kobo, iBooks/iTunes, and Create Space.