03/01/2021
WOMENS HISTORY MONTH ~ When I watched Episode 7 of Lovecraft Country and saw the Warrior Women of Dahomey, I had to do some research on them, because I was impressed with that bit of little known history.
The greatest pride I found in my research is that Dahomey (A West African state) is now Benin and I am 6% Benin & Togo (the lines of demarcation are arbitrary and a manifestation of colonialism). 😁 It would be a beautiful thing to know that an ancestor of mine was a Dahomey Warrior, but there's no way that I could know for sure.
The Dahomey Women Warriors were a bunch of Bad Mamma Jamma's.
"...3,000 heavily armed soldiers march into the square and begin a mock assault on a series of defenses designed to represent an enemy capital. The Dahomean troops are a fearsome sight, barefoot and bristling with clubs and knives. A few, known as Reapers, are armed with gleaming three-foot-long straight razors, each wielded two-handed and capable, the priest is told, of slicing a man clean in two.
The soldiers advance in silence, reconnoitering. Their first obstacle is a wall—huge piles of acacia branches bristling with needle-sharp thorns, forming a barricade that stretches nearly 440 yards. The troops rush it furiously, ignoring the wounds that the two-inch-long thorns inflict. After scrambling to the top, they mime hand-to-hand combat with imaginary defenders, fall back, scale the thorn wall a second time, then storm a group of huts and drag a group of cringing “prisoners” to where Glele stands, assessing their performance. The bravest are presented with belts made from acacia thorns. Proud to show themselves impervious to pain, the warriors strap their trophies around their waists.
The general who led the assault appears and gives a lengthy speech, comparing the valor of Dahomey’s warrior elite to that of European troops and suggesting that such equally brave peoples should never be enemies. Borghero listens, but his mind is wandering. He finds the general captivating: “slender but shapely, proud of bearing, but without affectation.” Not too tall, perhaps, nor excessively muscular. But then, of course, the general is a woman, as are all 3,000 of her troops. Father Borghero has been watching the King of Dahomey’s famed corps of “amazons,” as contemporary writers termed them—the only female soldiers in the world who then routinely served as combat troops. (September 2011, Smithsonianmag.com}"
There are many books and articles written about these historical warriors. Do yourself a favor and read up on them, even if it's a brief article.
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