Artemisia PIRATE PRINCESS OF HALICARNASSUS

Praised by Herodotus, what do we really know about the woman who stood with Xerxes against the Greeks?

- Jonathan Gordon

In 480 BCE Xerxes I took on the city states of Greece in two historic battles. In one, the Battle of Thermopylae, his (possibly) 300,000-strong army was triumphant, but at great cost and against what legend tells us was only 300 Spartans, led by King Leonidas (estimates vary, but 7,000 men seems more likely). Meanwhile, in the straits between the island of Salamis and the port of Piraeus, Xerxes' navy was crushed by the Athenians at the Battle of Salamis. In neither battle did Xerxes himself take the field, but history records the names of very few of his commanders. One who stands out, having warned the emperor against a battle at sea with Athens and being one of the few to exit the conflict with any praise, is Queen Artemisia I of Caria.

Artemisia was queen of the city state of Halicarnassus and it's thanks largely to her compatriot Herodotus that we still remember her. His record of the Battle of Salamis and its surrounding history is one of our few sources on the life and impact of Artemisia. "Other ancient Greek and Roman historians wrote about her too, but Herodotus gushed about her," says Dr Katie Nelson, co-author of A History of the World in 80 Lost Women. "He clearly deeply admired her. Plus, the way he didn't feel the need to 'explain' her presence tells us a lot about Persian attitudes to women at the time. The absence of an explainer tells us that a female general wasn't so unusual that it required a long explanation of how she came to be in such a role."