Tag: warrior

A similar but more dramatic link of status and service is evident in the study of the warrior women of the 18th and 19th century African kingdom of Dahomey. The “Dahomey Amazons”, a corps of exclusively female, musket-armed, superbly drilled warriors, present perhaps the most notable example of women being used in warfare. These soldiers originated around 1725 as royal palatial guards, drawn from the least delicate and most physically robust of the king’s thousands of royal wives. A number of circumstances contributed for these women’s selection as palace guards rather than mere concubines. As personal consorts of the king, royal wives were utterly loyal, and since African social tradition forbade men from inhabiting the king’s royal quarters, women took the role instead. The physical robustness of these West African women and a consistent lack of military aged males due to war and the slave trade led to the employment of two to five thousand female bodyguards at any one time after 1725. Increasingly comprehensive drill and training transformed this royal bodyguard into an offensive combat force over the next five decades, which Dahomean king Gezo employed successfully against neighboring African tribes like the Mahi, Yoruba and Oyo. The amazon regiments came to constitute the elite soldiers of Dahomey, often outperforming the Dahomean men on the field of battle. Due to their proximity to the authoritarian king and impressive military prowess, the amazons were endowed with remarkably high social status, above that of most men of the kingdom, a social reversal seldom seen in West Africa. This connection of military service and social status helped secure more recruits to replace the amazon’s losses in battle. The amazons’ legacy might have endured longer had the French not attacked the Kingdom of Dahomey in 1890. The far better equipped Imperial French Army decimated the Dahomean army and conquered the kingdom, dispersing the remnants of the female regiments.