[Elfsea] Re: Nine Worthies

[Morgan Cain (Ansteorra)]

> Where did you get this list?? Is It period?
>
> The two list I have are different. The Marchese Tommaso II of Saluzzo
> list a bunch of Amazons.  Jacques Iverny painted  This list in 15th
> century.
> Semiramis, Lampheto, Marpasia, Synoppe, Thamiris, Menalippe, Hippolyta,
> Orithyia,  and Penthesilea
>
> The other list I have is from a late 16th century Heraldry book
>        Deborah, Judith, Jael (Jewish)
>        Minerva, Semiramis, Thamiris (Classical)
>        Matilda of England, Joanna of Naples, Isabel of Spain (Christian)

The lists for women seem to be MUCH more fluid than the one for men.  I took
two or three lists of women (one from the Burgkmayr engravings of 1516, the
other is French) and chose the ones that I liked best.  It seems very much
to be the way that all the lists were devised.  I prefer the lists that were
more in line with the male Nine Worthies, on the scheme that Dryden
summarized so well:

        "Nine Worthies were they called, of different rites:
         Three Jews, three pagans, and three Christian knights."

That's why I don't like the all-Amazon version.  The symmetry and
recognition of other Worthy Women makes it easier for me to teach the
lessons of the Nine Worthies as equivalently female traits.

                                                ---= Morgan


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea,
 never regains its original dimensions."
                                 ---= Oliver Wendell Holmes
"....look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else."
        ---= Tom Stoppard, "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" (1967)