A female warrior on the battlefield.
花木蘭 (화목란) means A woman warrior who went to war in place of her father.. amazon means A woman warrior; a strong woman.. East Asian idiom and Western myth mirror the same human truth.
The Meeting
In Greek myth there was a tribe of woman warriors who lived apart from men, formed their own people, and drew the bow; in East Asia there was Hua Mulan, the filial daughter who disguised herself as a man in place of her aged father and rode the battlefields for twelve years. One was a tribe that refused men; the other, a daughter who had to become a man. Yet both posed the same question — may a woman not stand upon the field of war?
Western Myth — The Bow-Drawing Tribe of Woman Warriors: The Amazons
The Amazons were a tribe of woman warriors in Greek myth. They were said to dwell north of the Black Sea or on the Scythian plains, and to be descended from Ares, god of war. They did not live with men; sons born to them were sent away, and only daughters were raised. From childhood every woman trained in archery, horsemanship, and spear-throwing. According to Herodotus, they removed the right breast to draw the bow more freely — and one theory traces the etymology of 'Amazon' to the Greek 'a-mazos' (without a breast). The Amazon queen Penthesilea died fighting Achilles in the Trojan War, and another queen, Hippolyte, had her girdle taken in one of the twelve labors of Heracles. The word 'amazon' entered English in the 14th century and gradually broadened to mean a strong, independent woman. In the 1500s, when Spanish explorers discovered a mighty river in South America, they reported encountering a tribe like woman warriors, and so they gave the river the name Amazon.
The crucial point is that the Amazons were not merely women but women who built their own society outside the society of men. They did not challenge patriarchy; they were a tribe that rejected patriarchy altogether. And so, in Greek myth, war against the Amazons was a mythic rite of taming a presence that threatened the established order. It is no coincidence that Heracles, Theseus, and Achilles all fought an Amazon queen.
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Oxford English Dictionaryamazon etymology entry.
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Etymonlineamazon word origin.
Eastern Tale of Filial Piety — Hua Mulan, Who Went to War in Place of Her Father
Hua Mulan (花木蘭) is a legend of filial piety first recorded during China's Northern and Southern dynasties (5th-6th century). The oldest source is the yuefu poem the Ballad of Mulan, handed down for more than fifteen hundred years. In the Northern Wei period, to meet the invasion of the Xiongnu, the emperor commanded that each household send one man to the army. Mulan's father was already old, and her younger brother was a child. Mulan resolved: I will go in his place. She cut her hair, disguised herself as a man, took her father's armor and horse, and rode the battlefields for twelve years. After twelve years, when the war ended and the emperor sought to grant her high office, Mulan declined and asked only to be allowed to return to her hometown. When she came home, changed into her old clothes, and greeted her comrades, the companions who had fought beside her for twelve years were astonished to realize, only then, that she was a woman. The Ballad of Mulan closes with the famous lines: when two hares run side by side, who can tell which is the buck and which the doe?
If the Amazons were women who refused men, Hua Mulan was a woman who had to become a man. The Amazons built their own society outside patriarchy, but Mulan had to disguise herself as a man, within patriarchy, for the sake of filial piety (孝). And yet that closing image of the hares is powerful — when they run, none can tell which is male and which is female. That is to say, ability is not divided by sex.
Where the Mirrors Meet — Where the Two Myths Converge
Both share the common theme of the woman warrior on the battlefield.
The amazon, in Greek myth, and Hua Mulan, in East Asian tradition, captured the same human truth.
Both live on in everyday language. 'Amazon' is still used in English, and Hua Mulan in Korean.
Yet their modes of expression differ. The West posed the same question through an entire tribe; the East, through the story of a single filial daughter.
Mnemonic — One Line to Take Home
- ✓ amazon = derived from the Amazons. A woman warrior; a strong woman.
- ✓ 花木蘭 = a woman warrior who went to war in place of her father.
- ✓ Remember it all at once: 'amazon' and Hua Mulan — two different civilizations telling the same story.
"Myths never die. They still breathe today, alive within 'amazon' and Hua Mulan."
