{"id":536,"date":"2024-08-02T01:11:56","date_gmt":"2024-08-02T01:11:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sbedwards.co\/staging\/9372\/?p=536"},"modified":"2025-12-04T18:33:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-04T18:33:38","slug":"hypsikrates-the-transgender-spouse-of-mithradates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sbedwards.co\/staging\/9372\/hypsikrates-the-transgender-spouse-of-mithradates\/","title":{"rendered":"Hypsikrates, The Transgender Spouse Of Mithradates"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Hypsikrates, The Transgender Spouse Of Mithradates | Ancient Transgender History\" width=\"1290\" height=\"726\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2ZPJlzvMdnc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-27bdff8c61b391afc634c3c9db719629\">Gather \u2018round, friends. Let me tell you a tale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9a1804650b200d07a2df2b49ce3838b3\">Mithradates VI Eupator, the mighty king of Pontus, who, faced with the ever-growing shadow of Rome, stood fast against their hegemony, who year after year, decade after decade, endured both spectacular victory and crushing defeat, who saw his domain expand to dominate all of Asia Minor, and contract to a small rump state, who survived in battle against two of the Roman Republic\u2019s greatest generals, and who, against all odds, died an old man, by his own hand, never to see a day in a Roman prison&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c992e2f0307068954e7b497644bcd714\">Was not transgender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b95faf855f0239cd55a92285d170cf2a\">[BOOOOOOO]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9ce69b62ceb0e76d0bbf9237a897474c\">Let me finish!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-88cc602c75629f3785be93c875530fdd\">He had a lover, named Hypsikrates, who most certainly was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b651bc092d752fd6d973b978a950b897\">This is his story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fa81f71f15de7018a650d8c767840bd6\">In case this is your first time here, welcome. I\u2019m Sophie, and this is We Have Always Existed. It\u2019s a show where we explore the wealth of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@transgenderancienthistory\">transgender history<\/a> in the ancient Mediterranean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-117004b6179335c8a38768d6204b8c20\">And I guess I\u2019m on a trans masculine kick lately, since the last video was on the <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/TABZp5bIMVU?si=b4WrLV3OyFKKIcCL\">fictional character Megillus from Lucian&#8217;s Dialogues Of The Courtesans<\/a>, and what that could tell us about transgender history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-edb436a4cc8867bfcf6a920fd9635252\">And look, from a personal perspective, trans feminine history is more interesting to me. But I do love my trans brothers. Masculinity ain\u2019t my thing, but there\u2019s a lot that\u2019s pretty awesome about it, and it\u2019s cool to see how y\u2019all rock so well something I was never able to make work for myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4d2ebd0817e77ed04f193123631937da\">But as fun as fictional characters are, it\u2019s more fun to look at real people who did real things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-94b098e5497e90ac2918afc8c1d41ca1\">I\u2019m getting back to my roots here. Y\u2019all loved the video on the Enarei and Elagabalus \u2013 they\u2019re two of my most popular videos to date. So here\u2019s another real actual person who did stuff IRL.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3a872c4fb747d765f823b4b167e102d2\">Now, if you\u2019re not already a history nerd like me, you might not recognize the name Mithradates. After all, he\u2019s not a Greek or a Roman, and they seem to be about the only people who bothered to write much down in the classical Mediterranean. But Mithradates is one of the most interesting characters to come out of the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century BCE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f3f37e0702cfa924c58285ada36ce2cc\">And that century gave us many of the names people are most familiar with in Roman history, so that\u2019s really saying something. Spartacus, Cicero, Sulla, Marius, Pompey, Crassus, Mark Antony, Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, Vercingetorix, and the emperor Augustus \u2013 I\u2019m sure you recognize at least a couple of those. Some of them will make their way into our story today. But Mithradates is as interesting a character as any of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b9ebdbb12a2ee9c05251b7a20b64e61b\">I\u2019m going to do my best to not get pulled off on too many side quests with this one, but with such a fascinating cast of characters, you\u2019ll forgive me if I indulge a little bit here and there, as a treat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-dd247b0a25028061c9ce5f8d404823dc\">This is, of course, a story about Mithradates\u2019 lover later in his life, Hypsikrates. But he\u2019s cast as a supporting character to the main character Mithradates, so their stories are necessarily entangled here. I really can\u2019t separate the two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a152af87da04377b8056247c1b89474f\">Both our sources refer to him by the name of Hypsicrateia, the wife or concubine of Mithradates, but that\u2019s REALLY selling the guy short, for many reasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0e499b5cd5d11c8c525a80f2ed3338a6\">So, where do we get the name Hypsikrates from? Plutarch tells us Mithradates called him that. We also have another, very cool source confirming this, but more on that later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-339a1e72c3b78603e1d9221579010b55\">We\u2019ll start with a look at the period leading up to the creation of the Kingdom of Pontus, giving us an idea of the world in which Mithradates and Hypsikrates lived. From there, we\u2019ll talk about the life of Hypsikrates, look at everything we know about him, and explore whether or not he was trans by addressing some potential counter arguments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-774d9368faf334212a52d8b089d0ca13\">If you enjoy learning about trans history, your support on Patreon makes a huge difference. It helps offset some of the costs of having to buy used books that have been out of print since the 70s off eBay because that\u2019s the only way to get my hands on them unless I want to go travel to a public library in Switzerland. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-a89b3969 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link wp-element-button\" href=\"\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Support The Channel On Patreon<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a0968323f1d32307f2ecd92eb0e4e175\">Also, if you think trans people deserve to know and own our own histories, toss a like and a comment below, and don\u2019t forget to subscribe.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-20bb039d9fafc3311f3e1ae2e3270acd\">DO IT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-dec447fc5b6fc89a5fcf41512240f99a\">NOW.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8e12ed898fea010b5ddaf619c935c53d\">Cool, let\u2019s get into it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<nav class=\"wp-block-stackable-table-of-contents stk-block-table-of-contents stk-block stk-d004a28\" data-block-id=\"d004a28\"><p class=\"stk-table-of-contents__title\">Table of Contents<\/p><ul class=\"stk-table-of-contents__table\"><li><a href=\"#chapter-i-mithradates-romes-fearsome-adversary\">Chapter I: Mithradates \u2013 Rome\u2019s Fearsome Adversary<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#chapter-ii-the-life-of-hypsikrates\">Chapter II: The Life Of Hypsikrates<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#chapter-iii-what-we-know-about-hypsikrates\">Chapter III: What We Know About Hypsikrates<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#chapter-iv-is-there-another-plausible-explanation-here\">Chapter IV: Is There Another Plausible Explanation Here?<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#chapter-v-was-he-really-called-hypsikrates\">Chapter V: Was He Really Called Hypsikrates?<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#chapter-vi-the-fate-of-hypsikrates-and-a-possible-afterlife\">Chapter VI: The Fate Of Hypsikrates And A Possible Afterlife<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#ancient-sources\">Ancient Sources:<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#modern-sources\">Modern Sources:<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-i-mithradates-romes-fearsome-adversary\">Chapter I: Mithradates \u2013 Rome\u2019s Fearsome Adversary<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2decfcda97299cee4bf765b0ddb34794\">It wasn\u2019t always inevitable for Rome to become the dominant force in the Mediterranean. It\u2019s weird to think about, since they\u2019ve left us such a powerful cultural and institutional legacy. But once upon a time, they were a tiny, unimportant podunk town in the middle of an unimportant region. It took centuries before they\u2019d even brought all of Italy under their heel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4e6b3dacbe72aa05adadf1d95d37ca73\">As they grew, their greatest rival was Carthage. And with both being aggressively expansionist, it was inevitable for the two empires to come to blows. They did so in the three Punic wars, but the second was the most significant. It was the last real chance anyone had of halting the spread of Roman hegemony in the Mediterranean, and the Carthaginians came pretty close to doing it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f3a4520bfc37b711b423615fa203c88d\">But in spite of having arguably the greatest military strategist of the ancient world, Hannibal, leading their armies, they lost. Rome defeated Carthage, annexed their territory, reduced it to a rump state, and finally destroyed it in the Third Punic War, which ended in 146 BCE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ebbbb78670ffa37f3a22ec4dfd92ab47\">But that didn\u2019t mean Rome was through with formidable foes \u2013 particularly from the east. They had the diadochi (\u0394\u03b9\u03ac\u03b4\u03bf\u03c7\u03bf\u03b9), or \u201csuccessors,\u201d to deal with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e48cb20e68e5d1649c80e2b2ddd19c30\">The diadochi were a collection of empires carved out of the remains of Alexander\u2019s empire, who defeated and conquered the Achaemenid Persian Empire in 323 BCE, then died without an heir. That disrupted the balance of power in the region, and Alexander\u2019s various generals fought over who would succeed him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6a9113d6c8ca46c22f58fb963bb7fc3c\">After a couple decades of war, four notable generals created lasting empires, which is what we call the diadochi. These were the empires the Romans would run into as they expanded eastward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-393d3446a078154bb7749d6c82054f8a\">Ptolemy ruled Egypt, Cyprus, southeastern Asia Minor, and part of the southern Levant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e3aa5b46c91e528af3fa892db1aa47b8\">Cassander ruled Macedonia and most of Greece.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d5a886917342d42b092e522307060ce7\">Seleucus ruled most of the Levant \u2013 that\u2019s modern day Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and Jordan, that area \u2013 east Asia Minor, and everything east of it, as far as modern day Pakistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ece25abb83f1a1e58d6a1d4400d3e4e3\">And Antigonus ruled Thrace and the north and west of Asia Minor.<a href=\"#_msocom_1\">[SE1]<\/a>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c2810e1ad0362a3f6e2549d9c7e3d8e6\">These borders were fluid, of course \u2013 the powers continued fighting amongst themselves, and various breakaway kingdoms were formed over the years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9438fe809790ad7b4cc52003f63dcf60\">One of those kingdoms broke away from Antigonus\u2019 empire. The Kingdom of Pontus was founded by Mithradates I.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-394cffa8851db97ae71d8c12ee3b21df\">Mithradates I\u2019s father, Mithridates II, was the ruler of Kios.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a88480a54e95e7dfb22e7b94a3708d66\">Wait, what? Shouldn\u2019t the son be Mithradates III?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a30cf2bb71e37a79c08c670204ac6c98\">Yeah it\u2019s weird.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-97d602e7cd427d6df2e6cc30d322591e\">Mithradates II ruled Kios on behalf of Antigonus. But Antigonus became suspicious of him, so he had him executed in 302 or 301 BCE. So his son became ruler of Kios, where he was called Mithradates III. But Antigonus was suspicious of him as well, and Mithradates III learned he was plotting against him, so he escaped with a group of supporters and went to Pontus, where he became King Mithradates I Ktistes (K\u03c4\u03af\u03c3\u03c4\u03b7\u03c2), \u201cthe builder.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d40bec17cc01337f9e77471e48002c34\">So yeah, Mithradates III is also Mithradates I, because he was the third Mithradates in Kios but the first one in Pontus, and his dad is Mithradates II, but his grandson is also Mithradates II. It\u2019s very silly. <a href=\"#_msocom_2\">[SE2]<\/a>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d899ad768db80ed07ada7e745f91b415\">Fast forward a couple hundred years and a handful of Mithradateses. King Mithradates V Euergetes (\u03b5\u1f50\u03b5\u03c1\u03b3\u03ad\u03c4\u03b7\u03c2), \u201cthe benefactor\u201d, since he was a great patron of Greek culture, is poisoned at a banquet in 120 BCE and, and after some turmoil, his son Mithradates VI Eupator (\u0395\u1f51\u03c0\u03ac\u03c4\u03c9\u03c1) \u201cof a noble father\u201d takes charge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-26b891bad0c55f5fa2b5a4aeed2f992f\">THIS Mithradates is our boy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9525713ce9987d8d4bb7a2c1579aba04\">Seeing his father die of poisoning (and he suspected his mother of doing it) was a pivotal experience for Mithradates Eupator. From that point on, he made a habit of regularly ingesting small amounts of poison to immunize himself from its effects. And it turns out this is actually possible with some poisons, though not all. Today, this practice is called mithridatism. I\u2019m sure Mithridates would be proud and I\u2019m sure the Sicilian would be disappointed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d0a090e448d58ac3b6cca7b86408cbd4\">We also know Mithradates was a polyglot. According to Pliny The Elder, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-20ab3b73af20bdc813fa8e2a6e2465c4\">Mithridates, who was king of twenty-two nations, administered their laws in as many languages, and could harangue each of them, without employing an interpreter <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f7ea08b21559a2bdf3040a060e5259c3\">&#8211; Pliny the Elder, <em>Natural History<\/em>, VII.XXIV<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1d28585ef7e16cac15103f068cfe8667\">And here I am, with a smattering of French, Italian, and Latin all wrapped up in a tornado in my head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0a913a6ce2a905e43402a98f52c168bd\">A few years ago, I was on vacation in Mexico, and whenever I travel somewhere I try to make an effort to learn at least a bit of their local language. I\u2019m in their house, so to speak, so I feel like it\u2019s just respectful, y\u2019know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a26ed9063090b060ee6d049b99740efd\">So I was going out for coffee in the morning, and decided to learn how to order a coffee in Spanish. <em>Un caf\u00e9 grande, por favor<\/em> \u2013 I repeated it over and over in my head, making sure it stuck. Then, when I got to the front of the line, what did I say?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7998f41240c8b3d0dd3d5ffa89c6b5a8\"><em>Bonjour, je voudrais un tasse de caf\u00e9 s\u2019il-vous plait.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-41e172e0e3ac763b23a8149a641e20b4\">Yep, I\u2019m no Mithradates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4b90f770c40d7d736e1ffd72222b101e\">Anyway, Mithradates VI Eupator brought his kingdom from a relatively insignificant sliver of northeastern Anatolia to the dominant power in Asia Minor. In the process, he came to blows against the Romans three times, in what\u2019s called the three Mithridatic Wars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-58958c6f4d600f882e439ee10e6479cc\">There\u2019s a lot to say about these three wars, but we shan\u2019t get too far into them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-07adfe49dc548e0c96d403592e0838a9\">The first Mithridatic War was fought from 89 to 85 BCE, was led on the Roman side by Lucius Cornelius Sulla, and ended <em>status quo ante bellum<\/em>, a Latin phrase that means no territorial gains or losses on either side. This was partially because Sulla had to wrap things up quickly, since he had to return to Rome to deal with his political enemies who\u2019d been conspiring against him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b62efb91880cea89b3dd9ff43447b146\">The second was a war of aggression led by Sulla\u2019s glory hungry legate Lucius Licinius Murena he\u2019d left behind, which lasted from 83 to 81 BCE and ended in Roman defeat and retreat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6740f4b5f90a93587f000da5f0d99f5d\">It\u2019s the third Mithridatic War we\u2019re most interested in. The king of Bithynia, Nicomedes IV, willed his kingdom to Rome upon his death in 75 BCE, and Mithradates would have none of that&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-ii-the-life-of-hypsikrates\">Chapter II: The Life Of Hypsikrates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1a9d743775758f1e4117252cb08e3500\">Let\u2019s set the stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f3814a3553ae6e6fa84d8594a581437e\">Just before the final battle of the Third Mithridatic War, Mithradates had delivered a stunning blow to the Romans, ejecting them from his kingdom, Pontus, after the Battle Of Zela. So the Romans recalled their general and replaced him in 66 BCE with Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, known in English as Pompey The Great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-dd98f0d3fbf383dda6a35f0fcd22652f\">Pompey had already made a name for himself, first as a general under Sulla during his civil war against another Roman, Gaius Marius. This is the same Sulla who led the Roman forces during the first Mithridatic war, by the way. Then, Pompey put a final end to the slave revolt led by Spartacus, and most recently, he\u2019d rid the Mediterranean of piracy almost entirely in the span of just three months. Pompey was the Republic\u2019s golden boy, and the general they\u2019d had leading things in Asia Minor wasn\u2019t cutting it. So, Pompey was given command.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f7c20353abe168ec0d85199a0fc69976\">He sent his fleet to guard the coast of the Black Sea, cutting off the possibility of a naval escape for Mithradates. He convinced the Parthian king to attack Armenia, an ally of Mithradates to the east, to make sure they couldn\u2019t provide any support. He secured the Kingdom of Cappadocia to the south, cutting off that escape route as well. The territory to the north, Colchis, was part of Pontus, but it wasn\u2019t easily traversed. And he was attacking from the west.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3fa0fcabad9338363bd2afb4d478954d\">Mithradates was boxed in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fde48df65bd90e6496c8369c905a8a96\">Mithradates set up camp along the Lycus River in the mountains, on a hill called Dasteira. His camp was in rocky terrain, naturally defensible, and with only one way to access it, by path up a cliff. He stationed 2000 of his troops to guard it, and sent his cavalry out to harass Pompey\u2019s forces, hoping the Romans would run out of supplies and have to turn back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-83a2adabac16c711eec1aebce312f2fb\">However, Pompey had discovered Mithradates\u2019 camp, and attacked it in the middle of the night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5700870184d561cd0f247fbb7a6bc889\">Despite a surprise attack, Mithradates was thoroughly entrenched, so it should have been a hard battle. But Mithradates must have done something to really upset Artemis, because Plutarch tells us the Romans had a bright, full moon behind them, which cast long shadows before them. That, combined with the low light, made it difficult to see where the Roman soldiers were, so when Mithradates\u2019 troops hurled javelins at the Romans, they missed. The Romans, noticing this, pushed forward more zealously, the Pontic forces were routed, and more than ten thousand of them, fully a third of the Pontic army, were slaughtered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e888119235ff16973ea852d2adb8a615\">What about Mithradates? He was leading his cavalry in charging the Romans. At first, he had 800 horsemen with him, but at one point, he and three companions were cut off from the rest of the battle. Seeing how things were going, the four of them broke through the Roman rear and escaped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0a3e4a1488a86c02ccd55d8d20dedac3\">One of these four&#8230;was Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-46c36d1e347cbf739542cc871aff4f6c\">We don\u2019t know when Hypsikrates first met Mithradates, but scholar Adrienne Mayor suggests it may have been three years earlier, in 69 BCE, when Mithradates was recruiting troops across the region to fight the Romans. Hypsikrates\u2019 name means \u201cmountain strength,\u201d suggesting he came from the Caucasus region \u2013 one of the areas where Mithradates was recruiting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-15590ec0cbd0d9e4c3ee9b0632332559\">At first, Hypsikrates may have joined Mithradates as a stable hand. He looked after the horses. The word for this is \u201cgroom,\u201d I\u2019m told, but I also feel like maybe that word is toxic now. Kind of like \u201cbasic biology.\u201d Man, it must suck to be a biologist right now. As well as, you know, someone who\u2019s not a fascist monster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-917c6a221697079cb1c1fa45f639b310\">*sigh*<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-081f4cd5af97127b257943ec97088353\">Anyway, Hypsikrates eventually became Mithradates\u2019 personal attendant, and then, his lover. He led the cavalry charge along with Mithradates. We don\u2019t know who the other two were, but considering they were close enough to Mithradates and Hypsikrates during the battle to escape with them, they may also have been important figures in the Pontic military.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b5a1122699cb0a5052b00e970b0ec96e\">Anyway, the four of them headed east, joined after by about three thousand foot soldiers and a group of cavalry mercenaries who also managed to escape. It must have been heartening for Hypsikrates and Mithradates to see them, but it was still barely a tenth of their original force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f3b17cee77c9360779cc97fc48db17f7\">Eventually, they reached Sinora, Mithradates\u2019 treasury, along the border of Pontus and Armenia. Today, it\u2019s a small town with this name in Turkey, I\u2019m sorry I\u2019m not going to read it aloud I have absolutely no knowledge of Turkish. I really did try to find out how to pronounce it too, I promise, I\u2019m not just being lazy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1a5d4bb9e8fd42fadfc15d3fb246bdf1\">Once they arrived, they were welcomed by Mithradates\u2019 daughter Drypetina, who was there with her eunuch attendant, Menophilus. If you look into the family history of Mithradates there\u2019s a hell of a lot of backstabbing \u2013 the man\u2019s own mother tried to have him killed, and so did a bunch of his kids \u2013 but Drypetina wasn\u2019t like that. From what the sources say, she loved her father a great deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4afbc953011e61c07873f256e4a52cb9\">There, Mithradates distributed all his wealth to his remaining soldiers, and sent an envoy to Armenia asking for aid. He hadn\u2019t yet learned Pompey had gotten the Parthians to attack Armenia and that they weren\u2019t going to be able to help him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-25c409dd5a5719ebfec5960cd758675e\">He also prepared a set of poison pills, and gave one each to his closest friends, which certainly would have included Hypsikrates. That way, if they were ever captured by the Romans, they had a way out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a9386bb9ca870d7faa16ff8ffbd0928c\">At this point, the written sources neglect to mention Hypsikrates again. However, we have no reason to believe they parted ways \u2013 no, he certainly continued to accompany Mithradates after this point. Valerius Maximus tells us, after all, that Mithradates, quote, \u201cfelt that he was wandering with house and household gods as [Hypsikrates] joined him in exile.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-50c63b18eef3c69e7ccb5a10b4a92e60\">After leaving Sinora, the Pontic army headed north, still part of what remained of their kingdom, hoping to consolidate their power. They wintered in Dioscurias, a city just south of the modern Russian city Sochi, where they had the Winter Olympics back in 2014, remember that? The triumphant return of the Jamaican bobsledding team? That was so cool. Back when Russia was at least pretending to be part of the global community? Before MAGA, before the foundations of neoliberalism began to very noticeably crumble before our very eyes even in the heart of empire? Ah, those were the days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c2a1c855c2ee22cffc6267be94498534\">Then again, maybe I\u2019m just more politically aware now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-855faba5ecc162afbb96c2f8b4e0f698\">Their goal was to eventually reach Pantikapaeon on the Crimean Peninsula, and there establish a new capital. It was, however, under the control of Machares, one of Mithradates\u2019 many sons, who\u2019d betrayed his father and sided with the Romans. Yeah, great family there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-71428331468bef32eb7eb750f3f531b0\">So Mithradates planned to retake Pantikapaeon and the surrounding area from Machares, lick his wounds, gather allies, and rebuild his power base.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-47ef172e56d7496685c0c8331a4bec58\">Pompey, meanwhile, secured the surrender of Tigranes, King of Armenia, as well as the Pontic territories in Asia Minor. He took as much wealth as he could, including the cloak of Alexander the Great, which like, if you\u2019ve played Assassin\u2019s Creed: Odyssey that probably sounds pretty awesome. Like wow, Pompey unlocked a legendary item! He could add that to his kit and get +87 strength or whatever, but no, it would have been like more than 300 years old at that point, probably not in very good shape, and probably not even authentic because how could you possibly trace its provenance in the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century BCE?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2ed670ffa278a7d97962412ffdb0568c\">The only stat boost it would give him is to his bragging, which actually would be pretty helpful in Roman politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ead6d10108bfff2c8d56b1834060efee\">Anyway, Pompey tried to follow Mithradates, but after several setbacks he decided it was too much of a hassle, even with his new cloak, and Mithradates would probably die in the mountains anyway, so he declared himself the victor of the Third Mithridatic War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2864615b5b11eed510291be30ee6f660\">Back to Hypsikrates and Mithradates \u2013 in spring of 65 BCE, they crossed the Caucasus Mountains. That might not sound like that big a deal, but crossing mountains isn\u2019t easy today, with modern thermal gear and GPS devices etc. For a small ragtag band of troops who\u2019d just gotten their proverbial asses handed to them a few months earlier, it\u2019s a downright miracle. To this day, we don\u2019t know how he did it. No doubt Hypsikrates was helpful here, likely being from the mountains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3cd7e060e33a3303afc17f6b0fa608de\">Historian Oleg Gabelko says some Russian historians have raised the possibility that Hypsikrates died during this crossing, unable to endure the harsh conditions of the mountains. But considering how the two main things we know about him are that a) he was from the mountains, and b) he was a badass, I feel like that\u2019s unlikely, and so does Gabelko, for the record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-109c6fc74db1763c5caab3cf07df9caa\">No, I think that in the summer of 65 BCE, when Mithradates somehow showed up at the gates of Pantikapaion in full force, Hypsikrates was by his side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-65291a78bc3793532ba7f057300809c0\">When they arrived, the rebellious Machares was not interested in facing his father\u2019s wrath, so he killed himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-449ca5e8cc3d6cfdf6c79c33150f13d4\">In control once more, Mithradates petitioned Pompey for peace, asking for the same terms Tigranes received \u2013 to retain his kingdom in exchange for paying tribute to Rome. At the same time, he fell ill from a disease that led to ulcers forming on his face. We don\u2019t know the specifics of this disease, but it may have been related to the poison he drank every day to make himself immune.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b31e03b19381418f0d33c364e4efd10e\">It\u2019s also possible this was a communicable disease, and that Hypsikrates died from it, as scholar L.A. Naumov suggests \u2013 at least, Oleg Gabelko says they do. Naumov writes in Russian so I can\u2019t read the specifics of their work myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-851c3c3e2f3af452d6fce13b6391013d\">Pompey was surprised to learn Mithradates was still alive, but still refused his request. If Mithradates wanted the same terms Tigranes had, he\u2019d have to do so in person, like Tigranes did, kneeling before him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4bfa7912e16687b9976580aedaad7f39\">And his response?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-32a6f3d2908ba0baf8c1f668dced7933\">MITHRADADEEZ NUTS!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0bd1936975f6bd729a118ae1c37e8742\">Unwilling to meet Pompey\u2019s demand, Mithradates realized continued war with Rome was unavoidable. He and his generals, likely including Hypsikrates, made plans for war, with a daring strategy \u2013 to travel across central Europe and invade Italy itself, like Hannibal had two centuries earlier, the absolute madman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c33375f3bba8fd60a93fb986deabed6d\">Writers seem to be divided on this one. Some think it was a desperate, last gasp strategy, but others, including Roman commentators, seem to think it might actually have worked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6c405f703c9984df1ac9e6a0cc63826b\">But Mithradates never got the chance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b03427f89a89484a979460c8893efe03\">First, they faced a major earthquake, which Cassius Dio calls \u201cthe greatest earthquake ever experienced. (XXXVII.IV)\u201d This devastated several of the cities under Mithradates\u2019 control. He must have done something to upset Poseidon the earthshaker as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-08e00d6babeab3af0aab91da52fa248b\">Next was a rebellion that began in Phanagoria, one of the cities still under Mithradates\u2019 control toward the end of his life. It\u2019s on the other side of the Cimmerian Bosporus from Pantikapaion. The people of northern Pontus hadn\u2019t yet been touched by Mithradates\u2019 wars, and they weren\u2019t pleased with being heavily taxed and forced to serve in the military under the command of an old man on a losing streak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fc507e1b569b9bae939e72cc23181734\">It turns out that Mithradates\u2019 favoured son Pharnaces, his chosen heir, was at the heart of this rebellion. It grew to the point that Mithradates couldn\u2019t halt it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-223dbc34a7ce1f1f5b28ab50410c367e\">This rebellion involved significant fighting, and it\u2019s possible that Hypsikrates died in it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-16ff1aab30fb3d1f7bc2716b0b38399c\">One morning, Mithradates was awakened by his soldiers and citizens shouting their demands. Appian tells us they said, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3b814316cba96a91da2dc51da8cea472\">We want your son to be king; we want a young man instead of an old one who is ruled by eunuchs, the slayer of so many of his sons, his generals, and his friends. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0e5ac85f2a8e2e038c93b93a194479ff\">&#8211; Appian, Roman History, XII.CX<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bcd674ce57fffcdade0117ea2972d745\">At this point, Mithradates knew his days were numbered. If he were captured by Rome, he\u2019d be paraded through the city in chains, then executed. He decided to spare himself and his remaining family that fate, so he opened a bottle of poison, distributing it to those with him. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-30e143c5b696196f7d2e7615b7bd2fdf\">If Hypsikrates was still alive at this point, it\u2019s possible he drank the poison as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-223c75a9626a7c541fc1daebe3b12020\">Mithradates, however, was immune to the poison, having been ingesting small amounts his entire life. So he asked his bodyguard, Bituitus, to take care of him. Appian tells us he said, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5eedb3b6e046601b0547ed46e59f5048\">I have profited much from your right arm against my enemies. I shall profit from it most of all if you will kill me, and save from the danger of being led in a Roman triumph one who has been an autocrat so many years, and the ruler of so great a kingdom, but who is now unable to die by poison because, like a fool, he has fortified himself against the poison of others. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5324041a3564cd400e26c00f4e92a51a\">&#8211; Appian, Roman History, XII.CXI<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-476d23d0ca82b2e14dff81dfb8a575dc\">This was the end of Mithradates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d1cc74617f6122eb8058f80a362d2cb2\">After, Pharnaces sent an envoy to Pompey saying his father was dead, and asked for permission to rule Pontus as a client of Rome. To Pompey, the matter was satisfied, and Pontus remained independent until it was annexed as a Roman province by Nero in 62 CE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-a89b3969 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link wp-element-button\" href=\"\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Support The Channel On Patreon<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-iii-what-we-know-about-hypsikrates\">Chapter III: What We Know About Hypsikrates<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-cdbd2cba52eb39459f189c427e23e8c4\">Let\u2019s take a look at each of the passages we have about Hypsikrates. The two writers who mention him specifically are Valerius Maximus and Plutarch. We\u2019ll talk about each of them a bit, since writers deserve to be recognized too and maybe that means people will recognize me hundreds of years after I die too, that might be cool. Then again I\u2019ll be dead, so what will I care? Ah well. Then we\u2019ll read the passages, and talk about what they tell us about Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5e08681d132e52e18e69c2ac2065dfca\">First, Valerius Maximus. He was a 1<sup>st<\/sup> century CE Roman writer who lived during the reign of the emperor Tiberius, so at least 80 years after the end of the Mithridatic Wars. He was born poor, but showed a talent for writing, so he caught the attention of local rich guy Sextus Pompeius, a patron of literature. This is not the same Pompeius we talked about earlier who fought Mithradates, by the way \u2013 different guy. Sextus Pompeius was also patron to the poet Ovid, who\u2019s come up a lot on this channel so far, and it\u2019s a good bet the two of them knew each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-90addb9b5d80698e8f3d99b6b0d425a9\">Valerius Maximus\u2019 work is called FACTORVM ET DICTORVM MEMORABILIVM LIBRI NOVEM, or Memorable Doings And Sayings In Nine Books. If you watched the video on the gallae, we referenced Book VII of his work when talking about a precedent in Roman law that the gallae were legally recognized to not be men. This time though, we\u2019re looking at Book IV.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-96e53652cbcf708e8d6bd0ee98a5eab0\">Next is Plutarch, and we know quite a bit about him. He was born in 46 CE during the reign of the emperor Claudius in a small town called Chaeronea, east of Delphi. Claudius was two emperors after Tiberius, so it\u2019s possible he and Valerius Maximus lived at the same time, though it\u2019s unlikely they actually met each other. He had two brothers, Lamprias and Timon, married a woman named Timoxena, and had a daughter also named Timoxena, who died when she was just two years old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4b8ec40486959d6bf9fd622423343cdb\">He studied philosophy in Athens, at some point became a Roman citizen, and after that became one of the priests at the temple of Apollo at Delphi, where people used to go for oracles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-341707853a5d139c282506d3b763c5b4\">Also, he was a vegetarian, how cool is that? How many people\u2019s diets in history do we know? Do you know what Julius Caesar\u2019s favourite breakfast was? What about Charles V of Habsburg\u2019s favourite late night snack? I don\u2019t know. Do you? Maybe we do know this, I probably should have looked a bit more into this one before writing this part.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-22cc8d41037d97e1cd79a8b1147b7516\">Leave a comment below if you know what Julius Caesar\u2019s favourite breakfast was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a2cbabe41f91af276cd84396acdae5dc\">Plutarch is best known for his Parallel Lives, a collection of biographies where he pairs a notable Greek with a similarly notable Roman. It\u2019s a really important source for the lives of a lot of ancient figures. In this case, we\u2019re interested in his Life of Pompey. He paired Pompey with Agesilaus II, king of Sparta after the Peloponnesian War, by the way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bc00556709da94fa7d72e2e1cc6df857\">Anyway, let\u2019s look at the sources. We\u2019ll go in alphabetical order, so Valerius Maximus is first. I\u2019ve changed pronouns and names where noted with brackets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7dfc5323064c3ac09aeec983fb8cf8f1\">[Hypsikrates] also in [his] love for [his] husband Mithradates gave rein to [his] affection. For [his husband\u2019s] sake, [he] considered it a pleasure to convert the outstanding beauty of [his] person to masculine style. For [he] cut [his] hair short and accustomed [himself] to a horse and weapons the more easily to partake of [his husband\u2019s] toils and dangers. [He] even followed [Mithradates] as he fled through savage nations after his defeat by Gnaeus Pompeius, tireless in spirit as in body. Such loyalty on [his] part was a great consolation and a delightful solace to Mithradates in harsh and difficult circumstances. For he felt that he was wandering with house and household gods as [Hypsikrates] joined him in exile. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2fcad2d5d80ce56d07ff64ca9a345dd1\">&#8211; <em>Valerius Maximus, Memorable Doings And Sayings IV.VI<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7d69d546bd265f3825a11ef50382b1e9\">Next, Plutarch:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6bbc102cd91fe92862c2fc6e31eaf051\">Mithradates himself, however, at the outset, cut and charged his way through the Romans with eight hundred horsemen; but the rest were soon dispersed and he was left with three companions. One of these was [Hypsikrates], a concubine, who always displayed a right manly spirit and extravagant daring (for which reason the king was wont to call [him] Hypsikrates), and at this time, mounted and accoutred like a Persian, [he] was neither exhausted by the long journeys, nor did [he] weary of caring for the king&#8217;s person and for his horse, until they came to a place called Sinora, which was full of the king&#8217;s money and treasures. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ff5d7ca237fc6f7f3641b29849ccf66a\">\u2013 Plutarch, Life Of Pompey XXXII.VII-VIII<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-161ecaa110f41fc638ec64199ad002c3\">That\u2019s not exactly a full biography, but there are still things we can pull out of there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bf72b7032060dad47cd754310ce03977\">First off, Hypsikrates and Mithradates were quite in love. So much so, apparently, that their reputation for romance seemed to outlive both their time and their place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3b048d0b7511456f1d1daadd78597f3e\">In fact, Book 4 section 6 of Valerius Maximus\u2019 work focuses entirely on great love between married couples in history. The fact that he mentions Hypsikrates and Mithradates is particularly wild, since Mithradates was one of the great villains in Roman history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3f3800be6d5138d1eb034160f05e36be\">Like, nobody today really talks about the great love between Elizabeth Bathory and her husband, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d959105431f094075dc9b80794a8bb08\">But it was different \u2013 today, we view the enemies of the state as Evil. We had to get Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein because they were the Axis Of Evil. We have to defeat Hamas because they\u2019re Evil. Look, they use human shields! They killed babies! They refuse to release their hostages! They stopped the Palestinians from receiving aid!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-34f507d2e091aef3e46fd71eded54fd0\">Oh wait, it\u2019s the Israeli military that did all that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0796e3468751807c8d7efc4513f21fdc\">Of course, it\u2019s all done in the name of expansionism. I\u2019m not saying Osama or Saddam were swell guys, but plenty of leaders aligned with the American Empire are also not swell guys, and plenty of leaders not aligned with them are also not swell guys but they don\u2019t have any oil or other resources to exploit so it doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8ad09ac3e32cbfc7252c52baac8d1d2e\">In the modern world, conquering for the sake of conquering isn\u2019t really palatable to the average person. Especially since the American invasion of Vietnam, when the general public started to see the horrors of war firsthand on their televisions, most people think wars of aggression are Bad, Actually. There were anti war writers in the ancient world too, but expansion and conquering was more accepted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8df72c76d174f844024d35a3720d9fb1\">In Virgil\u2019s Aeneid, Book VI, Aeneas visits the underworld, where his father shows him what the future holds in store for his people \u2013 the Trojans, who would settle in Italy and become the Romans. After mentioning several of Rome\u2019s great conquerors, he says, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7b41961ac4004e640bb24d4ffef717f5\">\u201cBut you, Roman, remember, rule with all your power the peoples of the Earth \u2013 these will be your arts: to put your stamp on the works and ways of peace, to spare the defeated, break the proud in war.\u201d Virgil, Aeneid, VI. CMLXXX-CMLXXXIII<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6e332abd34be41307b23cfccb2a769a0\">So if you lived in a society where wars of aggression were both necessary and accepted, and where upper class men were encouraged to seek as much glory for themselves as possible, it makes sense that you\u2019d make your opponents out to be powerful and honourable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c77128f69670af789cffaf822ab13c6b\">That\u2019s why Valerius Maximus wrote about Mithradates and Hypsikrates fondly, and it\u2019s why we\u2019ll never see an American account of <del>how virtuous <\/del><ins>the great loves of <\/ins>Saddam Hussein<ins> or whatever<\/ins><del> was<\/del>, no matter how far into the future we look.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-48a9e6146563358f66e8cdb60297884f\">Anyway, we can also see that Hypsikrates was both quite masculine, and quite capable of enduring the harshness of battle and the wilderness. He was a steadfast companion to Mithradates both in battle and in the long voyage through the wilderness. He dressed like a Persian too, it seems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7db93635b557e7b8b6c3a476712ea7d2\">But what\u2019s really interesting is that he was, apparently, quite pretty as a girl, but once he joined with Mithradates, he adopted a more masculine persona.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-eec5e078d13eef94672f4f27abdc09fb\">Why?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7c6ace0670004e85b428252058ae4cda\">If we take Valerius Maximus\u2019 word for it, it was because Hypsicratea was a lovely, feminine woman who fell in love with Mithradates so much that she was willing to dress like a man, be called by a male name, adopt a bunch of traditionally male behaviours, and fight alongside him in battle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-99e794c5ce53a09163751c1ed10303dd\">Does that really sound like the most likely interpretation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fe1275f0d5afff6d39e7a3f83e21883e\">Like, okay Steve, you fell in love with this amazing woman, but she insists you grow your hair out long, dress like a woman, and by the way you\u2019re answering to the name of Stephanie now. And take these pills, they\u2019re good for you, don\u2019t worry about what they are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-81db89f894584abef5543103371ddc20\">You cool with that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0f4f818e819e5a503a9a3796642d8242\">Calm down trans girls in the audience, this isn\u2019t a forced feminization story you read on Literotica.com back in the late aughts that made you feel some funny feelings you\u2019d spend the next decade trying to suppress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2eb2f1b7b1f4092330f1c0a127afb037\">Stacy, you cool with your boyfriend calling you Jerry and slapping a fake beard on you every time you hang out?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ac27110dfcb0a7997c8a7041706ac4c0\">Yeah I didn\u2019t think so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-aaedec52149fc695102b759853c7f30a\">This explanation comes from the same idea that gives us the old \u201cthey\u2019re making the kids trans\u201d yarn. If someone isn\u2019t already masculine, you can\u2019t force them to be masculine. If you could, then conversion therapy would work in making trans people cis, but the only thing it works for is making trans people more anxious, more depressed, and more likely to off themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-558299fab86c89015199ef6486032190\">What\u2019s more, there isn\u2019t any evidence Mithradates took a similar approach with any of his other lovers, and he did have plenty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f706862a43893c6175b1b5c6ec0492ae\">In fact, Hypsikrates was spouse number 6. His other spouses did sometimes join him on campaigns, but they seemed to serve in more of a diplomatic role than a martial one. There\u2019s no evidence Mithradates was into like, forced masculinization or whatever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9727745ee90099d1ec3a032d239db5d9\">So it doesn\u2019t make much sense to assume Hypsikrates became masculine because that\u2019s what Mithradates wanted him to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-db74d46af4cab59f9383d6de5ac4f675\">That\u2019s just the way he was.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-iv-is-there-another-plausible-explanation-here\">Chapter IV: Is There Another Plausible Explanation Here?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bd6d39bed47ce8c0bdbe37f70953ac40\">Maybe there\u2019s something we\u2019re missing here. There are plenty of examples of warrior women in the ancient world, after all. Maybe Hypsikrates is just one of those? Let\u2019s take a look at some examples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-783d086e263057bed84a206885c00123\">The most obvious one is of the Amazons, a semi-mythical group of warrior women who lived on the edge of the known world at the time, which was actually not far from where Hypsikrates came from either. Their society was closed off to men \u2013 they\u2019d meet with men to procreate, return any male sons to their fathers, and raise the girls in their society. They were known for their strength, as well as their skills in hunting, horseback riding, archery, and combat. Sounds awesome to me, and the Athenians clearly thought so too, since Amazons show up all over the place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2366b33e1ffa368aaa4056e3938effec\">You can find Amazons on the Parthenon, on vases, and of course, in lots of stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-09bb7a8919d9deab999bf84e64b3cc86\">Now, we\u2019re not just looking for Amazons who are described as masculine. There\u2019s plenty of that, we know we\u2019ll find it. To the Greeks, \u201cmasculine\u201d was in some ways synonymous with \u201cdid stuff\u201d \u2013 women were mostly expected to stay home and take care of the house &amp; kids, tradwife to the nth degree. So just them riding horses, fighting, or hunting would have made them comparatively masculine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c21631c50a1089da45173a45855a3895\">What we\u2019re looking for is Amazons who are described as having adopted a male identity. That\u2019s quite a different story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-95b781be4a513444e9832d06b1d7b3b8\">Herodotus, 5<sup>th<\/sup> century BCE Greek historian from Halicarnassus, tells us about a group of Amazon warriors who were captured by Greeks in battle. They loaded the prisoners onto their ship, but the prisoners escaped and murdered their jailors. That gave them control of the ship, but they didn\u2019t know how to sail so they were just blown in whatever direction the winds took them. Eventually, they ended up in Scythian territory, and started raiding local Scythian towns. When the Scythians realized it was actually beautiful ladies attacking them, they sent their youngest, hottest men to set up camp near the Amazon base, where, I\u2019m sure, they staged a Zoolander photoshoot, but without the cameras. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f2ed7a52105a8422ea88b72dec53a656\">Eventually, they seduced the Amazons, but when the Scythian men wanted them to return to their town with them, they declined. After all, Scythian women did, like, girl stuff \u2013 weaving and sitting in wagons. They wanted to hunt and ride horseback and do awesome stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e4c8369a9e80406cce664038459b797e\">So the Scythian men agreed to abandon their town and wander off into the wilderness to live with their badass wives and form the Sauromatian culture, a Scythian subculture. Here, Herodotus tells us, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-22438ea2b90b67d0896c833d80432867\">[They] have continued from that day to the present to observe their ancient customs, frequently hunting on horseback with their husbands, sometimes even unaccompanied; in war taking the field; and wearing the very same dress as the men.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d3112b68522f5ba282025434d5f33d78\">\u2013 Herodotus, Histories IV.CXVI<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4ef83da4cded179d05129f5e77f927be\">Now, like many things Herodotus writes about, a lot of this is heavily embellished. But it doesn\u2019t really matter for our purposes, since what we\u2019re looking for is any sort of precedent of warrior women adopting male identities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0c3157e23b2b9253b369a0630d225d20\">The closest thing we have here, though, is the fact that Sauromatian women dress the same way men do. It\u2019s never mentioned that they wore their hair in a masculine style or adopted male names. It\u2019s also not clear whether Herodotus actually encountered these people in person, or whether he was giving a third hand account. And whoever saw them may have only encountered them while riding on horseback, so they may have only seen what they wore while doing so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c66c447967755668b14051fa1370110f\">However, Plutarch tells us Hypsikrates was dressed not just like a man, but \u201clike a Persian,\u201d which is very much different than the Sauromatians or Scythians would have dressed. It\u2019s possible he just didn\u2019t know the specifics, and \u201clike a Persian,\u201d was a sort of hand-waving eastward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-cf1885b62cc1d2cd7471563f69b23307\"><em>Dressed like a Persian, as my husband, treats me like a guy<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4edbee7e34482d25ecafc1b99ba2e860\">Anyway, we need more than what Herodotus gives us here. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-db7729120bcd8bd80e94b0b2961b5c3a\">What else we got?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8e76949b1374517082b97bd33cd0dd85\">In the Iliad Book III, the Trojans left the protection of their walls to meet the Greek forces camped outside. As they did, Helen stayed within, along with Priam, the king of Troy, who asks Helen about the various important Greeks. She tells him about Agamemnon, Odysseus, and Ajax the Greater, rambling on about some of their exploits. At one point, she says, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3ccec74355fa40299d375d29c28139be\">I myself, a helper in war, was marshalled among them on that day when the Amazon women came, men\u2019s equals.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ed743f39eb1c56ae4bcb4aad022e43cb\">\u2013 Iliad III.CLXXXIX<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7cbe60a13c4d9815a4d9cba6a8385840\">\u201cMen\u2019s equals\u201d doesn\u2019t really mean much. But Iliad Book VI might shed some further light on things. At this point, a Trojan ally named Glaukos tells of the adventures of one of his ancestors, Bellerophon, where he says, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d1a8307f69d9a96bf13ceace5af1ac7d\">He killed the Chimaira, obeying the portents of the immortals. Next after this he fought against the glorious Solymoi, and this he thought was the strongest battle with men that he entered; but third he slaughtered the Amazons, who fight like men in battle.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-69f7baca7f7351cd7b3412100fd16368\">\u2013 Iliad, VI.CLXXXIII-CLXXXVI<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8feabc787fddbd9b1307f2d5df89fa1f\">\u201cFight like men in battle\u201d gives us context on how the Amazons are men\u2019s equals \u2013 they\u2019re equals in combat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0f8eab06d535555b60c96a5e5cc7d2d4\">That doesn\u2019t give us anything more than Herodotus did, but it might be because these stories don\u2019t name any Amazons specifically, just as a group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a619ed910a35d3cc13909d88c6f9c322\">So, let\u2019s talk about some of the Amazons we know by name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5f53e0f838d53fcb41f3edb6d354c1f6\">Quintus Smyrnaeus gives us a long list of them. We don\u2019t know much about him specifically, other than that he\u2019s from Smyrna, he probably lived during the latter part of the 4<sup>th<\/sup> century CE, he had a son named Dorotheus who was also a poet, and his name is an onomatopoeia for when you spread peanut butter across a piece of toast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-039e53d33242fdf720739b19a3151ec2\">His work is called the Posthomerica, which picks up the story of the Trojan War after the Iliad ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a7d1ca93ea41dba113eb1a3de7bfcc1d\">A lot of cats don\u2019t realize this, but the Iliad isn\u2019t the story of the Trojan War. It\u2019s the story of a period of about 2 months, give or take, in the ninth year of the war. It was originally part of a larger epic cycle, most of which is now lost. But Quintus Smyrnaeus gives us a sort of abridged version of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-24e1accf7d5fe50edf49542d5be7df0c\">The Posthomerica picks up just after Hektor\u2019s funeral, which is where the Iliad ends. The Trojans are pretty miserable, since Hektor was their best guy and the Greeks still have Akhilles, their best guy, but then who should arrive but the Amazon queen Penthesilea and twelve of her best gals!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-999bcf15f5fa9696541c57aab5756437\">The daughter of Ares, Penthesilea had to leave her kingdom after accidentally killing her sister, Hippolyta, in a hunting accident \u2013 she threw her spear at a stag, but she missed real badly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e0f4cfdff78a471d327bd9e6c571afca\">And with her followed twelve beside, each one a princess, hot for war and battle grim, far-famous each, yet handmaids unto her: Penthesileia far outshone them all&#8230; Clonie was there, Polemusa, Derinoe, Evandre, and Antandre, and Bremusa, Hippothoe, dark-eyed Harmothoe, Alcibie, Derimacheia, Antibrote, and Thermodosa glorying with the spear.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5af571a0e7615a812e728818d377db7d\">\u2013 Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica I.XL<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b696035861d0981f42377115e1061d9c\">So there we go, the names of fourteen Amazon warriors \u2013 queen Penthesilea, her dearly departed sister, and her twelve companions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d32f366fe22c8d8efa4080c88bd48609\">None of these are masculine names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d9832b17cf2cfb9b20c6a05437455a0a\">There\u2019s another Posthomerica too, this one written by a 12<sup>th<\/sup> century CE Byzantine scholar named John Tztezes. If I had a nickel for every Posthomerica, etc. That\u2019s a whole lot later, though, getting into the later medieval era. His Posthomerica covers a similar period, and of course he mentions Penthesilea\u2019s arrival too, where he says, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-91e8a12bdd490865a9fd1ec53d8535ad\">There she came, Penthesilea, great-hearted daughter of Otrera the well-born, natural princess of the Amazons.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bb9b1c02260e3503c59c7bbd9cf5807a\">\u2013 John Tztezes, Posthomerica VIII.IX<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8041cb3e27b8b820299159da09b42234\">If you\u2019re interested in the Trojan War cycle but you\u2019ve not read these works before, I highly recommend them. They\u2019re a lot of fun. The Iliad, wonderful as it is, ends in a bit of an anticlimax \u2013 you know Troy will fall and Akhilles isn\u2019t going to survive the war, but at the end of the poem both are still standing. These Posthomericas help fill in the story, since they pick up right where Homer leaves off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d91a0685040e37366f0509ba33a5ee17\">Anyway, the first 200 lines or so of John Tzetzes\u2019 Posthomerica deal with Penthesilea\u2019s arrival, as well as her squad of bad bitches. Johnny boy talks a lot about how beautiful they all are, to the point where he has Eros and Ares fighting over Penthesilea because they\u2019re both in love with her. Yes, Ares, her father. Greek mythology is really weird for that sort of thing&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-25d550217028ebbbdea3295463b3cd71\">When she <em>is <\/em>compared to men, it\u2019s because she\u2019s described as being the equal to men in combat, that\u2019s all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-de625733e2fa564ad6900ced1ac644c7\">But after three days of Penthesilea and her squad slicing their way across the Greek forces, Akhilles shows up and kills them all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2dfa49d0eb86dfc5741cb689814b8e8f\">There Hippothoe fell, as well as Antianeira, and Toxophone died there and Toxoanassa, and beautiful Gortyessa, Iodoce and Pharetre, Andro, Ioxeia, Oistrophe and Androdaixa, with them Aspidocharme and Enchesimargos, Cnemis and Thorece, Chalcaor and Eurylophe, Hecate, Anchimache and Andromache the queen. All these great Amazon daughters fell there, leaders and queens; many and unspeakable were they.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3ded2c1cb52b3ac9a6a7f0e75cec6ec4\">\u2013 John Tztezes, Posthomerica CLXXVI-CLXXXIV<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-224c29615767d09b156a880e1eacf107\">Interestingly, that\u2019s an almost completely different set of names than what Quintus Smyrnaeus says, even though Johnny actually mentions Quintus at the beginning of his Posthomerica. Homeboy\u2019s gonna plagiarize, but it\u2019s okay because he mentioned the original, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3a5592dea9cac88dd2fd63882a9df58e\">(Please Hbomberguy don\u2019t send your weirdos after John Tzetzes he was doing his best okay?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-938a9762a0e651a78a991a48a943d1ce\">Only Hippothoe, whose name means \u201cfast like a horse\u201d, and of course Penthesilea, show up in both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-51086ba2cbde468c95abac8d6a8f2c16\">Now, this set of names does have \u201cAndro\u201d (\u0391\u03bd\u03b4\u03c1\u1f7c), which is literally just \u201cman\u201d or \u201cmannish.\u201d Think of the word \u201candrogyne\u201d \u2013 it\u2019s a portmanteau of \u201candro\u201d (man) and \u201cgunaikos\u201d (woman) \u2013 so an androgynous person is a person who displays characteristics of two sexes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e2bfdfe2e121b7ccfd479b1ff8eeb95a\">Seems like the smoking gun, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-426571b3050f6d299500c89d0a6a3c55\">Not necessarily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f6f06dbf3c97c71f1f35a7374e016ae0\">See, in John Tzetzes\u2019 work, he says Penthesilea showed up with more than just her squad. Quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6d030544d83521f974ad41319b308d69\">[S]he had with her many men of renowned Scythian archers and infantry and cavalry and war-loving men and women, whom she readily led and kindly loved. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5fe79d8255319b553d9b7e895481be85\">\u2013 John Tzetzes, Posthomerica XXIII-XXV<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4b77df6c9c908d18ca4b9a1153d92d08\">Johnny gives us a list of 20 names that Akhilles killed in the section I read a moment ago, and I\u2019m a historian not a mathtorian, but I\u2019m pretty sure 20 is more than 12. So it seems possible that Andro was <em>not<\/em> part of Penthesilea\u2019s squad, but was one of the Scythian archers of renown she brought with her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e9aaaa28c90635f10a94587706c094b5\">But even if that weren\u2019t the case, this name could also be read as not \u201cman,\u201d but rather \u201cmanly,\u201d in that she fought like a man. So, it doesn\u2019t quite fit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-02f28ab5a6a56296dc275b4f6910fc26\">So, what else we got?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0737e233d8ff1c19d41bf1b9a2c78dad\">Diodorus Siculus gives us a long list of Amazon names as well, describing how Herakles murdered a bunch of them while trying to get queen Hippolyta\u2019s magic belt. He sailed to their country, demanded the belt, and when they refused, he started slashing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a92fc8c6d5b54b74ff93fd2a5aea86eb\">Aella, Philippis, Prothoe, Eriboea, Celaeno, Eurybia, Phoebe, Deianeira, Asteria, Marpe, Tecmessa, Alcippe, Melanippe \u2013 Herakles butchered them all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-afbaadf954d2d8258ff4df8d77b54d97\">I guess he killed so many of them that he actually caused the Amazons as a culture to go extinct, and all because he liked the queen\u2019s belt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d8b70c68a660196b8e259b21d86a7823\">I\u2019m starting to see why he\u2019s such a hero in modern Western culture&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a134047890f170bbc4f2ba0d8bddbda3\">Anyway, the names. Oh my god the names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-77a541dbd7faf7b9db3cd5cf88cd41d4\">Let\u2019s take a look at what they all mean \u2013 all the ones we\u2019ve seen so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-38514fc4417390bf5da5d923f1d50166\">Aella means \u201cwhirlwind\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f50c1345a07b954891dd1634f18edd43\">Alcippe means \u201cstrong like a horse\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a5f2028383737b4adc79791347e29ab6\">Andro means \u201cman,\u201d though you could also say it means \u201cmanly\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-79121731c4c5e0e189fbe89d597e85b9\">Androdaixa means \u201ccleaving men asunder,\u201d geez<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-833d41ecdd3d8e24d532b78af101ff93\">Andromache means \u201cfights like a man\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b0ad40ae49fb0430ea3328a6db18132b\">Anchimache means \u201cfights up close\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8bd24d118d6c305b1246df8cc0c106af\">Alcibie means \u201cstrong and skilled\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-50057faa1b5c8f09706d6dfdb4057ee3\">Antandre means \u201copposes men\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0755993b50f5edfcb8f1a7311ca3f897\">Antianeira means \u201ca match for men,\u201d as in a match in combat<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-57e6cfad64d198d3bade97804c42d712\">Antibrote means \u201cequal of men,\u201d again in combat<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e79af7b1c8ccc4754e6e02d5701112c3\">Aspidocharme means \u201cbattle shield\u201d or perhaps \u201cplaster shield\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bda205648e675ca9bac791f419680c79\">Asteria means \u201cstar-like\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2a0d6bb7b25baa578ea4e72060f44448\">Bremusa means \u201cthunderous\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d09fd445b499d14bd32cdca60cd192cd\">Celaeno means \u201cdark one\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3e37e194129fd5f768884fe2a13b3847\">Chalcaor means \u201cbronze sword\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1fb9c210210f1ce8230cb44ecabb8626\">Cnemis is the name of either a mountain range or a single mountain near Phocis<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7f8e1197944159fae96126ab9a8c00f5\">Deianeira means \u201cman murderer,\u201d geez<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-97ccf1760e4b7790400f1acfffc72c69\">Derinoe means \u201cmind for battle\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c84e775e76803b2ab6c9c13836c68302\">Derimacheia means \u201cbattle fighter\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-08f6b6db505f6d13ee0b6a9db3b51874\">Enchesimargos means \u201ccrazed for the spear\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-185a406de00109200f82585830ad4cad\">Eriboea means \u201clots of cows,\u201d what?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-25e125ca4bac0ef50c08357ae7dca2f2\">Evandre means \u201cas good as a man\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8a89c41f2d83b3ffdb11f0d2c249465a\">Eurybia means \u201cfar strength\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-eeba7b5de0e3c768c118f8ad8914fb3c\">Eurylophe means \u201cbroad hill\u201d or \u201cbroad neck\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-be8b81be6705ce696f0946f1439f1244\">Harmothoe means \u201csharp spike\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-cc9e9220c9151930df85ffb02d3253a2\">Hecate means \u201cfar darting\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8ba1e300e6a405b7a17785e57cccc414\">Hippolyta means \u201creleaser of horses\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-67e9fd31a0bb5da2f0d968169c598c30\">Hippothoe means \u201cmighty like a horse\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-127875df6042aa21f9491c2b98f384f5\">Gortyessa means \u201cgirl from Gortyn,\u201d a town in Crete<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4c3ef7ba62140306463924da6794ed9a\">Iodoce means \u201carrow holder\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0d462ba674e3dd13c8fad111c9072269\">Ioxeia means \u201conslaught\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-361db1a9b9b2182f0403db2f6513eedb\">Oistrophe means \u201cwhirling arrow\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bcbf9a5000f43f824b59e9188efc29b1\">Otrera means \u201cquick\u201d or \u201cnimble\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-084a3cb38a05ee18950ecaa86c260e34\">Marpe means \u201cshe takes\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bcf09128041ee45d8ee982789c3d42e0\">Melanippe means \u201cblack horse\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0005453c34ad73004c7ea4a1fd4d3b44\">Pharetre means \u201cquiver girl,\u201d as in a quiver that holds arrows, not like a fraidycat<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ca5cacb9641dbeeee7fddcff993434a7\">Philippis means \u201chorse lover\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2311d743d5e9952e00f0a756ee368769\">Polemusa means \u201clady who makes enemies\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5542693b6eb1a52e499720b51fd3f1d8\">Phoebe means \u201cbright\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a2e7c6cc1a01476292a3270949024743\">Prothoe means \u201cswift\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-31704e8ae60c1227f57483a2765ab0a7\">Tecmessa means \u201csign reader\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-83f5b8367afecc21e02a64d9217b5699\">Thermodosa means \u201cgirl from Thermodon,\u201d a river in Boeotia near Thebes<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e9dbcc57d873a120635a5de104fbfb13\">Thorece means \u201cbreastplate\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-257c40845aad538f332805d9c5397a8f\">Toxoanassa means \u201cqueen of the archers\u201d<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4ffd5a6e7355132da7dfdbc49d6298cf\">Toxophone means \u201csound of an arrow\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-098686ff38ce928e9e46f346dc8e4ee6\">It\u2019s also worth noting that there are more Amazon names than just this \u2013 Adrienne Mayor lists more than 200 of them in the appendix of her book The Amazons, where I got many of these etymologies from. Some are in other sources, some are just names written on pottery. But the point here is not to create a catalog of Amazons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2f469b79bc3b1a43cf991b436292a306\">You can see some patterns though. A lot of these names are related to horses, archery, or combat. Makes sense \u2013 the Amazons were supposed to have been great archers and horse warriors. As well, a bunch of them are variations on \u201cI\u2019m as good as a man,\u201d but that isn\u2019t really referring to their being masculine \u2013 rather to their being competent warriors, and in a heavily patriarchal world, that\u2019s one way to do it, I guess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f0f7bff7c0a3c028d4abf29fe00a8df5\">Andro aside \u2013 and we already talked about why that name may be an outlier \u2013 I don\u2019t see any evidence suggesting warrior women adopted male names and male personas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-15c0e1f5bb56d27f9abf07846f41fe23\">That said, Hypsikrates may not have been an Amazon. In fact, scholar Margherita Facella believes the description Plutarch and Valerius Maximus give us is at odds with the idea Hypsikrates was an Amazon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9b9d784786a5cf6b1335eb86f9348e8a\">But he was from a similar region and was a horseback warrior, so maybe the difference doesn\u2019t really matter much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-15eea4828df5a3286b95286ff7cecd4e\">Even still, we can look at examples of other warrior women from the ancient world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-743512e60c5a417519fdacae84deb67a\">Artemisia I of Caria was queen of Halikarnassos in the 5<sup>th<\/sup> century BCE, during Xerxes\u2019 invasion of Greece. She sided with Xerxes, leading a fleet of ships, and was his only lady admiral. Xerxes highly revered her, since she often gave him great counsel. At one point, his other admirals were fleeing, while Artemisia had sunk an Athenian ship. That made Xerxes cry out \u201cmy men have behaved like women, my women like men!\u201d (Herodotus, Histories, VIII.LXXXVIII).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5430161e9c8a5c1a1befba7c117a2cae\">Clearly a badass. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0758aa564c62b6d979b652a68d4705ac\">But at no point does Xerxes call her, like, Artemisios or something silly like that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-925c3ea2f93dcd8d4587fab68606ab50\">Cynane was the half-sister of Alexander the Great, and fought on the front lines of the Macedonian army, like her brother. After Alexander\u2019s death, she fought with the rest of his former generals over his empire. She could have married any one of them, since that would have given them more legitimacy, but she didn\u2019t want to give up rule of Macedonia to someone other than her family. So instead, she decided to fight to the death. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-65580a93e35e7f9d409cb4b55ab0ac35\">But she wasn\u2019t referred to as like, Alexander\u2019s brother or whatever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-231ca5e10f8450e749929239778504fc\">There are tons of stories of warrior women, or women who disguised themselves as men to accomplish something, and I\u2019ve read a bunch of them, though certainly not all. It turns out that there\u2019s a lot of material that survives from the ancient world, and it\u2019s difficult to know about all of it. If I\u2019m missing something, leave a comment below, I\u2019d love to hear it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ea972e908cda387ad4bb47e3637ef995\">But I spent a lot of time looking, and reading, and researching, and other than Hypsikrates, I didn\u2019t find a single example of a woman who was so masculine that \u201cshe\u201d took on a man\u2019s name and a male persona.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2a24e283dd1a11c00eeb92cbb8e8f8b9\">No, Hypsikrates is an outlier here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-a89b3969 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link wp-element-button\" href=\"\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Support The Channel On Patreon<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-v-was-he-really-called-hypsikrates\">Chapter V: Was He Really Called Hypsikrates?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-93b8a6b3625e819e37078976b751cb8e\">A question you might find yourself wondering is whether Hypsikrates was a real person or not. After all, we have only Roman sources for his existence, and they wrote several decades after his death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-84a5bbfc4c7df360033dd5d2bb341801\">And even if he did exist, was he really called Hypsikrates?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bcbe587aaf55c3689647e55064bec157\">Maybe Hypsicrateia was just a warrior woman that Mithradates loved, and Plutarch just made the whole Hypsikrates thing up. Maybe that\u2019s the reason there seems to be no precedent for a warrior woman taking a man\u2019s name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bb2213ab7310715f8f4f7904922d8c6c\">But no, a pretty amazing archaeological find from the mid 2000\u2019s does give us definitive proof that Hypsikrates was a real person, and that his name <em>was<\/em> Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d4f8ac2163aa8e112ec955fc9a30f9c6\">Sometimes, it can be easy to forget the stories we read about in history are actual events that happened in actual places, and that we know the locations of most of those places. So it\u2019s not just a matter of opening up a dusty old book and taking their word for it \u2013 we often have physical evidence to back up their claims as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ffd5924e27a5bcbbedabce48d98e0afb\">Case in point \u2013 the city of Phanagoreia. As a refresher, it\u2019s where Mithradates\u2019 son Pharnaces sparked the rebellion that ended his father\u2019s long reign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a9759723ce758d616fd1ffab5e925d19\">Phanagoreia was rediscovered in the 18<sup>th<\/sup> century, and excavations began in earnest in the 19<sup>th<\/sup> century. I won\u2019t go into the details of it too much, mostly because most of the sources of it are in Russian, but there\u2019s a particularly interesting discovery we made in 2005 related to our boy Hypsikrates \u2013 the marble base of a monument built to honour him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-72be004991b85deeb6ea626e839f6e89\">It says, \u201cHypsikrates, wife of King Mithradates Eupator Dionysos, farewell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-35310a87e7ff8cc8647f5880db599933\">So, there you go. Hypsikrates was a real person, named Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-07c4d37f2868c3fd38aa47d10486d218\">But what\u2019s really telling there is that the carving says Hypsikrates \u2013 clearly a man\u2019s name \u2013 and then refers to him as a wife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-628ee1172bb891799623040bfbdc2e81\">What\u2019s going on here?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-016fd63ed379aa2b0a1336dae0a6ab0b\">Based on closer analysis, we can tell the carver who created this made mistakes along the way, and corrected them. In particular, the spacing between the words \u201cHypsikrates\u201d and \u201cwife\u201d are different than the precision spacing in the rest of the letters. As well, the first line isn\u2019t centred, and it raises up a bit at the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f1b4a98944cfe472d6a6a1fdc5e72961\">However, the rest of it suggests he would have been a highly skilled craftsman, and it\u2019s not like we can see any issues with the stone itself they\u2019d have to have carved around either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3f2605d19db73a466008de46e52dd824\">It\u2019s hard to believe they would have made, like, a typo or something \u2013 it takes a lot longer to carve a letter than to type one. And it\u2019s such a small inscription.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-475ac8e3bfc4c50a9cc3f222a6b0d3fb\">Oleg Gabelko does a deep dive into analyzing this piece, and suggests several possible conclusions. One particularly interesting idea for us today is that the carver might not have known how to refer to Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-87005c88cc520424fab4f87ef31de786\">The fact that it says \u201cfarewell,\u201d almost certainly means it was an epitaph \u2013 that it was created after the death of Hypsikrates. But it\u2019s the way the errors were corrected that suggest it was created during Pharnaces\u2019 rebellion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d045dfae666b6ef848fae7057bb00373\">Because look, there are two different ways to correct an error when you\u2019re carving in marble. The best option is to carve it flat and start from scratch. That gets rid of the mistake altogether, but of course it takes longer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f3bd5958afe7d7eeadb9ace3e3d12d2f\">The other is to fill in the mistake, then re-carve it. That\u2019s much quicker, but if it worked perfectly, we wouldn\u2019t be talking about it now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2868754e17bc3ee5594c070b3b9d0f54\">Mithradates was in Pantikapaion at the time and there was a rebellion going on, so they couldn\u2019t rightly consult with him on how best to deal with this carving. So, they did their best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0050dfeda5d7f469319b118dcbc28767\">So, what does this mean?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0611671282158e1f3a509a959e059a90\">First, that Hypsikrates\u2019 name, and his identity, were both public knowledge, not just the pet nickname Mithradates gave to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-090673dfe1ced14a7d7b371eb59776f6\">It tells us Hypsikrates survived the trek from the moonlight battle with Pompey at least until they reached Pantikapaion. And if Gabelko is right, he survived until the final days of Mithradates\u2019 reign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3314a70feaf877569221dd9e375c95bd\">Perhaps most importantly, it tells us that Hypsikrates was not just Mithradates\u2019 concubine, like Plutarch says, but his wife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8c6dbca25a737cfc15c895d18a1e56dd\">How do we square that with what we know of Hypsikrates?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b9fc48021fea56af360353b5a6d82757\">How can he dress like a man, take a male name, fight like a man, serve a masculine role, and yet be considered a wife?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-861b5d55b36e4c4cf55e4c7478aed62e\">Gender, gender roles, and how one was able to transgress them were all very much different in the ancient world compared to today. But at the same time, perhaps they\u2019re not so different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2048f589e7215a3bdfef25be47981b0a\">Some of the masculine descriptions of Hypsikrates can be hand-waved away as just having been a strong powerful woman in a heavily patriarchal society, but by no means all of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-01b8ca3abdffb252d88a9b6dc24dc328\">Perhaps, as much as was possible given his situation, Hypsikrates was expressing his true gender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5c100884e876c89e388bc6e86ed95697\">It\u2019s difficult to say for sure what was happening here. On one hand, Mithradates claiming a husband might have felt emasculating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3cef04ba207d427c449f1c79badb166d\">But Mithradates also claimed descent from Alexander, who was almost certainly what we might consider today to be bisexual \u2013 he had relationships with women, and had at least one son, probably more. But he seems also to have been quite taken with Bagoas, a Persian eunuch courtier and dancer. His most significant relationship, though, seems to have been with Hephaestion, a childhood friend and cavalry commander in the Macedonian military.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-50f65e447db0dd8c1a710ee005630a01\">But while most scholars today consider Alexander to have been bisexual, his relationship with Hephaestion is never openly acknowledged by contemporary historians. The closest we get is a quote from Pseudo-Diogenes \u2013 that means it\u2019s a piece attributed to Diogenes of Sinope, but he probably didn\u2019t write it. If you watched the video on the Scythian Enarei priestesses, we talked about Pseudo-Hippocrates, same idea. Anyway, this work is called the Cynic Epistles. It\u2019s a collection of letters written about cynic philosophy. Epistle 24 reads, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e467734b9d0bb24ea091b9674f2cd713\">\u201cTo Alexander, greetings. If you wish to become good and upright, throw aside the rag you have on your head and come to me. But you certainly cannot, for you are held fast by the thighs of Hephaestion\u201d \u2013 Pseudo-Diogenes of Sinope, Epistle XXIV<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e96a996196b106c67a3a98378c640b4c\">Oh myyy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c24b148f9462c9fc6335452f2d1f7ba0\">It seems wild to think about, but even for someone who conquered a pretty big chunk of the known world, the rules of gender and sexuality in ancient Greece still applied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6e6335094bd626756b4809d226a8926e\">In the ancient world, you weren\u2019t born a man. Rather, you earned your masculinity, and if you didn\u2019t perform it the way you were supposed to, you\u2019d be considered unmanly or effeminate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-bb0792a6c32fbd9d89c36a4cdf0f07c0\">Because in some ways, masculinity hasn\u2019t changed. If you\u2019re a man and you don\u2019t perform your masculinity the way toxic alpha male dude bros think you should, they\u2019ll call you a woman. Unless you\u2019re a trans woman, in which case, you\u2019ll never be a woman, you\u2019ll always be a man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-63628bae46646d102befd071ed604223\"><strong>FACTS AND LOGIC<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f9b4f3959c9c1b0c58d3f28e0b1ca781\">So even if Alexander proved his prowess in battle, more than just about any other Greek before or after, he might have still been seen as effeminate or weak for being into Hephaestion \u2013 especially if he was the bottom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8ae0e1dfae2f61440b38296461f9ba64\">But Hephaestion, in that situation, had a lot to lose too. It\u2019s not like he was just some femboy in Alexander\u2019s entourage \u2013 he was a military commander himself, and officially Alexander\u2019s second in command. At times, he led parts of the Macedonian military himself, so being seen as a <em>kinaidos<\/em> \u2013 an effeminate man \u2013 was not something Hephaestion could afford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-312b5b0736a5753e6bea94fa7abef410\">In the same way, Mithradates couldn\u2019t afford to be seen as such either, and nor could Hypsikrates. Effeminacy was clearly not in Hypsikrates\u2019 nature, and Mithradates doesn\u2019t seem to have had any relationships with men other than Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d2c87d70a16e6fee868dc3d196d51879\">And yes, women can be tops and men can be submissive and breedable, but in the ancient world, as today, that was associated with some unkind stereotypes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-ac24ee460825bbea338036dcbefe42c6\">In fact, one of the best sources we have on ancient homo stuff is a published speech by the Athenian orator Aeschines, called <em>Against Timarchus. <\/em>In it, he makes the argument that another Athenian, Timarchus, should be barred from politics because he prostituted himself to older men when he was younger. Even though Aeschines offered no actual evidence, it still worked \u2013 Timarchus was stripped of his political rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-f2dde4f37d3ed92dabd6d3a1a1db7720\">So there was a prejudice against bottoms \u2013 and really, is anybody surprised? We talked about this all the way back in the <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/SX-WHJeDgjQ?si=eO4aRR_8_QgtMBTj\">Elagabalus video<\/a>, where the emperor would have been hated not because of her fancying men \u2013 lots of Roman emperors did that \u2013 but because she was a bottom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6bbeb824504c347c3b0282d8bc6ef36c\">Back to Hypsikrates and Mithradates \u2013 had they both presented themselves as men, it would then naturally follow that one of them would have been viewed as the bottom, and for two people whose prowess in battle was one of the central elements of who they were, that would have been a problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-98e58ec3804a591c5c50e82d36a77696\">As a result, Hypsikrates might have continued to identify as Mithradates\u2019 wife, while adopting his masculine name and persona. This would strike a balance between allowing Hypsikrates to be himself, while still maintaining public personas that inspired strength and confidence in their subjects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1d554f939e5c180aa6f109f902852da2\">Is that an ironclad theory? No, it\u2019s not. The Sacred Band of Thebes, for example, was an elite group of Theban Hoplites. There were 300 of them, 150 pairs of lovers. The idea was that fighting alongside your lover would make you fight harder, and they certainly did. The rise of the Sacred Band coincided with the era of Theban Hegemony, 371 to 362 BCE, where Thebes was the top dog in Greece, not Sparta or Athens for once. And we know they weren\u2019t viewed as objects of scorn, at least not universally. Plutarch shares an anecdote about this in his Life of Pelopidas, one of the leaders of the Sacred Band:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2d267e900cd8a5b46bc4278fabd3d690\">It is said, moreover, that the band was never beaten, until the battle of Chaeroneia; and when, after the battle, Philip was surveying the dead, and stopped at the place where the three hundred were lying, all where they had faced the long spears of his phalanx, with their armour, and mingled one with another, he was amazed, and on learning that this was the band of lovers and beloved, burst into tears and said: &#8220;Perish miserably they who think that these men did anything disgraceful.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2c2ad4f641d2ec193363324f53da9f46\">\u2013 Plutarch, Life of Pelopidas, XVIII.IV-V<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3c0fa06f3a2fb331231a8cc62710f682\">So we can find examples of gay male soldiers admired for their prowess, but that seems like more of an exception than a rule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-82ba936ad04d201ffcbdfe9417cfa10c\">But even if this theory isn\u2019t true, I don\u2019t think it really matters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-249353d32d83aea4776041ef934c0af0\">Let\u2019s take Susan Stryker\u2019s definition of transgender in a historical sense, and compare it with Hypsikrates:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-2505f1c2de812da5ef60223e99f06371\">[P]eople who move away from the gender they were assigned at birth, people who cross over the boundaries constructed by their culture to define and contain their gender.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3ce344786a1fade595333b4f6c646323\">&#8211; Susan Stryker, Transgender History, Page 1<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-76de0517ae9dd35204fc6b64820b4927\">Hypsikrates fits the bill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"chapter-vi-the-fate-of-hypsikrates-and-a-possible-afterlife\">Chapter VI: The Fate Of Hypsikrates And A Possible Afterlife<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b05213fb3875b229d856efa4e5a46a5a\">I know somebody would be asking me about this if I didn\u2019t include it here, so I want to talk about one of the theories behind what ended up happening to Hypsikrates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e1dbbc5fff1b54ae329f3f459835e76c\">This idea was put forth by Adrienne Mayor, and I must stress this is not really considered by most credible historians to be a worthwhile theory. It relies far too much on some pretty big logical leaps. But it might be fun to think about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d26819b53dc04ef78630c9db97e17789\">The name Hypsikrates shows up only twice in the classical record for the 1<sup>st<\/sup> century BCE. One is the subject of this video, and another is a Pontic historian who appears during the conquests of Julius Caesar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c8d1c842590d3140054f32eb4157e805\">In 49 BCE, Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon river. This was significant because it marked the boundary between the Roman provinces of Italy and Cisalpine Gaul. Caesar had <em>imperium<\/em> in Cisalpine Gaul, which meant he was allowed to lead an army in that territory, but Roman law said that only elected officials \u2013 consuls and praetors \u2013 could hold<em> imperium<\/em> in Italy itself. By crossing the Rubicon, Caesar declared himself in open rebellion against the Roman state. This was a major gambit \u2013 if he\u2019d failed here, he\u2019d have been executed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e909dee9f8515cc1cb2ecadfd713553d\">That\u2019s where he said one of his most famous phrases: <em>ALEA IACTA EST \u2013 <\/em>the die is cast. There was no turning back after this point. <a href=\"#_msocom_15\">[SE15]<\/a>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9235efd21c45694146325ae5953fbe97\">The forces of the Republic, of course, resisted, led by none other than Pompey \u2013 the same Pompey who was such a thorn in the side of Mithradates years earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d55646237bac6bc2ae2541725608ba3d\">After several battles, Caesar defeated Pompey at the battle of Pharsalus, in northern Greece, in August of 48 BCE. Pompey managed to escape, where he fled to Alexandria. Caesar followed him there, hoping to capture his old friend and grant him clemency \u2013 that was kind of his thing. However, when Caesar arrived there three days after Pompey, he discovered he\u2019d been executed.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-08760e62f47ee9e0275320614ae7d625\">Eventually, word of Rome\u2019s civil war traveled east, landing upon the ears of none other than Pharnaces II, the son of Mithradates who\u2019d led the rebellion against his father that led to his death, and king of what was left of Pontus. Pharnaces took this opportunity to travel south, recapturing a significant chunk of his father\u2019s kingdom. In the process, he\u2019d defeated one of Caesar\u2019s legates, and captured a significant number of Romans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4c1f9013950eb01938c4a44d5d008207\">Following the death of Pompey, Caesar left Alexandria for Armenia to face Pharnaces. The two came to blows at the Battle of Zela in 47 BCE, and Pharnaces performed so poorly that the battle was only a few hours long and ended in a decisive, easy win for Caesar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a22671f551c6aaa5fcfd1a2bf15b6e73\">After, he said another of his famous phrases, which is about the most arrogant thing anybody has ever said: <em>VENI, VIDI, VICI. <\/em>I came, I saw, I conquered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a007b309c06a5d25dac713c14bd1ebf8\">And that about sums it up, honestly. Fantastic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-566d02609493f5f29cdb052650db77b6\">After, Caesar freed a number of prisoners of war, including someone named Hypsikrates, who accompanied Caesar after and wrote about his military exploits as well as the history of Pontus. I\u2019m going to refer to him as Hypsikrates of Amisus, as he\u2019s referred to in the literature, to avoid confusion. There\u2019s enough Mithradateseses, and now we\u2019ve got multiple Hypsicrateseseses, I\u2019m doing my best here y\u2019all!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-5a9d1034b3568d940910c93a4b870619\">None of Hypsikrates of Amisus\u2019 writings survive, but the geographer Strabo cites him in a couple of different places \u2013 notably, when talking about fortifications in the area around Mithradates\u2019 final capital, Pantikapaion, and in talking about the peoples who live around the Caucasus \u2013 all things <em>our<\/em> Hypsikrates would have known about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-24d640a87cfb7723a23eeae893972b4e\">In fact, Book XI, Chapter V of Strabo\u2019s Geographia specifically mentions that he\u2019s leaning on the expertise of Hypsikrates of Amisus when writing that section, as well as that of Metrodorus of Skepsis, who was himself a friend of Mithradates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d1a4584737a6e1f4c3ecbe6b98731554\">Hypsikrates of Amisus is also mentioned in a piece by<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9e6555beafe9b908e486cbab3b9cc812\">Aulus Gellius, in his Attic Nights. Specifically, he says, quote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-03bd564530b74bc96802425cb4cbe781\">[H]e declared that this was stated by Hypsicrates, a grammarian whose books on <em>Words Borrowed from the Greeks<\/em> are very well known.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-4b23b053d4dc05c3517004a8224f38ee\">\u2013 Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights XVI.XII<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b80e89af4566b863874c8d484473f724\">It\u2019s not unreasonable to imagine <em>our<\/em> Hypsikrates would have known a number of languages as well. After all, we know Mithradates was a polyglot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-873f40754166e2626f70f28b5cd39cbe\">Flavius Josephus also quotes Hypsikrates of Amisus when talking about Mithradates of Pergamon, YET ANOTHER Mithradates, and about Caesar\u2019s campaigns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-20134a0853d569a3a841b461f0863e9b\">One more \u2013 this one\u2019s from Pseudo-Lucian.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3903c3b38712251dd83d5c846ed28fb6\">Remember Lucian, from the last video? He was famous as a satirist, but the piece in question is called the Macrobii, and it\u2019s a dry, boring list of facts. As a result, modern scholars believe he probably didn\u2019t write it, but it survives as part of a collection of his works. So instead we say it was by Pseudo-Lucian, because that seems as good a name as any.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d61595db2e9b8764a085f7a6dfabaa89\">Anyway, he says:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-3-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-091ed5ebba442a49a372b044b742bb5b\">Hypsikrates of Amisus, the historian, who mastered many sciences, lived to be ninety two. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0f36453eb75c51f883a4bc1eab18ebb1\">\u2013 Pseudo-Lucian, Macrobii I.XXII<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-35d4439d5e73022bae1a31e9e8661f03\">Adrienne Mayor uses this vague, circumstantial evidence as proof that Hypsikrates of Amisus is, in fact, our Hypsikrates, who survived the fall of his lover and lived the rest of his life as a man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-e8d2356b876a3c1ad5591b060bd883fd\">And look, I\u2019d love for this to be true. But as it stands, the evidence available to makes this a pretty big logical leap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-a5d568955a24f3ed755429e3444f9a7a\">But just like with the <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/ABpT6e-KlOo?si=HPvFx2y1Ie-YJGRF\">Scythian Enarei priestesses<\/a> \u2013 remember them? The trans feminine priestesses of the goddess Atargatis who may have figured out a form of HRT using pregnant mare urine, 2500 years ago? Just like with them, there\u2019s no harm in daydreaming about what might have been.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-3d94ff1430b4b42da4f01b265b7887be\">But also just like with the Enarei, I don\u2019t think it matters whether or not this idea is true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8a91753171147038a503b68e1d8f74b7\">Because even if Hypsikrates didn\u2019t enjoy a second life as a grammarian and historian, his original life with Mithradates is clearly a transgender one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-9dac9d6ffb4a727d9c807b9bb40cf1cf\">Did Hypsikrates experience gender dysphoria? I have no idea, and the current evidence doesn\u2019t give us enough to say one way or another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-1ad103603c58bcd8ce480bd93883d800\">But Hypsikrates dressed as a man, took a male name, and did stuff men of the time would do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-cfa8be90b40c7089e6c8412d6058582d\">If that\u2019s not a transgender story, I don\u2019t know what is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-44025125f6ebd77b31187957540caa2c\">And for those following along at home, most scholars agree that Christ was crucified in either the year 30 or 33 CE, and had begun his ministry a few years prior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fb9b278a160069b4abaf8d2915d6cade\">What does that tell us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-c2289f1aeed49404d50991de9588ecb5\">It tells us that the transgender life of Hypsikrates predates Christ, and therefore, Christianity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-fe3a8950968e7f107597162d7f86f2e5\">I don\u2019t hate Christianity, I have a&#8230; complicated relationship with it. But those who hate us often do so in the name of Christ. They claim we\u2019re a new invention, a result of the woke mind virus or whatever, but the truth is we\u2019re older than their perverted vision of Christ.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-534b16b40e2086c14a3ba3c03e0958fc\">And Hypsikrates is one of the newer ones, relatively speaking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-96237b112eedfa6c3ea592ec7ebba688\">As Christ hung in agony on the cross, birthing a new religious movement, our existence was already ancient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-31034db3a6e1b1f3f5dbfc158bc633ab\">Because we have always existed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-6e5573c6e6e5d8e28cc37a67d485d631\">And so long as humanity continues to endure, so too shall we.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-a89b3969 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link wp-element-button\" href=\"\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Support The Channel On Patreon<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"ancient-sources\">Ancient Sources:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-0720779177e5edda67ad3e9fd941d5d1\">\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL300\/1950\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ammianus Marcellinus. History, Volume I: Books 14-19. Translated by J. C. Rolfe. Loeb Classical Library 300. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1950<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL004\/1913\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Appian. Roman History, Volume III: The Civil Wars, Books 1-3.26. Translated by Horace White. Loeb Classical Library 4. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1913<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL200\/1927\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Gellius. Attic Nights, Volume II: Books 6-13. Translated by J. C. Rolfe. Loeb Classical Library 200. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1927<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL032\/1914\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Dio Cassius. Roman History, Volume I: Books 1-11. Translated by Earnest Cary, Herbert B. Foster. Loeb Classical Library 32. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1914<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/search.worldcat.org\/title\/herodotus-histories\/oclc\/619342998\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Herodotus. \u201cHistories\u201d. Translated by George Rawlinson. Hertfordshire, Wordsworth Editions, 1996. <\/a><br>\u25baJohn Tzetzes. &#8220;Posthomerica&#8221;. translated by Ana Untila. 2014.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.attalus.org\/translate\/justin8.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Justin. &#8220;Epitome of Pompeius Trogus&#8217; Philippic Histories&#8221;, Translated, with notes, by Rev John Selby Watson. London: Henry G. Bohn, York Street, Convent Garden, 1853<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tertullian.org\/fathers\/photius_copyright\/photius_06bibliotheca.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Memnon. &#8220;History of Heraclea&#8221;. Translated by Andrew Smith, 2004<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/bim_eighteenth-century_polynuss-stratagems-of_polyaenus-of-lampsacus_1793\/page\/n1\/mode\/2up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Polyaenus. &#8220;Stratagems In War&#8221; Translated by R. Shepherd. London, George Nicol, 1793<\/a>. <br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/naturalhistoryof11855plin\/page\/n9\/mode\/2up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pliny The Elder. &#8220;Natural History, Vol. I&#8221;. Translated by John Bostock and H. T. Riley. Bohn&#8217;s Classical Library. London, Henry G. Bohn, 1855<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL245\/1931\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Plutarch. &#8220;Moralia, Volume III: Sayings of Kings and Commanders. Sayings of Romans. Sayings of Spartans. The Ancient Customs of the Spartans. Sayings of Spartan Women. Bravery of Women&#8221;. Translated by Frank Cole Babbitt. Loeb Classical Library 245. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1931<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL087\/1917\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Plutarch. &#8220;Lives, Volume V: Agesilaus and Pompey. Pelopidas and Marcellus&#8221;. Translated by Bernadotte Perrin. Loeb Classical Library 87. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1917<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/cynicepistlesstu0000unse\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pseudo-Diogenes. &#8220;The Cynic Epistles&#8221;. Translated and with an introduction by Abraham J. Malherbe. Missoula, Society of Biblical Literature, 1977<\/a>.<br>\u25baPseudo-Lucian. &#8220;Macrobii&#8221;. Translated by Andrew Smith, 2018.<br><a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/geographyofstrab07strauoft\/page\/n9\/mode\/2up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u25baStrabo. &#8220;Geographia&#8221;. Translated by Horace Leonard Jones. London, G. P. Putnam&#8217;s Sons, 1930<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.loebclassics.com\/view\/LCL492\/2000\/volume.xml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Valerius Maximus. <em>Memorable Doings and Sayings, Volume I: Books 1-5. <\/em>Edited and translated by D. R. Shackleton Bailey. Loeb Classical Library 492. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000<\/a>.<br>\u25baVirgil. &#8220;The Aeneid&#8221;. Translated by Robert Fagles. Toronto, Penguin Classics, 2006. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"modern-sources\">Modern Sources:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-palette-color-8-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7561661da54f20dfc93f2685c27d6161\">\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/392425490_Pompey's_Campaign_against_Mithradates\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Anderson, J. G. C. &#8220;Pompey&#8217;s Campaign against Mithradates&#8221; Journal of Roman Studies. 12 (1922): 99-105<\/a>. <br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.academia.edu\/8196770\/A_Neglected_Epithet_of_Mithridates_Eupator_ID%C3%A9los_1560_\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ballesteros Pastor, Luis. \u201cA Neglected Epithet of Mithridates Eupator (ID\u00e9los 1560).\u201d Epigraphica , vol. 76 (2014): 81\u201385<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.stockholmuniversitypress.se\/chapters\/19\/files\/21ae1d9d-e8ef-4863-8745-8a1e9b427a8c.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Bremner, Jan N. &#8220;Shamanism in Classical Scholarship: Where are We Now?&#8221; Horizons of Shamanism   (2016): 52-78<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/global.oup.com\/academic\/product\/the-scythians-9780198820123\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Cunliffe, Barry. \u201cThe Scythians.\u201d Oxford University Press, 2019<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/greekhomosexuali00dove_0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Dover, Kenneth James. &#8220;Greek Homosexuality&#8221;. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1989<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/transreads.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/2019-03-14_5c8adaf598629_domitilla-campanile-transantiquity-crossdressing-and-transgender-dynamics-in-the-ancient-world-1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Facella, Margherita. &#8220;Beyond Ritual: Cross-Dressing Between Greece And The Orient&#8221; TransAntiquity: Cross-Dressing and Transgender Dynamics in the Ancient World. Edited by Domitilla Campanile, Filippo Carla-Uhink, and Margherita Facella (2017): 108-120<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.academia.edu\/40415858\/A_Historical_and_Epigraphic_Commentary_on_Hypsicrateia_s_Epitaph_Ruthenia_Classica_Aetatis_Novae_A_Collection_of_Works_by_Russian_Scholars_in_Ancient_Greek_and_Roman_History_Ed_by_Andreas_Mehl_Alexander_Makhlayuk_and_Oleg_Gabelko_Stuttgart_Franz_Steiner_Verlag_2013_P_173_184\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Gabelko, Oleg. &#8220;A Historical and Epigraphic Commentary on Hypsicrateia\u2019s Epitaph&#8221;. Ruthenia Classica Aetatis Novae: A Collection of Works by Russian Scholars in Ancient Greek and Roman History \/ Ed. by Andreas Mehl, Alexander Makhlayuk and Oleg Gabelko (2013):173-184. Stuttgart, Franz Steiner Verlag<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/transreads.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/2019-03-14_5c8adaf598629_domitilla-campanile-transantiquity-crossdressing-and-transgender-dynamics-in-the-ancient-world-1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">La Guardia, Fiorella. &#8220;Aspects of Transvestism in Greek Myths and Rituals&#8221;. TransAntiquity: Cross-Dressing and Transgender Dynamics in the Ancient World. Edited by Domitilla Campanile, Filippo Carla-Uhink, and Margherita Facella (2017): 99-107<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/books\/paperback\/9780691150260\/the-poison-king\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Mayor, Adrienne. &#8220;The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, Rome&#8217;s Deadliest Enemy. Princeton University Press, 2009<\/a>. <br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.2307\/j.ctt7zvndm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Mayor, Adrienne. &#8220;The Amazons: Lives and Legends of Warrior Women across the Ancient World&#8221;. Princeton University Press, 2014. JSTOR<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/publication\/305752220_Making_Sense_of_Nonsense_Inscriptions_Associated_with_Amazons_and_Scythians_on_Athenian_Vases\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Mayor, Adrienne, John Colaruso, and David Saunders. &#8220;Making Sense of Nonsense Inscriptions Associated with Amazons and Scythians on Athenian Vases&#8221;. Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. 83 (2014):1-97<\/a>.<br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/blog.oup.com\/2022\/09\/unmanly-men-and-the-flexible-meaning-of-kinaidos-in-classical-antiquity\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Sapsford, Tom. &#8220;Unmanly Men and the Flexible Meaning of Kinaidos in Classical Antiquity&#8221;. Oxford University Press blog. 6 September, 2022<\/a>. <br>\u25ba<a href=\"https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/romanforeignpoli0000sher\/page\/n5\/mode\/2up\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Sherwin-White, Adrian Nicholas. &#8220;Roman Foreign Policy In The East&#8221;. London, Duckworth Press, 1984<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\"><a id=\"_msocom_1\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gather \u2018round, friends. Let me tell you a tale. Mithradates VI Eupator, the mighty king of Pontus, who, faced with the ever-growing shadow of Rome, stood fast against their hegemony, who year after year, decade after decade, endured both spectacular victory and crushing defeat, who saw his domain expand to dominate all of Asia Minor, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[190,186,189,187,4],"tags":[144,121,156,150,153,152,155,148,138,134,136,149,113,117,154],"class_list":["post-536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trans-men-in-history","category-transgender-archaeology","category-transgender-historical-individuals","category-transgender-history","category-we-have-always-existed","tag-ancient-history","tag-ancient-rome","tag-classical-history","tag-eunuch-documentary","tag-eunuch-history","tag-history-of-eunuchs","tag-lgbt-ancient-history","tag-lgbt-history","tag-roman-empire","tag-roman-empire-history","tag-trans-history","tag-transgender-ancient-history","tag-transgender-history","tag-transgender-history-documentary","tag-transgender-roman-history"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Hypsikrates, The Transgender Spouse Of Mithradates - Sophie Edwards<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sbedwards.co\/staging\/9372\/hypsikrates-the-transgender-spouse-of-mithradates\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hypsikrates, The Transgender Spouse Of Mithradates - Sophie Edwards\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Gather \u2018round, friends. 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