An absolutely wonderful job, bibliophage!!!
Do the sources discuss the likelyhood of an actually existing band of warrior women because of the multiple early references in art and story to such a group? That is, can we dismiss as unlikely the concept of the Amazons springing from imagination in light of the various examples all from about the same time?
Wish all staff reports were this well written. 
I would only note that the hypothesis that the word “Amazon” is derived from *ha-maz-an should not be taken as an assertion that Amazons must be based on an Iranian-speaking original. Angaros (“mounted courier”) is almost certainly a loan from a Middle Eastern language, but no one proposes that it derives from an otherwise undocumented custom of archaic Greeks hiring Hurrians to man their posts.
You know, bibliophage I was planning to curse your name during my evening prayers tonight because of that horrible “wicked steppe mothers” joke, but then you redeemed yourself with the allusion to the candiru fish, so I decided to overlook it. This time.
Great job.
Brilliant report!!! Cecil best keep on his toes with this kind of talent brewing in the SDSTAFF. Bibliophage RULES!!!
(Still giggling like a schoolgirl at the “wicked Steppe mothers” line!)
The pun flew right by me. Neat column, though.
Gotta love those evil steppe mothers!
But the “Lovely jugs they are too.” After talking about artwork showing breasts painted on amphorae made my day.
A great (or terrible, depending on your sensibility) bit of wordplay.
Oops, I just started a new thread not realizing this one was on the same topic. Oh well, here’s what I said:
My theory: There’s something about women who kick ass that people find sexy and that captures the imagination. Witness Xena, Warrior Princess and Charlie’s Angels. 3000 years ago, stories like that could have easily evolved into fables and legends.
Just MHO of course.
And by the way, nice job bibliophage
What a fascinating and humorous article this is. I really enjoyed the historical references as well as the puns, especially given the fact that my online nick for over 15 years (yes, that’s pre-internet) has been Amazonia. People have asked questions about the history of Amazons, and I had little to tell them.
I have to admit though, that I found the ending of the article - moving from the Amazons to amazon.com to the internet to male-improvement-related-spam - irrelevant, and a little anti-climactic.
dear cecil
A note on word meanings
a long time ago a friend told me the meaning of the word amazon was “with out breast” as you stated and everyone took to mean they cut off or removed a breast
this meaning could also be taken that if the women were the warriors in the society then who raised the kids ??
the childeren were simply rasied with out there mothers breast or breast milk
I got no 100% proof of this but is a thought I had while reading
that was not listed in the list of possable meanings
all of them tended towards the warrior aspect of the amazons
but not juts a plan discription of them
after all if one werre to remove a breast for archery ( ie the right side as I have always heard ) what would a left handed archer have done ??
Another tiny bit of my ignorance is vanquished, thanks to bibliophage. I had long ago swallowed, without question, the amazon=a+mazon derivation. Which is strange, becasue I knew perfectly well all the traditional and modern depictions of Amazons represent them as two-breasted. I knew the term was inaccurate, but it never occurred to me to question its authenticity.
Thanks for a job well done!
I apologize for not responding to this thread earlier. It’s been a hectic couple of weeks.
I doubt there was ever an ancient society in which all the warriors were women. There is certainly no archaeological evidence of such a society. But women fighting alongside men is not unheard of, as the case of the Sauromatians shows. Though the Sauromatians are too late to be the original source of the myth, it is possible that an earlier group with a similar lifestyle could have been the source. It is interesting to note that the Cimmerian invasion of Asia Minor was taking place at about the same time the Amazon myth was developing. I am aware of no evidence that Cimmerian women fought alongside their men, but relatively little is known about their lifestyle, so anything is possible. As far back as 1881, one scholar (Rhode) proposed the Amazons were based on the Cimmerians, but this hypothesis has attracted little attention.
Point taken. To be fair, I should also note that the Cimmerians themselves may have been an Iranian people, so that’s another possibility. I haven’t read the 1912 paper by Lagercrantz where he proposed that etymology, so I don’t know what his thinking was.
Now that you mention it, I believe I did come across a proposed etymology like this in my research. But I’ll be darned if I can remember where I read it, and I can’t find anything in my notes. In any case, I doubt all “breastless” etymologies no matter what the reasoning. Recall that the word existed in Greek for two or three centuries before anyone suggested that it meant “breastless.” I suspect it came from a language other than Greek, but we will probably never know which one.
Just a few late (and lame!) comments:
If the “breastless” etymology is correct, one explanation could be this: being warriors, they presumably did the ancient equivalent of “working out” and, as I have observed at our local fitness club, very fit and muscly ladies seem to lose their breasts.
The article mentions that the Amazons might have come from Phrygia. They were also known as “manless”…could this be because they were Phrygid? (i.e. the original ice maidens)
If they ate meat rather than bread (an early Atkins diet?) this may also have reduced their breast size, as well as increasing their halitosis, thus making them doubly unattractive, unapproachable, and therefore more likely to be manless! 
Gothic magath (“virgin”); undifferentiated Germanic metze (“slut”); Sanskrit Uma-soona (“children of Uma”); or Slavic omuzhony (“masculine women”).
Hmmm! Is Uma Thurman a breastless slut…? a masculine woman…? Does she have children…? I’m getting confused!
Amazons may have come from Bactria… is this the same place that Bactrian camels come from? Aren’t they the ones with two humps???
“Turkey became closely associated with Amazons”…
Most of the turkeys I come across at this time of year have a large succulent portion of breast. (aside: do turkeys have one breast or two???)
Ah well, now I’ve got that off my breast - uh - chest, I’ll be on my way, just leaving you with a song…
“Thanks for the mammary…”
Maybe they started with three?