• Puabi

    Puabi

    There's bling and then there's bling. And then there's Queen Puabi (ca. 2600 BCE). When Leonard Woolley excavated her tomb at Ur in the 1920s, the world gasped. So much gold! So many jewels! Her ...

  • Queen of Sheba

    Queen of Sheba

    The Queen of Sheba (ca. 950 BCE?) is claimed by both Ethiopia and Yemen. It’s not impossible that both are right; the ancient realm of Saba (Sheba) may have spanned the Red Sea. Or perhaps she was ...

  • Queen Victoria

    Queen Victoria

    Queen Victoria (1819-1901) was the longest-ruling female monarch in history. We often think of her as the elderly widow of her later years, but the movie "The Young Victoria" reminded us that she ...

  • Razia Sultan

    Razia Sultan

    Razia Sultan (1205–1240) was the first female Muslim ruler in South Asia. Remembered as a brilliant general and politician, she reigned as the fifth Sultan of Dehli from 1236 to 1240. The ...

  • Rita Hayworth

    Rita Hayworth

    Rita Hayworth (1918-1987) was born Margarita Carmen Cansino, the daughter of a professional flamenco dancer from Spain. Trained as a dancer herself, she started out in Hollywood doing bit parts. ...

  • Sappho

    Sappho

    Sappho (ca. 620-570 BCE) was the world's first great love poet, composing lyrics of astonishing power and immediacy. The Greeks considered her the greatest of all the lyric poets; it's a tragedy ...

  • Sojourner Truth

    Sojourner Truth

    Sojourner Truth (1797-1883) was one of America's greatest heroines. Born into slavery in New York, she became a powerful voice for abolition and women's rights. Her most famous ...

  • Sor Juana

    Sor Juana

    In the relentlessly patriarchal society of New Spain, there was no place for a girl genius. Juana Inés de la Cruz (1648–1695) was a prodigy: she could read and write by the age of three, was ...

  • Susan B. Anthony

    Susan B. Anthony

    Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906) devoted her life to the cause of women's suffrage, toiling for over 50 years in the face of incredible opposition (not to mention ridicule). As the de facto "Napoleon" ...

  • Themistoclea

    Themistoclea

    The Greeks considered Pythagoras the "father of philosophy." He taught a system of natural science, mathematics, and ethics that profoundly influenced the Western canon. Ah, but who taught ...

  • Tin Hinan

    Tin Hinan

    Tin Hinan (4th century) was the legendary queen of the Tuareg people, the matrilineal desert-dwelling Berbers who are famous for their blue clothing---and for the fact that it's their men, rather ...

  • Tomyris

    Tomyris

    Tomyris (6th century BCE), the warrior queen of the Massagetae, was the woman who defeated and killed Cyrus the Great. In revenge for Cyrus's trickery and the death of her son, Tomyris led her ...