Representations of Semiramis from Antiquity to the Medieval Period

Victoria Eileen Worrall

Bachelor of Arts (Hons. I)

A thesis submitted for the degree of Master of Philosophy at

The University of Queensland in 2019

School of Historical & Philosophical Inquiry

 Abstract

The traditions surrounding Semiramis, the Babylonian Queen, are as rich as they are diverse. At different
times and places, differing social, economic, political, and religious circumstances have combined to
create a variety of versions of Semiramis to suit numerous agendas. Therefore, we do not see one singular
canonical tradition on the Queen but a multifaceted version in which her story is transmitted, refracted,
and distorted by numerous hands.

Running through this multiplicity of images are continual concern about Semiramis’ identity as ruler and
her position as an Oriental queen. Images of Semiramis are highly conditioned by discourses relating to
the East and normative expectations about gender. This thesis identifies three main themes in Semiramis’
tradition: sexual excess, ability at monumental construction, and success in military exploits. Each
chapter assesses the main literary trends supplemented with a case study. The first chapter on sexual
excess establishes that there is a long tradition of the Western imaginary associating the Oriental East as
sexually promiscuous. This manifests in the sexualized image of Semiramis apparent in our sources,
particularly with later charges of incest examined in the case study. Chapter Two, on monumental
construction, demonstrates that strong Orientalist clichés and literary tropes are entrenched in the
traditions of the Queen and are further reinforced by the tomb story. In contrast, the military
representations of Semiramis, examined in Chapter Three, vary greatly. When mentioned in relation to
Alexander the Great she is often a triumphant expansionist, whilst other sources use this representation
as evidence of her despotism which is exacerbated by Late Antique sources as bloodthirstiness. However,
in the Medieval sources these ideologies become characteristic of masculine strength and good
sovereignty, evident in the revolt story. These receptions of Semiramis not only reflect the changes in
the debates on woman, power, and female sexuality, but also academic Zeitgeist.

i
 Declaration by author

This thesis is composed of my original work, and contains no material previously published or written
by another person except where due reference has been made in the text. I have clearly stated the
contribution by others to jointly-authored works that I have included in my thesis.

I have clearly stated the contribution of others to my thesis as a whole, including statistical assistance,
survey design, data analysis, significant technical procedures, professional editorial advice, financial
support and any other original research work used or reported in my thesis. The content of my thesis is
the result of work I have carried out since the commencement of my higher degree by research
candidature and does not include a substantial part of work that has been submitted to qualify for the
award of any other degree or diploma in any university or other tertiary institution. I have clearly stated
which parts of my thesis, if any, have been submitted to qualify for another award.

I acknowledge that an electronic copy of my thesis must be lodged with the University Library and,
subject to the policy and procedures of The University of Queensland, the thesis be made available for
research and study in accordance with the Copyright Act 1968 unless a period of embargo has been
approved by the Dean of the Graduate School.

I acknowledge that copyright of all material contained in my thesis resides with the copyright holder(s)
of that material. Where appropriate I have obtained copyright permission from the copyright holder to
reproduce material in this thesis and have sought permission from co-authors for any jointly authored
works included in the thesis.

ii
Publications included in this thesis
No publications included.

Submitted manuscripts included in this thesis

No manuscripts submitted for publication.

Other publications during candidature

No other publications.

Contributions by others to the thesis

No contributions by others.

Statement of parts of the thesis submitted to qualify for the award of another degree
No works submitted towards another degree have been included in this thesis.

Research Involving Human or Animal Subjects

No animal or human subjects were involved in this research.

iii
 Acknowledgements

First of all, I would like to thank my supervisor Professor Alastair Blanshard for his exceptional guidance
an unwavering support throughout the process of this thesis. My thesis definitely would not be at its
current state without you. I would also like to thank my secondary supervisor, Janette McWilliam, for
alerting me to some very useful scholarship that helped shape my thesis.

I am also grateful for the informed opinion of Christian Djurslev, fellow Semiramis enthusiast, who
helped me realise what exactly I had in front of me. I look forward to reading your upcoming publication.

To my friends and peers at UQ (and ex-UQ), my warmest appreciation for your supportive environment.
To Amy and Nile, my sincerest gratitude for your endless support, laughter, cynicism, and, at times,
tissues. I am truly thankful for your friendship and being such a strong support system throughout some
hard times. Also, Nile, thanks for putting up with me being very vocal about my constant cold extremities
and hunger.

A special thanks to everyone that proof read this thesis. I am gratefully indebted to your valuable (and
often comical) comments and feedback on this thesis… or with the case of my mother her sympathies
for Semiramis. “Yes mum, I’m sure Semiramis could have sued for defamation.”

To my family—for their support, formatting, and “How to Get Your Thesis Done 101” tutorials. Lastly,
Sonny, thank-you for reminding me of the big picture.

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Financial support
This research was supported by an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship.

Keywords
Semiramis, reception, orientalism, babylon, historiography, gender, greco-roman, late antiquity,
medieval.

v
Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classifications (ANZSRC)

ANZSRC code: 210306 Classical Greek and Roman History

Fields of Research (FoR) Classification

FoR code: 2103, Historical Studies, 100%

vi
 Table of Contents
Abstract ...................................................................................................................................................... i

Declaration by author ................................................................................................................................ ii

Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................................. iv

Table of Figures ....................................................................................................................................... ix

List of Abbreviations ................................................................................................................................ x

INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................... 1

CHAPTER ONE ..................................................................................................................................... 5

Part One: Sexual Excess ..................................................................................................................... 5

Mesopotamia and Sex ....................................................................................................................... 6

The First Tradition .......................................................................................................................... 11

The Second Tradition ...................................................................................................................... 19

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 27

Part Two: Incest ................................................................................................................................ 29

Semiramis’ Incest in the Greco-Roman Sources ............................................................................ 31

Semiramis’ Incest in the Late Antique and Christian Sources........................................................ 35

Semiramis’ Incest in the Medieval Period ...................................................................................... 38

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 47

CHAPTER TWO .................................................................................................................................. 48

Part One: Monumental Construction ............................................................................................. 48

Semiramis’ Building Programme: Babylon and Beyond ................................................................ 49

Oriental Decadence ......................................................................................................................... 50

Controlling Nature: Hydraulics and Masonry................................................................................. 61

The Legacy of Semiramis ............................................................................................................... 67

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 68

Part Two: The Tomb of Semiramis ................................................................................................. 69

Herodotus on the Tomb of Nitokris ................................................................................................ 71

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 The Legacy of Herodotus’ Tomb Story .......................................................................................... 75

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 80

CHAPTER THREE .............................................................................................................................. 83

Part One: Military Exploits ............................................................................................................. 83

The Sources: Cleitarchus and Diodorus .......................................................................................... 84

The Narrative of Diodorus Siculus ................................................................................................. 85

Semiramis’ Ambition and Greed .................................................................................................... 86

Military Skills of Semiramis ........................................................................................................... 90

Semiramis and Alexander ............................................................................................................... 91

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................... 95

Part Two: The Revolt Story ............................................................................................................. 97

Rhodogyne and Semiramis ........................................................................................................... 101

Semiramis and the Revolt Story: Medieval Period ....................................................................... 114

Conclusion .................................................................................................................................... 123

CONCLUSION.................................................................................................................................... 124

Bibliography.......................................................................................................................................... 127

Ancient Sources ................................................................................................................................ 127

Medieval Sources .............................................................................................................................. 129

Modern Works .................................................................................................................................. 130

viii
 Table of Figures

Figure 1. Bronze relief of King Esarhaddon and Queen Mother Naqi’a, 681-669 BCE. Lourve, 2
Paris. AO 20185
Figure 2. Burney relief, otherwise known as Queen of the Night, Babylon c. 19th-18th cent. BCE. 7
BM 2003,0718.1.
Figure 3. Britney Spears, “Everytime” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YzabSdk7ZA 7

Figure 4. Clay plaque depicting a copulating couple drinking beer, Babylon c. 2000 BCE. The 8
Israel Museum 87.160.0743.
Figure 5. Stone mosaic pavement of Ninus and Semiramis, ca. 200 A.D. Princeton University 19
Art Museum: y1937-264.
Figure 6. Johann Zainer der Ältere’s illustration accompanying of Heinrich Steinhöwl’s 30
translation of Giovanni Boccaccio’s De claris mulieribus [c. 1474], Signatur B-561,1:
Rar. 704, b2a.
Figure 7. Portrait of Semiramis holding a chastity belt, Hartmann Schedel, Nuremburg Chronicle 44
(Nuremberg: Anton Koberger, 1493), fol. 29r. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek,
Rar. 287, fol. 29r.
Figure 8. Glazed brick relief of lion, 605-562 BCE Babylon. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 55
Vorderasiatisches Museum, VA Bab 4376.
Figure 9. Glazed brick relief of lion, 605-562 BCE Babylon. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 55
Vorderasiatisches Museum, VA Bab 4376.
Figure 10. Sculptured relief from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal (668-631 BC) at Nineveh in 56
northern Iraq. BM 124939,a.
Figure 11. Behistun Inscription, relief with inscription. 67

Figure 12. Maarten van Heemskerck, 1572, engraving by Philips Galle, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in 70
the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen Dresden. 5601.101:7.
Figure 13. A close up of the statue of Semiramis in front of the tomb. Philips Galle, 1572, Maerten 72
van Heemskerck, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the
Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden.
5601.101:7.
Figure 14. Manta, castle, sala baronale, north wall the Nine Worthies and Female Worthies (photo: 92
Fratelli Alinari, Florence)
Figure 15. Nine Worthies depicted on the west to north walls of the sala baronale at the Castello 97
della Manta, Manta, Italy.
Figure 16. Female Worthies depicted on the north to east walls of the sala baronale at the Castello 97
della Manta, Manta, Italy.

Figure 17. Semiramis depicted on the north wall of the sala baronale at the Castello della Manta, 99
Manta, Italy.
Figure 18. ‘Queen Semiramis with Attendants’. Tapestry. Flemish, Tournai c. 1480. Wool, silk; 121
tapestry weave. Honolulu Museum of Art.
Figure 19. A close-up of the details of Semiramis’ face and hair. 121

ix
 List of Abbreviations
Standard References:

ABL R. F. Harper, Assyrian and Babylonian Letters, (Chicago, IL: Chicago

University Press, 1914-)

ARAB Ancient Records of Assyria and Babylonia, Vol. 1 and 2, Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press, 1926/7

BM British Museum

FGrH F. Jacoby, Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker (Berlin and Leiden,
1923-)

MLLM Mediae Latinitatis lexicon minus eds. J.F. Niermeyer & C. van de Kieft
rev. von J.W.J. Burgers, 2002

MET Metropolitan Museum of Art

OLD Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012

Sources:
All sources have been abbreviated according to the Oxford Classical Dictionary fourth edition, except
for the following:

Agathangelos
Agath. History of the Armenians

Anonymous
ADM Tractatus de mulieribus claris

Asser
Asser. Al. Life of Alfred

Claudian
Claud. Eutr. Against Eutropius

Christine de Pizan
De Piz. Le Livre. Le Livre de la Cité des Dames or Book of the City of the Ladies
De Piz. Paix. Livre de paix or The Book of Peace

Constantine of Manassess
Const. Man. The Chronicle

Dante Alighieri
x
Dant. Inf. Inferno

Eustache Deschamps
Desch. Balade

Flugentius
Fulg. De aetatibus. On Ages of the World and of Man

Geoffrey Chaucer
Chauc. PF. Parlement of Foules
Chauc. MLT. Man of Law’s Tale

Gilgamesh Epic
GE

Giovanni Boccaccio
Bocc. FW. De mulieribus Claris or Famous Women
Bocc. Tes. Teseida
Bocc. De cas. De casibus illustrium virorum

John Lydgate
Lydg. Fall. Fall of Princes

John Malalas
Joh. Mal. Chronicle

Laurent de Premierfait
De Premierfait. Des cas des nobles hommes et femmes.

Michael the Great

Michael Syrus. Chron. Chronicle

Moses Khorenats‘i
Mos. Khor. History of the Armenians

Old English Orosius

OE Seven Histories Against the Pagans

Petrarch
Petr. De vir. De viris illustribus
Petr. Sine nom. Sine nomine
Petr. TL. Triumph of Love
Petr. TF. Triumph of Fame

xi
 INTRODUCTION

The traditions surrounding Semiramis, the Babylonian Queen, are as rich as they are diverse. At different
times and places, differing social, economic, political, and religious circumstances have combined to
create a variety of versions of Semiramis to suit numerous agendas. Therefore, we do not see one singular
canonical tradition on the Queen but rather we see her being represented in a variety of ways, often in
contrast to each other: timid and virtuous, yet brazen and disreputable; ingenious and ambitious, but
avaricious and insatiate. Over time her story has been transmitted, refracted, and distorted by numerous
hands.

Despite the rich traditions surrounding the Queen, the majority of past scholarship has focused on
recovering Semiramis’ ‘historical’ equivalent.1 Today, modern scholarship generally accepts the
identification of the ‘historical’ Semiramis as the Neo-Assyrian regent, Sammu-ramat, and to a lesser
extent, the figure of Naqi’a.2 Hildegard Lewy in 1952 first argued that later sources, such as Diodorus
Siculus, blended the two historical queens together, and as a result, presented one single legendary
personage.3 The historicity of Semiramis was then revised by scholars over half a century after Lewy’s
publication, most comprehensively by Stephanie Dalley. In Semiramis in History and Legend (2005),
Dalley expanded upon Lewy’s argument explaining that the confusion between names was typical within
the ancient Sumerian tradition. Dalley then added more archaeological and literary evidence to justify
these claims over the course of two later publications, The Greek Novel Ninus and Semiramis (2013) and
The Mystery of the Hanging Garden of Babylon (2013).

Links to these two historical figures have been suggested due to their association with construction,
politics, and on occasion military deeds, which we find echoed in our sources on Semiramis. Sammu-
ramat (c.850-c.790-785 BCE) had an unprecedented active role in the political and military spheres
during the reigns of her husband, Shamshi-Adad V and son, Adad-nirari III. Inscriptional evidence lists
the Queen accompanying her son on campaign to modern-day Aleppo, and another inscription on two
dedicatory statues records her involvement in the construction of a new temple to the god Nabu at
Nimrud.4 Similarly, there is ample evidence demonstrating that the historical Naqi’a (c.730-668 BCE),

1
See Lehmann-Haupt 1910; Eilers 1971; Capomacchia 1986; Pettinato 1988; Comploi 2000.
2
Pettinato 1988: 309-310.
3
Lewy 1952: 265.
4
BM 118888; BM 118889; Grayson 1996: 226-227.
1
otherwise known as Zakutu, exerted extraordinary authority in the Neo-Assyrian court under the reign
of her husband Sennacherib, her son Esarhaddon, and grandson Ashurbanipal.5 These sources record that
she made numerous donations, restored temples, and constructed a palace in Nineveh.6 We also have a
visual representation of Naqi’a with her son in a bronze sculpture from Hillah near Babylon that
commemorates the rebuilding of Babylon and the return of exiled gods after the city had been razed in
689 BCE by Sennacherib (Figure 1).7 The inclusion of females in any public monument was extremely
rare and as such the evidence of Naqi’a and Sammu-ramat’s involvement in these affairs demonstrates
their powerful position and exceptional status.8

Figure 1. Bronze relief of King Esarhaddon and Queen Mother

Naqi’a, 681-669 BCE. Lourve, Paris. AO 20185.

While this thesis takes notice of this previous scholarship, it is primarily interested in Semiramis’
constructed image rather than the reality. However, in comparison to other female figures there has been

5
See Melville 1994; Svärd 2015: 40-48; Svärd 2016: 129.
6
ABL 114, 348, 368, 569.
7
Kalensky 2005.
8
Dalley 2013: 121-122.
2
little comprehensive analysis of the reception of Semiramis throughout history.9 The most exhaustive
analysis has been produced by Alison Beringer in The Sight of Semiramis: Medieval and Early Modern
Narratives of the Babylonian Queen (2016). This book looks at the visual communication, acts of seeing
and being seen, in the narrative of Semiramis. It is limited in scope, focusing on the German Meisterlieder
of the Late Middle Ages, meaning that the analysis of the Greco-Roman tradition is essentially subsidiary
and lacks contextualisation. Other works only briefly examine traditions relating to the Queen. Julia
Asher-Greve’s article ‘From “Semiramis of Babylon” to “Semiramis of Hammersmith”’ (2007) briefly
summarises the changes in reception of Semiramis from Antiquity to the twentieth-century. However, its
aim is not to explain these changes so much as to demonstrate how there has been an aversion for
Assyriologists to incorporate feminist critique and methodologies of gender studies into their work,
reluctance to research women’s history in general, and a lack of acknowledgment of the influence of
Orientalism in the field area. Other works on Semiramis with broad scopes exhibit similar limitations.
For example, Irene Samuel’s 1944 article ‘Semiramis in the Middle Ages’, which is frequently cited for
the Late Antique and Medieval periods, argues (incorrectly) that a sexualised Semiramis was the
conception of the Queen and was a unique invention of these periods.10 As such, these periods are in dire
need of revision and re-examination.

This thesis will analyse how Semiramis is constructed in literature and visual sources from Antiquity
until the fifteenth-century and aims to fill in these gaps and correct the inaccuracies perpetuated by past
scholarship on the Babylonian Queen.11 As previously stated, the traditions surrounding Semiramis vary
greatly. However, three main themes can be identified: sexual excess, ability at monumental construction,
and success in military exploits. These three main themes form the basis of the chapters of this thesis and
are divided into two parts, an overview of the main trends in the literature followed by a case study that
examines in detail how these trends apply to one particular motif. As demonstrated by Charles
Martindale, a pioneer of classical reception studies, ancient texts and figures do not remain static or
untouched as they are passed along in the Classical Tradition. Instead, they are pliable and
impressionable, reaching us in a complex state—a farrago of fact and myth—constructed by the chain of
receptions that are very different from their original condition.12 As such, in order to understand how

9
See for instance, Lucy Hughes-Hallet (1990) and Mary Hamer’s (1993) works on the reception of Cleopatra as well as Heike
Bartel and Anne Simon’s (2010) edited book on Medea.
10
Publication re-examining Semiramis in the Late Antique period by Christian Djurslev is forthcoming.
11
Due to the range of sources being examined all dates are CE unless specified otherwise.
12
Martindale 1993: 7. Also see Martindale and Thomas 2008; Hunter 2009; Hardwick and Stray 2008, for an overview of
classical reception studies.
3
Semiramis has been received by subsequent generations, the thematically grouped sources will be
chronologically examined to demonstrate how they have been appropriated, reconceptualised, and
recontextualised over time. As a work of classical reception, this thesis will eschew aesthetic judgement
in favour of criticism of texts and images and take into consideration the differences as well as the
continuities of traditions on the Queen. Drawing upon the methodologies of past reception studies, such
as Mary Hamer’s Signs of Cleopatra (1993), this will be achieved by restoring these sources to their
historical context and situating them in relation to a number of cultural discourses.

During the course of this thesis, the role of the East in the Western imaginary, the function of female
rulers in the discourse of rulership and kingship, and how exemplary individuals contribute to moral
discourse, will be explored. In order to achieve this, I will explicitly engage with the notions of
Orientalism developed by Edward Said and Alain Grosrichard.13 Said argued that Western-European
thought articulates the Orient through the use of patronizing and derogatory stereotypes of the East which
in turn reinforces the superiority of the West. He further argued that this stereotyping was motivated by
the political agendas of imperialistic society to justify the colonisation of Eastern societies that are viewed
as needing Western intervention to be civilized. This ideology was said to have endured even in the post-
colonialist society and influenced representations of the Near East in academia. In a similar fashion,
Grosrichard’s 1979 work Structure de sérail sees “Oriental Despotism” as a product of Western fantasy
evident in literary fiction of the East. This revolves around the excess of pleasure and obedience that is
monopolized by the Oriental despot supported by a hierarchical system of organization including viziers,
eunuchs, slaves, wives and concubines. This better explains the way in which we see the East being
represented in Greco-Roman sources. While sensitive to Said’s imperial and Grosrichard’s
Enlightenment context for much of Western culture’s Orientalism, this thesis will show that a number of
these key themes can be traced much earlier.

As such, this longitudinal thesis sheds light on Semiramis—an important figure who has had a strong
presence in traditions throughout Antiquity and onwards—that has been previously understudied and
overlooked. Moreover, by correcting mistakes and inaccuracies made by past scholarship on the Queen,
a more accurate and nuanced understanding will be gained. This will provide a platform for future
scholarship on Semiramis, and other Near Eastern figures in general, to build upon.

13
Said 1978; Grosrichard 1998.
4
 CHAPTER ONE
Part One: Sexual Excess

‘Four soft but titillating syllables, sweet to the memory; a name that is quite well known, and
one which for most evokes an eastern queen, legendary and lascivious…’14

His words laden down with projected desire, the popular French historian Georges Roux introduces his
readers to Queen Semiramis. This sexually-charged description of the Queen was originally published in
1984 in the magazine L’Histoire, a popular magazine for the layman. Throughout his life, Roux was
incessantly captivated by the seductive ancient Near East. In his spare time, while practicing medicine in
Paris in the 1940s, Roux dabbled in Assyriology at École du Louvre and the École des Hautes Études.15
Unable to give up this passion, he continued to pursue this interest alongside his medical career over the
next two decades. While working as a medical officer for the Iraq Petroleum Company, Roux published
numerous articles on the ancient Near East for a variety of popular historical magazines, including a
series called The Story of Ancient Iraq. This series was incredibly popular and was later collated and
developed into the book Ancient Iraq (1964). In the foreword to the third edition of this book, Roux
attributes the popularity of his work to fulfilling a previously unsatisfied need amongst the public for
works on Mesopotamia.16 Instead of being dully factual like contemporaneous scholarly publications in
the same area, his work on ancient Mesopotamia was informed, easily accessible, and entertaining to
non-specialized readers. As such, Roux was instrumental in developing conceptions of the ancient Near
East in the general public. This was particularly the case for Semiramis, as demonstrated in his
introduction to the Babylonian Queen in the collaborative book Everyday Life in Ancient Mesopotamia
(1991), quoted above. In presenting Semiramis in this way, Roux tapped into a long tradition about the
Queen, one which saw her as the embodiment of the sexually-voracious, liberated and libertine Oriental
queen, a femme fatale. In this tradition, she is associated with salacious and scandalous activities. Sources
recount a range of deviant sexual acts associated with the Queen’s insatiable lust such as promiscuity,
the murdering of her lovers, and bestiality. It is a tradition which stands in stark contrast to her
presentation as the enlightened monument builder or cunning military strategist that will be discussed in
proceeding chapters.

14
Roux 2001: 141.
15
Roux 1991: Foreword.
16
Roux 1991: Foreword.
5
Before the sexualised representation of Semiramis can be examined, it is necessary to place
Mesopotamian sexuality in context. While sexual promiscuity has long been associated in the West with
the East, it is worth considering the extent to which this vision of Mesopotamia refracts the lived
experiences and historical context of Mesopotamian life. Following this, it will be explained how the
highly sexualised nature of Semiramis developed in our sources and will explore how this theme was
used by them. It will be demonstrated that there are two main traditions concerning Semiramis’ sexual
nature, both of which can be found in Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica. The first, dubiously
attributed to Ctesias, has given her much less agency, she is a desired object whose sexuality is only
effectively awakened once she achieves queenship. In her widowhood, she emerges as a tyrant, with sex
being one of the urges she needs to satisfy. The second, alternate tradition in the Bibliotheca Historica
increases her agency and has her as a sexual object, plotting to achieve power. She is sexual from the
very beginning and driven by sexual desires. It was this tradition that was particularly embraced by
sources. Nevertheless, both these competing traditions construct Mesopotamia as intrinsically sexual
where female desire was unquestionably embraced. Moreover, contrary to previous scholarship, it
determines that a sexualised Semiramis can be traced well before the Late Antique and Medieval periods.
This summary will provide context for the case study explored in the second half of this chapter:
Semiramis committing incest with her son Ninyas.

Mesopotamia and Sex

The origins of this vision of the Queen are the product of a number of factors. Mesopotamian sexual
mores encouraged an open eroticism that may well have contributed to this image of the Queen. This
aspect of Mesopotamian life was first noticed by scholars when Near Eastern sites began to be unearthed
and a number of fantastical antiquities were brought back to Europe. Ranging from monumental
mythological figures of lamassu, human-bull hybrids, to reliefs of men hunting ferocious lions, these
artefacts were taken and displayed in the British Museum and Louvre to the amazement of European
scholars and the general public.17 But what particularly caught the interest of both parties was the
abundance of imagery of nude men and, in particular, naked, voluptuous and sexually liberated women
engaging in erotic acts. From a Western perspective, Mesopotamian culture seemed to be anything but
prudish. This sentiment carried over into academic analysis where artefacts of this sort were branded as
pornographic.18 However, in reality, in the ancient Near East, nudity did not always equate to sex or

17
Fagan 2007: 9-11.
18
See Bahrani 2001: 43-95.
6
 Figure 2. Burney relief, otherwise known as Queen Figure 3. Britney Spears, “Everytime”
of the Night, Babylon c. 19th-18th cent. BCE. BM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YzabSdk7ZA
2003,0718.1.
sexual functions. Instead, Assante has demonstrated that art of the ancient Near East has been unfairly
influenced by nineteenth-century visual habits and gender attitudes which misled, and still mislead,
scholars to come to these conclusions.19 For example, scholars have concluded that the nude, front facing
woman with detailed breasts illustrated in the Burney relief must have been initially located in a brothel,
completely neglecting the contextual imagery of the Underworld that surrounds the figure (Figure 2).20
A decade after this theory was proposed, the public continued to rationalize the nudity of the figure by
placing it in a purely sexual context. In 2004, when this artefact was acquired by the British Museum,
Peter Aspden, a columnist from Financial Times Magazine, described the figure in the relief as having
‘a cool contemporary look to her, not unlike the latest Britney Spears video’, referring to the video for
“Everytime” that features a provocatively damp Britney Spears walking around only wearing a white
buttoned up shirt or lounging naked in a bathtub (Figure 3).21 This sexualisation would have been further
emphasised to the public as less than a month prior to the publication of the Financial Times Magazine
article, Spears had been voted the “Sexiest Woman in the World” by For Him Magazine readers.22 From

19
Assante 2006.
20
Curtis and Collon 1996: 92.
21
Aspden, Financial Times Magazines 24.4.04
22
Wikipedia entry: FHM’s Sexiest Woman in the World.
7
these examples it is apparent that the Western perception of the nude body equating to a sexualised body
was so heavily imposed on Mesopotamian culture that modern comparisons to pop stars were a
normalised phenomenon.

Figure 4. Clay plaque depicting a copulating couple drinking beer,

Babylon c. 2000 BCE. The Israel Museum 87.160.0743.

Seen to be the pinnacle of this pornographic form of art were the numerous terracotta plaques depicting
sexual intercourse between couples. These plaques were distinctly Mesopotamian, and have not been
found anywhere else in the ancient Near East.23 These scenes were often categorised as scenes of
prostitution due to coitus a tergo, the explicit pose adopted by the couple in which a man penetrates a
woman from behind.24 Figure 4 shows one such example where a crouched woman drinks beer through
a straw as she is being penetrated by a man in the aforementioned position while the man is raising a cup
of wine to his lips. In this context, the method of drinking was equated to a sexual innuendo for oral sex
on their respective partners.25 In the past these reliefs have been construed as purely pornographic. This
became a factoid repeated by scholars after Walter Andrae’s publication of the excavation of Aššur.26
Andrae erroneously attributed the original setting of sex plaques to the temple of Ishtar because of the
scenes of ‘orgiastic sex’ associated with the goddess.27 More recently, it has been proposed by Assante
that these depictions had a magico-religious purpose, warning away bad spirits in vulnerable thresholds
of buildings, whilst also promoting an auspicious life for the residents. 28 Therefore, what we would

23
Bahrani 2001: 51.
24
Assante 2000.
25
Assante 2000.
26
Andrae 1935; Scurlock 1993: 15; Pinnock 1995: 2526; Westenholz 1995.
27
Andrae 1935: 103.
28
Assante 2006: 194.
8
distinguish as two separate genres, high art and pornography, were, in fact, not separated in
Mesopotamian art at all. Instead, highly erotic images could be pious works associated with a deity’s
cult.29 These instances exemplify how modern social mores have been hugely influential in re-writing
the archaeological record of ancient Mesopotamia.

This perception of a freely erotic Mesopotamia in the archaeological record was strengthened with the
decipherment of Akkadian texts in the mid-nineteenth century. A major theme that became apparent from
this breakthrough was the explicit eroticism found in poetry and narratives. Erotic elements that were
often alluded to included explicit references to male and female genitalia, female pubic hair, male and
female orgasm, oral sex, and sexual arousal and satisfaction.30 As such, these sources were particularly
different in the way that females were presented. They featured, possibly even celebrated, female
sexuality where these acts were associated more with pleasure than procreation.31 For example, in a love
song dedicated to Shu-Sin (a Sumerian king of the Third Dynasty of Ur) and the goddess Inanna, erotic
symbolism of sweet honey is used in relation to describing the vulva and mouth. Leick argues that this
refers to cunnilingus—a sexual activity that was purely for pleasure and not essential for procreation.32
The love song reads:
In the bedchamber dripping with honey let us enjoy over and over your allure, the sweet
thing. Lad, let me do the sweetest things to you. My precious sweet, let me bring you honey.33

The emphasis placed on pleasure rather than procreation in Mesopotamian sources demonstrates that
they did not see a division between love and sex, rather sex was a direct expression of love that produced
close intimacy.34 Nevertheless, this was largely ignored by scholarship in favour of theories that
conformed to Western ideological framework to explain explicit references to sex, such as fertility cults
and dubious religious prostitution.

The unbridled sexual freedom of Mesopotamian culture was also perceived in their religious practices.
This is particularly evident with the festival of the Sacaea, otherwise mistaken as the Babylonian festival
of the Akitu by Greco-Roman sources and modern scholars.35 In the infamous book The Golden Bough by

29
Bahrani 2001: 43.
30
Bahrani 2001: 45.
31
Pryke 2017: 45.
32
Leick 2003: 94.
33
Šu-Suen B, ETCSL 2.4.4.2.
34
Westenholz 1995; Pryke 2017: 44-46.
35
See Bidmead 2002: 34-36.
9
Sir James Frazer (1890-1915), the Sacaea is portrayed as the Eastern origin of the Roman Saturnalia. As
such, Oriental tropes associated with the East are clear in Frazer’s description of festival as one of sexual
license, ‘when the customary restraints of law and morality are thrown aside, when the whole population
give themselves up to extravagant mirth and jollity, and when the darker passions find a vent which
would never be allowed them in the more staid and sober course of ordinary life... too often degenerating
into wild orgies of lust and crime’.36 This was a highly popular theory, in both the academic and non-
academic world, but due to the influence of sensationalising Greco-Roman sources it was seriously
outdated and misinformed.37

There are many different explanations and reinventions of this festival in Classical sources. In fact, many
sources mistook the Babylonian Akitu as a precursor to the Persian Sacaea.38 This means that scholars have
been ready to import various traditions attached to the Sacaea. According to Athenaeus, both Berosus and
Ctesias recorded that social norms were overturned during the Sacaea in Babylon, similar to Roman
Saturnalia festival.39 As such, slaves gave orders to their masters and the zoganes, a specially chosen slave,
dressed in the king’s clothing and ruled in his stead for the duration of the festivities that occurred over
a span of five days. Furthermore, Dio Chrysostom, in a dialogue between Diogenes and Alexander, used
the festival as an example of the dangers of power without wisdom. 40 In this version, a criminal who is
condemned to death was chosen to act as the Persian king by donning his clothing, ruling in his stead,
and consorting with his concubines.

However, the actual events of the Akitu festival were more sober than is represented in Greco-Roman
sources. The festival was the most important festival of the Babylonians honouring the patron deity of the
city, Marduk. It occurred once a year at the beginning of the New Year in April and was carried out within
twelve days. When the festival was at its most developed stage it involved sacred processions of statues
of gods (most importantly Marduk), feasting, prayers, sacrifices, and the raising of the tablets of Enuma
elish (the Babylonian creation myth). However, the Babylonian sovereign was needed for an important
ritual, and thus the festival could only be carried out if he was present.41 During this ritual, the king was
stripped of his royal insignia upon entering the Akitu temple, he was slapped until he cried, and made to

36
Frazer 2009: 630.
37
Assante 2003.
38
Langdon 1924: 65-72.
39
F4. Athenaeus 14.44 p. 639c.
40
Dio. Chrys. Or. 4.67.
41
Pettinato 2005: 222-223.
10
kneel in front of the statue of Marduk and recite a penitential confession.42 This ensured the prosperity of
the people in the New Year as well as the king’s fidelity and legitimation of his position, yet there is neither
evidence of a substitute king ruling during the Babylonian New Year Festival, nor of any public execution
of a criminal as told in our ancient sources. Thus, it seems that the Babylonian Akitu gained its reputation
as a festival of sexual license through conflation with the Sacaea and sensationalising Greco-Roman
sources.

Accordingly, it would be easy to dismiss the construction of Semiramis’ lust as just the product of
Western fantasy. While the West has always constructed the East in sexual terms, we should also
acknowledge that very different sexual protocols operated in Mesopotamia.43 While many of the stories
relating to Semiramis were no doubt the product of exaggeration, these exaggerations may have had their
origins in the sexual life of the Mesopotamians and their beliefs about the sex-lives of the powerful. At
the very least, knowledge of Mesopotamian sexuality may have supported (or failed to correct) the
sexualised image of Semiramis. As will be demonstrated in this chapter, the Babylonian Queen’s
increasing rampant sexuality is present in the early Greco-Roman tradition.

The First Tradition

There are two competing traditions on Semiramis’ sexuality. The first tradition sees the Babylonian
queen with limited agency. In the following sections, I outline the principal stories that contributed to
this first tradition of the sexualised Queen.

Ctesias of Cnidus, our earliest source, is cited by Diodorus Siculus as being responsible for the story of
Semiramis’ sexual awakening, the defining feature of the first tradition. Ctesias served as a physician in
the Persian court at the turn of the fourth-century BCE, accompanying Artaxerxes II on campaign
throughout the East. His work, the Persica, is a history of Persia from its origins to the reign of Artaxerxes
I. Whilst this work is now fragmentary, it has been preserved in Diodorus Siculus, Nicolas of Damascus,
Plutarch, and Photius.44 For Semiramis, the source which is most extant is Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca
Historica who devotes much of Book Two to her. However, it has been shown by Compoli that the
Semiramis we see in Diodorus Siculus is an adaption of Ctesias, merged with other sources. 45 As

42
Bidmead 2002: 93-103.
43
Bahrani 2001; Asher-Greve 2007; Asher-Greve and Westenholz 2013.
44
See Llewellyn-Jones 2009: 7-20.
45
Campoli 2002.
11
explained by Llewellyn-Jones, the fragments of Ctesias actually show very little Orientalist clichés in
comparison to later sources, especially after the reign of Sardanapalus. Instead what we see reflected in
the Persica is a story of the harem, the inner-circle of the king, where women and eunuchs vied for rank
and position within the confines of the court.46 As such, Diodorus’ Semiramis should be seen as his own
representation, divergent from Ctesias.

Diodorus’ use of Ctesias’ account serves multiple purposes in his work. Firstly, it introduces the character
of Semiramis and explains how ‘the most remarkable of all women of whom we have a record… rose to
such great esteem’ to become his wife and queen of Babylon.47 Secondly, it demonstrates how
Semiramis’ beauty drives men to extremes, foreshadowing her future behaviour in the text. In order to
do this, Diodorus digresses from the tale of Ninus’ reign to create a fuller realization of Semiramis.

A large proportion of the account on Semiramis discusses her relationship with Onnes and Ninus. The
beautiful Semiramis is the object of a dramatic tale of competition between powerful men. Semiramis’
beauty is seemingly so spellbinding that it forces these men to breaking point, and eventual death, to win
her over. Indeed, there may even be something supernatural about Semiramis’ beauty. 48 The account
begins when Onnes, the governor of Syria, laid eyes on Semiramis while inspecting the herds of her step-
father, Simmas. From this one encounter Onnes was smitten and entreats Simmas with intense conviction
to give him the maiden in marriage. After the two were married, Onnes became ‘completely enslaved by
her and, because he would do nothing without her advice, he was successful in everything’.49
Consequently, when Onnes was away in Bactra he failed to invade the city and a siege was drawn out.
Onnes, being ‘very much in love with his wife’, sent for Semiramis who achieved what the men could
not.50 With a small force, she scaled the rocky outcrop and captured the city. This display of military
intelligence and skill caught the attention of the Babylonian king, Ninus. Ninus likewise became
infatuated with her beauty and goes to great lengths in wooing the Babylonian who was still married to

46
Llewellyn-Jones 2009: 82-84. See for example, Curtius (5.1.38) for the stereotype of harem women present in Greco-
Roman literature.
47
Diod. Sic. 2.4.1.
48
Semiramis’ spellbinding beauty may have been a divine power inherited from her mother, the love goddess Derketo. We
are told that Derketo was cursed by Aphrodite who caused her to have a violent passion for a handsome youth, and from this
union bore Semiramis. (cf. Diod. Sic. 2.4; Luc. Syr. D. 14.) The most comprehensive analysis for this myth is Lightfoot’s
(2003: 9, 59, 251-356, 473) commentary on Lucian’s On the Syrian Goddess. In this work Lightfoot explains the connections
of Derketo, otherwise known as Atargatis at the temple in Hierapolis-Babyce, to the later forms of Inanna-Ishtar: the
Phoenician goddess Astarte and the Greco-Roman Aphrodite/Venus.
49
Diod. Sic. 2.5.
50
Diod. Sic. 2.5.
12
Onnes.51 It is here where the narrative reaches a dramatic climax.52 To sweeten the deal, Ninus offered
his own daughter Sosanê to Onnes to wed but Onnes refused. Frustrated, Ninus turned to violence,
threatening to blind Onnes if he did not obey—clearly casting Ninus as a despotic figure in the tale.53
Then Onnes, ‘in part because he was terrified by the King’s threats, and in part because of his love for
his wife, was consumed with rage and madness, placed a noose around his neck and hanged himself’.54
Whilst Semiramis’ beauty clearly has a dramatic effect on these men, her agency is severely limited. As
her father or husband and guardian, Simmas, Onnes, and Ninus restrain her sexuality. However, this is
only temporary. This dynamic dissolves with Ninus’ death, and she transitions from a wife to a widow,
cast to the fringes of society where she is free to engage in sex without restraint. As such, it is in this next
phase of her life as a widow where her sexual voracity comes to the fore in our sources. It is here where
she transforms into the clichéd despot.

Historians of the ancient family have long been fascinated with the figure of the widow.55 This suggests
that they have greater agency, and in this way, widows are likely to be more active. They occur
throughout literature from Cornelia and Evadne, who refuse to marry and even kill themselves in grief
at the death of their husband, to the old, ugly, and horny widows in Aristophanes’ Assembly-Women
bickering over men.56 As such, they can be virtuous and chaste, or sexually voracious women. 57 The
former chaste type conformed to ideal gendered social roles, and the latter rejected them. The latter
women are seen to reject these roles because they are unwilling to give up sexual pleasure to resign
themselves to chastity after experiencing their “sexual awakening” by a man in marriage.58 Without the
constraints of a man, they have lost the control exercised by a husband. With this newfound freedom
they can indulge in their passion and lust. In this way, the widow adopts a male attitude and is seen to be
defying her true nature.59 Thus, widows were a powerful symbol of disorder and destructive potential of

51
Diod. Sic. 2.6.
52
Llewellyn-Jones and Robson argue that Ctesias’ Semiramis provides strong evidence that the Persica could be categorized
as a novella with her love-life acting as a climatic event in the story and may have been influential in the formation of
Xenophon’s Cyropaedia which replicates character types of Ctesias. (Llewellyn-Jones and Robson 2004: 68-76)
53
According to Grosrichard (1998: 56), controlling the gaze was ‘the driving element of despotic power in the Orient’. As
such, we see blinding as a commonly reported punishment inflicted by Near Eastern kings in ancient sources. See Llewellyn-
Jones 2013a: 173-177.
54
Diod. Sic. 2.6.
55
Buitelaar 1991; Walcot 1991; Dixon 1992.
56
Plut. Vit. Ti. Gracch. 1.3; Ar. Eccl.1050-1110; Eur. Supp. 1015-20.
57
Walcot 1991.
58
Walcot 1991: 11.
59
Walcot 1991: 11.
13
uncontrolled female sexuality.60 It is this threatening empowerment that Semiramis embodies after
Ninus’ death where she is seen to conform to notions of an unrestrained widow.

As a widow and queen of Babylon, Semiramis experiences sexual liberation. With her newfound
freedom, she luxuriates in her sensual desires without the constraint of a patriarchal figure. It is when she
transitions to this liminal position that her overt sexuality comes to the fore in the “Ctesian” tradition of
the Bibliotheca Historica.61 It is also at this point where she gains greater agency. This is evident in the
text when she visits the Median city of Chauon:

In this place she passed a long time and enjoyed to the full every device that contributed to
luxury; she was unwilling, however, to contract a lawful marriage, being afraid that she might
be deprived of her supreme position, but choosing out the most handsome of the soldiers she
consorted with them and then made away with all who had lain with her.62

These soldiers were essentially her equivalent of concubines. Concubines were highly intriguing Oriental
custom and were a tell-tale mark of an Oriental despot and their sexual excess in Greco-Roman sources.63
For Semiramis in particular, this theme of overcoming passion linked with death also builds upon
previous episodes in Book Two. The first instance is demonstrated by her immortal mother, Derketo,
who killed her lover after she was cursed by Aphrodite to lust after him.64 The second being Ninus’ and
Onnes’ passion which drove the latter to his death. However, like most instances in the Bibliotheca
Historica, Semiramis outdoes her predecessors.65 She does this by having a substantially higher body
count.

Semiramis’ motives for these dramatic actions have been the subject of academic debate. Beringer
believes that Semiramis’ unwillingness to marry, justifying the execution of her lovers, would be read as
an act that diminishes the harshness of her actions.66 However, it is more likely that this reasoning offered
by Diodorus was intended to be a titillating incidence demonstrating the characteristics of a despot who
refused to give up power.67 As the passage makes clear, Semiramis is very concerned about maintaining
her position. It is this desire that underpins her actions. This is articulated by Diodorus who recounts that

60
Buitelaar 1991: 9.
61
Seymour 2014: 64.
62
Diod. Sic. 2.13.
63
Llewellyn-Jones 2013a: 181-185.
64
Diod. Sic. 2.4.
65
Diod. Sic. 2.8; Beringer 2016a: 41.
66
Beringer 2016a: 38.
67
Waters 2017: 58.
14
Semiramis refused to contract a lawful marriage to protect her sovereignty.68 Accordingly, she is seen to
use her newfound power and agency to eliminate any potential threats to her position, and being a woman,
this is the threat of patriarchal dominance that comes with marriage. As such, the reading of this passage
clearly links Semiramis’ unnatural and excessive eroticism to the realm of the clichéd Oriental despot.

Greco-Roman society has always held a great interest in tyrannical figures and Oriental despots.69 Each
individual and time-period had different notions of tyranny that were wide-spread, malleable and ever-
changing.70 People were acutely aware of the dangers associated with tyranny, whether it be the fate of
citizens under this oppression or the eventual downfall of despotic leaders. This was particularly the case
in the political sphere where comparisons or allusions to tyrannic behaviour were slanderous to one’s
reputation and could be detrimental to one’s career. This was certainly the case for the Bithynian native,
Dio Chrysostom, in the early second century CE. The orator was hit with two lawsuits and a barrage of
insults while attempting to get the city of Prusa to assume responsibility for a building project that had
become financially detrimental to him. The leading force opposing this, and filing the lawsuits against
Dio, was Flavius Archippos.71 Archippos’ allegations of tyranny were addressed by Dio in his discourse
“On the Beautification of Prusa” in which he denies these defamatory allegations by outlining the true
characteristics of a tyrant. Dio does this by drawing on the example of Semiramis, the quintessential
female tyrant. He comments;

For according to my understanding tyrant’s acts are like the following: seduction of married
women and ruining of boys, beating and maltreating free men in the sight of all, sometimes
even subjecting men to torture, as, for example, plunging them into a seething cauldron, and at
other times administering a coat of tar; but I do naught of this. Furthermore, I know regarding
a female tyrant, Semiramis, that, being advanced in years and lustful, she used to force men to
lie with her. And of male tyrants I have heard it said that so-and-so did the same thing,
outrageous old sinner!72

From this it is apparent that Dio perceived, or selectively categorised, tyranny as manifesting in sexual
and violent crimes, moving away from more traditional concepts which equated tyranny to selfish
adornment or construction of property e.g. Nero’s Domus Aurea.73 As such, Semiramis’ tyranny is

68
Diod. Sic. 2.13.
69
See Lewis 2006.
70
Lewis 2006: 1-6.
71
See Bekker-Nielsen 2008: 135.
71
Plin. Ep. 10.81-82.
72
Dio Chrys.Or. 47.
73
Suet. Nero. 30ff.
15
marked by lecherous and cruel actions that seemed to have developed in the later years of her life
presumably after the death of Ninus when she became sole ruler of the Empire, gaining greater agency.
Evidently, Dio did not see this matching his own behaviour. Nevertheless, from the letters of the imperial
magistrate, Pliny the Younger, we know that the lawsuit was forwarded onto Trajan.74 The emperor
dismissed the charge of desecration and demanded that Dio submit his books for inspection. However, it
seems that no further action was taken on the subject.75 Nevertheless, the damage had been done and
Dio never recovered from this political attack.

A later source which plays heavily upon this first tradition of the Babylonian Queen is the Ninus
Romance, one of our earliest surviving Greek novels potentially dating to the mid first-century BCE.76
The romance follows a tale of two young, chaste lovers, Ninus and Semiramis, eager for marriage who
have to overcome the obstacle of their young age, as well as physical obstacles, in order to be together.77
The Semiramis in the novel, who is unnamed in the fragments, is far from the fearsome warrior queen
that is included in Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica, written roughly contemporaneously with the
novel. Instead, she is so modest and shy that she cannot bring herself to mention the word “marriage”,
nor can she bring herself to speak at all.78 Thus, this source is representative of Semiramis’
characterisation before she becomes a widow where she has virtually no agency and conforms to the
ideals of a chaste and virtuous youth. Despite these differences, there are some parts of the Semiramis
narrative that have been retained, albeit in an altered form. Most of these similarities can be found in the
characterisation of Ninus who takes on many of the Babylonian Queen’s attributes. Like Semiramis, he
is characterised as a bold warrior, who leads an expedition into Armenia during winter where he traverses
difficult terrain and survives a shipwreck, prolonging the separation between Ninus and his beloved. In
comparison, there are a small number of elements Semiramis’ characterisation that have been retained in
the novel. Namely her exceptional beauty and divine mother, Derketo, who has been reshaped from an
ill-fortuned murderess to a motherly woman named Derceia who tries to quicken the marriage between
the two.79

74
Plin. Ep. 10.81.
75
Plin. Ep. 10.82.
76
See Bowie 2002: 48–53: Tilg 2010: 109–26.
77
See Stephens and Wrinkler 2014 for the Greek fragments and their translation.
78
A.IV.20-V.6.
79
Dalley 2013b: 121.
16
Whitmarsh argues that this lack of correlation with the Bibliotheca Historica is understandable as
Diodorus tended to downplay erotic elements in favour of military ones in comparison to Ctesias’ original
account.80 This is evidenced by the love story of Zarinaea and Stryangaeus, labelled ‘the most famous
episode of the Persica’, which is completely omitted by Diodorus Siculus.81 As such, Whitmarsh finds
it conceivable that Ctesias’ Perisca could have had a fuller romance which inspired the Greek novel but
was abridged and reduced in the Bibliotheca Historica. However, due to the irreconcilable differences
between the girl in the Ninus Romance and Diodorus’ Semiramis, Whitmarsh proposes that the
Babylonian queen is not the love interest in the novel. Instead, he suggests that she was a previous wife
or lover of Ninus who was completely omitted from the Bibliotheca Historica because she did not
contribute anything to his political history of Assyria. Whilst Whitmarsh’s theory is interesting, this
extrapolation of the fragmentary romance is not substantiated in any surviving sources that reference
Ctesias’ Persica. Thus, it is, at best, speculative.

A range of theories on the Ninus Romance have been suggested over the years. The theories differ greatly,
no doubt because of the extremely fragmentary nature of the novel and the lack of information
surrounding its origins. Perry interprets the work as being aimed at juvenile readers. 82 G. Anderson
speculates that the novel was not a degeneration of historiography, due to its seemingly irreconcilable
presentation of Semiramis as an innocent lover, but was rather following similar patterns to Inanna-Ishtar
who could embody two extremes—the innocent lover and the virago.83 More convincingly, M. J.
Anderson argues that the novel explores the differing responses to erotic desire and aidos, moral shame.
Within the confines of patriarchal societal conventions Semiramis is timid and silenced, whereas Ninus
is bold and liberated through rhetorical eloquence.84 In this sense, Semiramis is representative of the
shame-stricken silent heroine who was common to other Greek novels such as Chariton’s Callirhoe and
Heliodorus’ Aethiopica.85 No matter the purpose of this novel, Gera comments that the most telling aspect
is that the mythological heroes of the tale have been heavily adapted from their legends. They have been
rationalized and humanized, but also trivialized.86 An explanation for this has been proposed by Dalley

80
Whitmarsh 2018: 33, 163.
81
Whitmarsh 2018: 165.
82
Perry 1967: 164-166.
83
Anderson 1984: 93-94.
84
Anderson 2008.
85
In fact, Diodorus’ account of Semiramis shares many similarities with the Greek novel Callirhoe written by Chariton
between 25 BCE - 50 CE. Like Semiramis, Callirhoe’s superhuman beauty attracts the attention of numerous men. Most
notably King Atraxerxes, who wants her as a concubine, and Dionysius, an overprotective and jealous man who kills himself
when he is unable to have the heroine. See Llewellyn-Jones 2013a.
86
Braun 1938: 10-11; Gera 1997: 73.
17
who has argued that this novel was conceived as a political scheme of the Seleucids.87 As the rulers of
Babylon, she argues that Antiochus, Seleucus, and their wife Stratonice, deliberately inserted themselves
into the legend of Semiramis and Ninus (the founders of the great cities of Babylon and Nineveh) by
humanizing the characters to show themselves as the founders of a new historical epoch.88

Figure 5. Stone mosaic pavement of Ninus and Semiramis, ca. 200 A.D. Princeton University Art Museum:
y1937-264.

The popularity of the Ninus Romance is demonstrated in a mosaic from Antioch (c. 200 CE) that shows
Ninus lying on a mattress and cushion holding a portrait of a girl, believed to be Semiramis.89 This refers
to scenes in the novel where Ninus pines over the Babylonian either while he is separated from her during
a campaign, or in order to resist the temptation of other lovers. The Semiramis being depicted is once
again the antithesis of her dominant characterisation in our sources. The Semiramis of the Ninus Romance
is more akin to her pre-widowed characterisation in the Bibliotheca Hisotrica where her agency is
severley restricted. In both instances she is not in control of her own love life, instead it is dictated by
her suitors. These suitors have an intense passion towards her and are eager for marriage, going to great
lengths to do so. In the case of the Ninus Romance, the barriers to marriage are literally mountains and
rivers, whereas in the Bibliotheca Historica, they are the rivals of other men.

87
Dalley 2013b.
88
Dalley 2013b: 121-122.
89
See Levi 1944; Levi 1947: 117-118.
18
 The Second Tradition

As previously mentioned, there is a second, alternate tradition of Semiramis’ rise to power that originates
in the Bibliotheca Historica. This tradition is distinctly different from the first tradition in which
Semiramis does not have much sexual agency until she is liberated by the death of Ninus. Instead, it sees
Semiramis manifesting excessive sexual behaviour and increased agency from the very beginning of the
tale. Thus, sources in this tradition present this behaviour as innate and inseparable from her persona.

Due to the increased sexual agency promoted in this tradition recorded by Diodorus, Semiramis is often
labelled as a courtesan, a fitting role for a lustful woman that also makes her rise to power more
remarkable. It has been proposed by Drews and others that the accounts which favoured Semiramis’
malicious rise to power as a courtesan were engaging with the previously mentioned ancient ritual of the
Sacaea.90 The similarities between this festival of sexual license and topsy-turvy rituals and Semiramis’
rise to power are striking in many aspects. Like the zoganes or scapegoat figure mentioned in Greco-
Roman accounts of this festival, Semiramis likewise originates from low birth and rises to the position
of sole ruler during a festival setting. Moreover, like the zoganes who wears the garb of the king,
Semiramis wears androgynous garb to masquerade as her son in order to retain power.91 Gera comments
that whatever ritual, if any, underlies the tradition she is a definitively different figure from Ctesias’
queen.92 This figure is one that is more typical of barbarous, female queens in the Greco-Roman tradition
as she only uses traditionally female weapons—beauty, seductiveness, deception, and wiles—in order to
rise from a courtesan to queen of Babylon.

As previously mentioned, the malicious account of Semiramis’ rise to power first appears in the
Bibliotheca Historica. This version is sourced not from Ctesias, but Athenaeus.93 Much concerning
Athenaeus is speculative. Both the birth place and date of Athenaeus have, and continue to be,

90
Drews 1974: 389-390; Boncquet 1987:126-127; Pettinato 1988: 91-94. The motif of Eastern rulers having sex and then
killing their lovers is also found as the frame for One Thousand and One Nights, a collection of ancient Middle Eastern folk
tales complied in the ninth-century BCE. In this tale, King Shahryār marries, beds and subsequently kills a succession of
virgins until he marries the wily daughter of the vizier who spins a continuous tale of stories to capture the king’s attention
and prolong her life for one thousand and one nights. See van Leeuwen 2018.
91
Just. Epit. 1.2; Oros. 1.22.
92
Gera 1997: 77. Some outliers of this narrative that still fit into these characterisations include Moses Khorenats‘i (1.15), who
states the demeanour of the Babylonian was so frightening that Ninus abandoned the throne and fled to Crete. Whilst Macrobius
(In Somn. 2.10.7), states that Semiramis was Ninus’ daughter and would have consequently inherited the throne.
93
Diod. Sic. 2.20.
19
contentiously debated by scholars. Early scholarship led by Marquart and Krumbholz have proposed that
he was a native of Athens, however more recent scholarship has refuted these claims.94 Additionally,
dates from the fourth to first century BCE have also been suggested with similar futility.95 Although our
knowledge of Anthenaeus is lacking, it is apparent that his narrative greatly varied to Ctesias’. This story
starkly contrasts to Semiramis’ seemingly passive rise to the throne in which power was gained through
marriage to Onnes then Ninus. Instead, she is a comely courtesan who tricks her way onto the throne. By
using a combination of beauty and cunning Semiramis was able to gain complete control over Babylon
during the New Year’s festival in a short amount of time by progressively gaining acceptance and power
in the palace until she became the king’s wife. Then, taking advantage of the king’s love for her, she
persuaded him to yield the throne to her for a period of five days. On the first day she received the sceptre
and the regal garb and held a banquet where she gained complete trust of the commanders and other royal
dignitaries. Then, on the second day, she enforced this power by having the king arrested and thrown
into prison. After this, she did not relinquish her power and instead kept the throne for herself. In this
version, Semiramis has great agency from the beginning of the tale and uses her feminine charms to
further her position. Other narratives on this alternative tradition are similarly less flattering, playing into
Oriental tropes of the female as a seductress and harlot.

This narrative is exaggerated and expanded upon, in Plutarch’s Moralia. In the essay “The Dialogue on
Love”, the Babylonian Queen’s voracious sexual behaviour is paired with her propensity for killing men.
The dialogue discusses the intended marriage between a young man, Bacchion, and a wealthy widowed
woman, Ismenodora. There are two opposing stances on the marriage being discussed. Protogenes argues
that only desire, not genuine love, can be found in heterosexual relationships and that virtuous friendship,
which accommodates love, can only be found in homosexual pederasty.96 As such, Ismenodora is seen
to conform to the negative stereotype of widows prevalent in Greco-Roman society. To Protogenes she
is essentially a “cougar”, ten years his senior, preying upon and enslaving younger men because she is
driven by desire and cannot control her sexual urges. Daphnaeus, the other interlocutor, argues against
this. He adds that many fruitful relationships have come from poor men marrying rich and noble women,
whereas only weak men let themselves be exploited and emasculated by women. To reinforce this
argument, a list of women of this calibre are recited. Included are women who ‘have trampled on the
crowns of kings’; Samian flute-girls, ballet dancers, Agathoclea the mistress of Ptolemy IV and her mother

94
Boncquet 1987: 124-5; Marquart Krumbholz 1897.
95
BNJ 681; Stronk 2016: 120n155.
96
Plut. Mor. Amat. 750.
20
Oenanthê, as well as the mysterious figure of Aristonica.97 An extended example is given with Semiramis.
The version follows a similar pattern to Athenaeus, but with added hostility in which Semiramis is directly
responsible for the death of her husband. According to Plutarch, the Syrian was the lowest of the low; a
servant and concubine of a house-born slave of the king. Despite this, when Ninus caught sight of her he
instantly fell in love, which remains unrequited throughout the text. Semiramis, now motivated by hate,
went about her usual way of using her cunning to slowly amass power, and then once she had full control
decreed that Ninus be seized, put in chains, and then put to death.98 In this reiteration of the tale Semiramis’
despotism has been increased, not only does she usurp the throne but she also kills Ninus.

The next of our sources to give a rendition of this tale was Aelian in his Historical Miscellany of the third
century AD.99 Under the Severan dynasty in the second- and third-centuries, the Roman author compiled
his Historical Miscellany from a selection of anecdotes, biographies, and other types of miscellaneous
information.100 These titbits were grouped together in thematic chapters for the convenience of the reader.
As shown by Johnson, Aelian often uses human behaviour in everyday life, instead of deeds accrued over
a career, as reflection of an individual’s character to be used as exempla.101 In the case of Semiramis, the
anecdote relating to her rise to power is the first entry to book seven which relates maxims and titbits on
luxury and modesty and how they relate to tyranny and virtue. Aelian’s tale goes as follows;

Semiramis of Assyria has been variously celebrated by different authors. She was the most
attractive of women, even if she was rather careless of her appearance. When she appeared
before the Assyrian king, summoned because of her notorious beauty, he fell in love with her
at their first encounter. She asked the king for royal dress and five days rule over Asia, with
everyone carrying out her orders. She was not refused. When the king placed her on the throne
and she realised that everything was in her hands and subject to her will, she instructed the
bodyguards to kill the king, and in this way she acquired the kingdom of Assyria. This is the
account of Dinon.102

Semiramis’ lust for power and usurpation of the throne is indicative of other immoral actions for which she
is known—her tyrannical sexual rapaciousness. Like other versions of this story, particularly the
Bibliotheca Historica, Semiramis’ beauty is stressed. However, in this account it made clear that her

97
Plut. Mor. Amat. 753.
98
Plut. Mor. Amat. 752-753.
99
His account is very similar to that of Plutarch who was a prominent source for this work; however, Dinon of Kolophon (the
father of Cleitarchus) is named as his source. This suggests that Dinon was the original source of the two versions. (Wilson 1997:
10.)
100
Johnson 1997: 212.
101
Johnson 1997: 213.
102
Ael. VH. 7.1.
21
carelessness of the effect of her beauty directly resulted in the death of the king.103 Furthermore, Llewellyn-
Jones comments that the account reflects the Persian belief that the Great King’s robe possessed
supernatural powers of monarchy. Thus, the throne could be usurped by the removal of them.104
Nevertheless, Semiramis’ feminine charms promote agency in this position and her notoriety for killing
her lovers is applied to this tale, further emphasising her despotic actions.

It is evident that these macabre versions of Semiramis’ rise to power were of particular interest to Greco-
Roman sources. More sources conform to this second tradition than the first. It can be theorised that this
was due to the entertaining factors of the drama and villainy of this alternative version. Moreover, it also
played upon preconceived notions of the dangers of female sexuality that was typical of Eastern women.
Thus, this tale was so intriguing and popular that in the hundred and seventh Olympiad, Aëtion the famed
painter, illustrated this episode of Semiramis raising from slavery to royal power.105 It is also apparent that
this highly dramatized rendition continued to be appealing for later sources, and especially in Christian
sources who embraced this tradition with enthusiasm.106

Semiramis, as well as notions of Babylon, were radically and irrevocably changed in Christian sources,
with a number of sources responsible for this radical change in perception. Justin’s Epitome of Pompeius
Trogus’ Philippic Histories was one such source which was important for the later rendition of the
Christian Semiramis. Most importantly, he lists Ninus and Semiramis as the first rulers of noteworthiness
and the first rulers to wage war.107 Featured heavily is the Greco-Roman tale of Semiramis cross-dressing
to pretend to be her son in order to retain the throne after the death of Ninus. 108 He ends with the short
outline of Semiramis’ incest with her son Ninyas.109 This is the first time this event is mentioned, and as
such will later become extremely influential in the sexualisation of the Babylonian Queen in the Christian
sources.110 Next we have Eusebius-Jerome’s Chronicon that was compiled in the fourth-century CE and
was the first to place Ninus and Semiramis (again as the first pagan rulers of noteworthiness) into a
Christian timeline at the same time as Abraham.111 This was detrimental to their reputations, especially

103
Ael. VH. 7.1.
104
Llewellyn-Jones 2013b: 64.
105
Plin. HN. 35.78.
106
Parr (1970) argues that this tale influenced the allusion to Semiramis in Chaucer’s Man of Law's Tale.
107
Just. Epit. 1.1.
108
Instances of cross-dressing being used deceptively and as a weapon are also found in other Greco-Roman sources. See
Hdt. 5.20; Plut. Vit. Pel. 11.1-6.
109
Just. Epit. 1.2.
110
Beringer 2016a: 51, 59-60.
111
Jer. Chron. 1-7, 20.
22
due to the importance of the Latin translation of the chronicle that became a key history in Medieval
Europe.112 Samuel comments that by making the two rulers contemporary to Abraham and the formation
of the Christian faith, they were designated the pagans opposed to the origins of the religion.113 Roughly
a century later, this was then added to by St Augustine in his City of God. In this text, Babylon was
constructed as the antitype of the heavenly kingdom of God that was reached through Christian piety and
observance in the Last Judgment.114 In comparison, the earthly city of Babylon, the first Rome, was
located in people’s hearts, created through selfish love of oneself rather than God. The earthly city was
led by the bloodthirsty and immoral Ninus and Semiramis, and like Rome after it, it would eventually be
conquered by Christianity.115 As such, for his account of Semiramis, Augustine combined the parallelism
of Eusebius-Jerome (Abraham-Babylon and Jesus-Rome) with the details of Justin (Ninus and Semiramis
as the first rulers to wage war) and omitted any other details of the Greco-Roman tradition that were
deemed superfluous.116

This tradition was also built upon in the Historiae Adversus Paganos by Paulus Orosius, a Church father
writing in the early fifth-century CE and student to St Augustine. His history consisted of a continuous
narrative of the troubles and disasters that preceded Christianity. Similar to Justin, he states that Babylon
was led by Ninus and Semiramis. Not only were they the stereotypical evil pagans, but their sinful ways
were described as spreading like a plague, infecting other nations. Of this pair, Semiramis in particular,
was purely connected with insatiable sexual appetite and bloodlust.117 This behaviour was innate and a
product of her paganism, not a sudden shift in behaviour that came with widowhood.118 By doing this,
Orosius is seen to deviate from his main source for this period of history, Justin’s Epitome of Pompeius
Trogus’ Philippic History, in which Semiramis’ sexual nature is only briefly touched upon.119 Therefore,
it seems that Orosius is largely innovative in his characterisation of a highly sexualised Semiramis.

Orosius remarks that ‘[Semiramis], ablaze with lust and thirsting for blood, lived amid unending
fornication and murder’, employing the biblical themes of carnal passion and bloodlust associated with

112
Laistner 1940: 243.
113
Samuel 1944: 34.
114
August. De civ. D. 4.6; 16.3, 17.
115
August. De civ. D. 18.2.
116
Samuel 1944: 35.
117
Samuel 1944: 35.
118
Van Nuffelen 2012: 128.
119
Samuel 1944: 34; Fear 2010: 15.
23
Babylon.120 Orosius also adds Diodorus’ story that the Babylonian queen killed men after she had sex
with them. However, they are not explicitly identified as soldiers. Instead, it is stated that they were ‘men
she had summoned as a queen, but detained as a prostitute’, implying that it was a common occurrence.121
To further amplify the debauchery of her actions, it is added that she illicitly conceived a son with one
of her concubines which she then impiously exposed. Fear comments that the Whore of Babylon from
Revelation may have been the inspiration for this highly eroticised image of Semiramis.122 In Revelation,
the Whore of Babylon was the personification of the evils and corruption of Babylon and the pagan
world, which in turn was a metaphor for the decline of Rome.123 By drawing these parallels, Orosius
added to the concept of Babylon, the earthly city of Augustine, as the first empire that fell due to
corruption and paganism, while Rome prevailed because of Christian faith. However, this hyperbolic
treatment is not just found with Semiramis. Van Nuffelen comments that other women in the work
(Amazons, Thamyris, Artemidora, the matrons poisoning Rome, and the Gallic and Germanic women)
also overstepped the limits of their sex in a similar way. Thus, while Semiramis is unprecedently
sexualised, it was not an isolated incident within the text. Nevertheless, Orosius’ Historiae Adversus
Paganos was one of the most widely read and popular works in Medieval Europe, thus it was highly
instrumental in the later receptions of Semiramis.124 This is particularly evident in the work of Dante
Alighieri, who places her in the second circle of Hell resigned for carnal sinners.125 Petrarch and
Boccaccio also find fault with her increasingly voracious sexuality. However, in these later instances,
Semiramis’ immoral sexuality is shown with a different example, an example that demonstrates that she
reached the lowest possible standard of sexual morality— incest with her son Ninyas.126 This will be
discussed in the case study of this chapter.

The excessively sexualised and bloodthirsty Semiramis promoted in Christian sources is perpetuated by
later sources. One such example is recorded in the eighth-century by Moses Khorenats‘i whose History
of Armenia is quite distinct from other traditions we have encountered. Posing as an eyewitness in the
fifth-century, Moses blends the oral Armenian tradition with Greco-Roman and Christian sources to
create a fictitious history of his homeland in the “Golden Age” of Armenian literature.127 In this case,

120
Oros.1.4.7.
121
Oros.1.4.7.
122
Fear 2010: 52 n145.
123
See Revelation 17.1-6.
124
Brumble 1998: 302.
125
Dant. Inf. 5.55.
126
Petr. De viris. 5.45
127
Thomson 1980: 20-61; Darling Young 2018.
24
the Armenian tradition of Semiramis (known as Shamiram) as a sorceress is combined with her
characterisation as a libidinous tyrant found in our Greco-Roman sources.128 Semiramis’ rampant
sexuality is linked with unrequited love for the Armenian king, Ara the Beautiful. As his name suggests,
Ara was renowned for his beauty. So much so that the lascivious Semiramis, before they met, wished to
marry him. However, Semiramis was still married to Ninus. This forced her to conceal her inherent
promiscuity and restricted her agency until her husband fled to Crete, then allowing her to ‘freely parade
her passion’ for the Armenian King.129 It is apparent that this predatory behaviour was innate but hidden,
as Ninus justifies his abandonment of his kingdom after discovering Semiramis’ ‘pernicious and evil way
of life’.130 With Ninus out of the picture, she is able to fully embrace her lifestyle. The Queen sent Ara
gifts and offerings to entice him to Nineveh, ‘either to marry her and reign over the whole empire that
Ninus had ruled, or to satisfy her desires and then return to his own land in peace with magnificent
gifts’.131 When Ara refused, the Babylonian queen was outraged and travelled to his land ‘anxious… to
subject him and dominate him to fulfill her desires’.132 Moses also notes that Semiramis had become
‘madly inflamed simply as if she had already seen him’. 133 During the battle, Ara was slain, despite
Semiramis’ orders for him to be captured alive. ‘Being demented by desire’ and wishing to avoid
continuous warfare with the Armenians, Semiramis attempted to resurrect Ara from the dead. However,
her attempts were unsuccessful and she ordered Ara’s decomposing body to be disposed of in a ditch.134
To quell the locals, Semiramis disguised one of her lovers as Ara and spread the rumour that the gods
had brought Ara back to life, thus convincing the Armenians not to continue the war. After this,
Semiramis ruled over the land for some time all the while eliminating any threats to her power, including
her sons.

Hacikyan comments that in the Armenian tradition Ara and Semiramis are the antithesis of each other.
Ara is a “faithful husband” who remains loyal to his wife Nvard despite Semiramis’ advances and

128
In Armenian legend, Semiramis seems to gain her magical powers by a set of pearls or a talisman. When they are thrown
into the sea the queen is turned into stone. (Mos. Khor.18) Hacikyan also records of another unnamed variation in which
Shamiram used her powers to seduce young men, whom she then killed. Her magic pearls are stolen by an old man, who the
Queen pursues to Lake Van and uses her hair to as a sling to cast a large stone at him but misses, and the pearls are thrown
into the water causing the Queen to lose her power. (Hacikyan 2000: 41)
129
Linguistic similarities have been found with Nectanebo’s desire for Olympias in the Alexander Romance and Diocletian’s
lust for the beautiful Rhipsimē in Agathangelos’ History of the Armenians. (Agath. 140; Thomson 1980: 21, 96n1.)
130
Mos. Khor. 17.
131
Mos. Khor. 15.
132
Mos. Khor. 15.
133
Mos. Khor. 15.
134
Mos. Khor. 15.
25
allurements.135 Ara is patriotic to his country and family, whereas Semiramis is a depraved despot. Thus,
the Armenian tradition preserved by Moses Khorenats‘i is seen to continue the link between sexual
excess and tyranny found in preceding Greco-Roman sources. However, in the end it is a Christian source
so Semiramis gets the Christian treatment. Rather than transforming into a dove mentioned in other
Greco-Roman sources, divine justice is served with her death at the hands of her victims.

It is in the Christian tradition where Semiramis gains the most agency in comparison to previous sources
we have seen. This is clear in the late Byzantine romance The Narrative of Alexander and Semiramis,
the Queen of Syria and Concerning the Eleven Riddles (c. late fourteenth- to early fifteenth-centuries) by
an unknown author.136 In the romance the unknown author plays upon preconceived Christian tropes
associated with the Queen—rampant sexuality linked with violence—and uses them as barriers that the
protagonist, Alexander the Great, must overcome and tame.137 Not only are these themes of sex and
bloodlust retained but are exacerbated by applying the violence of Medusa and the eroticism inspired by
the Alexander Romance under the name of Semiramis.

It has been suggested that this romance was inspired by Alexander’s encounter with Candace of Meroe
in the Alexander Romance.138 Candace, a descendant of Semiramis, is described as a very beautiful
middle-aged widow with three sons, who reminded Alexander of his own mother.139 Disguised as
Antigonus, Alexander met the Queen but was recognized by her from a portrait she had of him and
nothing came of their relationship. This was deemed an unsatisfactory ending for many Byzantine
scholars. Stoneman argues that John Malalas reworked the tale into a story of sexual conquest.140 In his
reworked account, he similarly has a disguised Alexander being foiled by the widowed Candace who
recognized the Macedonian’s physical characteristics. Diverging from the previous tradition, she then
stated ‘Emperor Alexander, you have captured the whole world but one woman has captured you’, and
they wed.141 Since Malalas’ reworked account and the Byzantine romance share common elements of
disguise, identification, and marriage it would seem that Candace has been replaced by Semiramis in

135
Hacikyan 2000: 38, 41.
136
The romance is preserved in two manuscripts: Codex 197 from the Greek Monastry of St. Barlaam at Meteora, and Cod.
Gr. 2122 from the Egyptian Monastery of St. Catherine at Mount Sinai. Translations of these codices can be found in Ulrich
Moennig’s Die Erzählung von Alexander und Semiramis.
137
See Chapter Three, ‘Semiramis and Alexander’.
138
Stoneman 2008: 134.
139
AR 19, 22.
140
Stoneman 2008: 134.
141
Joh. Mal. 8.195.
26
order to add more dramatic elements to the story. A similar interchange in the romance happens with the
well-known legend of Medusa. However, instead of Medusa’s piercing gaze that turns men into stone, it
is Semiramis’ overwhelming physical beauty that leads men to their death.142 By using these two legends
the author could play with the themes of eroticism and sadism that Semiramis was associated with during
this period. This is fully realised from the first moment we are introduced to the Queen in the romance.

In this unique romance, Semiramis retains a persona of ferociousness, intelligence, and self-preservation.
Semiramis, who was in search of a husband and heir, wages that she will marry any suitor who can look
upon her and answer a number of riddles. Stunned by her beauty, none are successful and are put to death
for their ineptitude, their heads displayed on the city gate. Beringer comments that she is a mixture of the
Sphinx, the poser of riddles, and a Gorgon, able to kill at a glance.143 At its core, the romance is a repartee
of intelligence, where an incognito Alexander, like Perseus, out-smarts and tames the monster. Alexander
does this by linguistically deflecting Semiramis’ trickery by correctly answering riddles, and
subsequently taming her through marriage. Indeed, it seems that Alexander was the only appropriate
match to conquer the queen. Moreover, this initial wager demonstrates that she was not opposed to
marriage but would only submit to an equal.144 In her pairing with Alexander, the Queen does not lose
any power. When the two are to be married, Semiramis sends Alexander a letter explicitly subjugating
herself and her kingdom to her beloved. However, she does not revert back to the Semiramis that we
have seen in the first tradition. Instead, Alexander replies, affirming his love for her and submitting
himself to her as well and they live in marital bliss continuing to rule side by side until their death.
Semiramis’ sadistic tendencies abate after their marriage as she never becomes a widow, and so the
audience is left unaware if she would return to her previous way of life.

Conclusion

This chapter has demonstrated that there is a long tradition of Western imaginary associating the Oriental
East as sexually promiscuous and the constructions and receptions of Mesopotamian sexuality may have
supported (or failed to correct) the sexualised image of Semiramis. In the past it has been perpetuated by
scholars, such as Irene Samuel in her frequently cited article Semiramis in the Middle Ages, that a
sexualised Semiramis was purely the product of later sources, particularly in the Medieval period.145

142
Ovid. Met. 4.797.
143
Beringer 2016b:137.
144
Cod. Gr. 2122. 80-86.
145
Samuel 1944.
27
However, this is simply not true. As demonstrated above, Semiramis was associated with a variety of
sexual excesses in a range of early sources. In these sources, two competing traditions arise. The first,
originating from Ctesias in the fourth-century, sees Semiramis as an object of infatuation that causes the
demise of men whilst under patriarchal control. Then, upon widowhood she is liberated and gains greater
agency, both sexually and politically. The competing, and more popular tradition, originating with
Athenaeus, sees Semiramis manifesting greater agency and exhibiting excessive sexual behaviour from
the very beginning. Regardless of the traditions, the Queen’s excessive sexual acts increased over time
as a manifestation of her despotism. Similarly, Oriental discourse is found in later sources on the Queen,
often reciting the same sexual excesses found in the Greco-Roman tradition. However, in these later
sources, focus is placed on Semiramis’ incestuous advances and sexual freedom law. This will now be
analysed in depth as the case study of this chapter.

28
 Part Two: Incest

Figure 6. Johann Zainer der Ältere’s illustration accompanying of Heinrich Steinhöwl’s translation
of Giovanni Boccaccio’s De claris mulieribus [c. 1474], Signatur B-561,1: Rar. 704, b2a.

De Mulieribus Claris (1361-1362), by the famous Florentine writer Giovanni Boccaccio, was the first
collection of biographies in Western literature that was exclusively dedicated to women.146 The work
consists of 106 biographies of historical women, featuring Semiramis as the second woman. Surviving
in over a hundred manuscripts, the collection was the fountainhead of its genre, remaining popular
throughout the Medieval period and inspiring many imitations and vernacular renditions.147 One early
example is Heinrich Steinhöwl’s fifteenth-century German translation of the work. This vernacular
translation increased the availability of this work to a wider audience in this region and was particularly
influential for the later Meisterlieder tradition—a form of didactic poetry of the later Middle High
German period.148 However, the text itself is only one part of the story. The illustrations within, drawn
by Johann Zainer der Ältere under the careful curation of Steinhöwl, are eye-catching to say the least.149

146
Brown 2001: xi.
147
Brown 2001: xxii.
148
This tradition has been examined in Alison Beringer’s 2016 publication Sight of Semiramis: Medieval and Early Modern
Narratives of the Babylonian Queen.
149
Steinhöwl was a local physician, translator, and financial supporter of Johann Zainer’s print shop in Ulm, Germany.
(Domanski 2007: 46-50.)
29
Figure 6, which accompanies the passage on Semiramis, drips with palpable eroticism. Nestled in
between three half-naked women in the midst of de-robing and a statue perched on a base looking on
voyeuristically lies the naked figures of Semiramis and Ninyas tangled in an incestuous embrace. Not
only does this erotic scene refer to Semiramis’ sexual perversion, namely incest, but also how she
domineeringly controls others’ sex lives. This manifests in the three women in the left of the scene that
evoke a monstrous law of complete sexual freedom that was implemented by the Queen as an act of
subterfuge to mask her own rapacious and grotesque sexuality. The purpose of these illustrations, then,
was to emphasise characteristics or acts of the protagonists from the work. Through the inclusion of
incestuous and sexually charged imagery alongside the text, the Babylonian Queen is firmly entrenched
as a figure considered outside the realm of “normal”, a transgressor of normal societal boundaries,
especially sexual ones. Not only is this scene one of perverted morals and bacchic frenzy, but it is also
one of inverted humanity and normality, a “verkehrte Welt” or a topsy-turvy world.150 All previous
restrictions are off: mothers are fornicating with their sons and women are giving into their carnal desires.
In fact, it seems that everyone has traded places and genders, or is at least attempting to. The women in
undergarments allude to the popular Medieval concept of “Battle for the Breeches”—the metaphorical
struggle for power and sexual favours between the sexes.151 Often images of this theme occurred in
overtly moralizing formats, such as “verkehrte Welt”, in which women’s power over men was caricatured
and the overbearing females ridiculed to warn against domineering viragoes, such as Semiramis.152

As demonstrated in the previous half of the chapter, Semiramis is associated with a variety of sexual
excesses and perversions in our sources. Her insatiable libido drives her to engage in multiple sexual acts
with endless lovers, sadistic sex murders, and we even see her charged with bestiality.153 The most
outlandish of these crimes that grabs the attention of our sources is her incest and the law enacted by the
Queen to legalise this criminal act. However, incest and the sexual freedom law was a fairly recent
tradition, but a particularly pervasive one, within the Babylonian Queen’s mythology. In this case study
it will be demonstrated that prominent sources throughout the Late Antique and Medieval periods—St
Augustine, Orosius, Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Chaucer—combine cruelty and immorality to the

150
Domanski 2007: 229.
151
For “Battle of the Breeches” see Peacock 1989: 85; Grössinger 1997: 15-17; Gibson 2009: 226.
152
Peacock 1989: 100, 109; Peacock 1999.
153
Pliny records that Semiramis’ horse was seemingly so human-like that the Babylonian fell in love and had sex with it.
(Plin. HN. 8.64. See Roller 2003: 226n86.) An eleventh-century French manuscript recounts that she fell in love with a bull,
later revealed to be Jupiter. (See Dronke 1970: 66-113; Beringer 2016a: 113-117)
30
charges of sexual excess, manifesting in Semiramis’ incestuous advances towards her son.154 Since these
sources have all been researched extensively and have a strong history of transmission it is apparent that
there has been an unbalanced focus on these actions, particularly in modern scholarship. As such, this
chapter will examine the narrative of incest and the incest law, taking into consideration how it has
perpetuated Semiramis’ reputation as sexually transgressive figure.

Semiramis’ Incest in the Greco-Roman Sources

Associations of Semiramis with incest first appear in Augustan literature. By adding this element to the
narrative, our sources are seen to be engaging with contemporary fascination and abject horror provoked
by incest. In Roman society, like the majority of others throughout history, incest was deemed a cultural
taboo. In Latin literature incestum, deriving from incastum (the antithesis of chastity), was a broad term
for ‘a sense of moral revulsion at specifically polluting forms of sexual intercourse’. 155 These acts were
seen to disrupt the family, wider society, natural order as well as the pax deorum and, as such, were seen
to be a form of religious pollution as well as corruption of social norms.156 As such, the punishment for
this crime was duly harsh with the culprits executed by being flung from the Tarpeian Rock, a method
reserved for especially heinous crimes.157 This harsh punishment was inflicted upon anyone that went
against the ius gentium, the common set of moral and legal doctrines that bound Roman citizens and all
civilized people.158

Despite being a cultural taboo, incest held an intense fascination for Greco-Roman society. This is
evidenced by the numerous tales of incest in ancient literature, such as plays and political discourses that
were a socially appropriate outlet to explore the topic—the most famous being Oedipus. During the
Roman Empire, false allegations and malicious gossiping of consanguineous relationships ran rampant
in the histories and biographies of Roman emperors. For example, both Nero and Caligula are said to
have seduced their sisters, Domitian his niece, and Nero was rumoured to have infamously succumbed
to illicit relations with his own mother, Agrippina.159 These charges were a means of isolating and
externalising an enemy.160 As such, these figures were often associated with barbarism and tyranny, with

154
Petr. TL. 3.76-78; Bocc. FW. 2; Dant. Inf. 5.55; Chauc. MLW. 358-59; Chauc. PF. 279-94.
155
Shaw 1992: 169.
156
Moreau 2002; Lennon 2013: 57, 71.
157
Tac. 6.19.1.
158
Justinian, Digest 23.68.
159
Suet. Cal. 23, 24; Suet. Cl. 26, 39; Suet. Dom. 22; Suet. Nero. 28.
160
Lennon 2013: 73.
31
incest as an expression of their excess, impropriety and loss of control.161 Females in any position of
power or liminal status as well as individuals of the barbaric Other were often targeted with these
allegations.162 Semiramis was one such individual who was not immune to this treatment in this period.

The first time we encounter the story of incest is in the fragmentary remains of the Diegeseis by the
Augustan mythographer Konon, persevered in Photius. The Diegeseis were a collection of fifty stories
mostly concerning foundation myths and aetiologies, employing a combination of quasi-historical
anecdotes, paradoxography, fables, and parables.163 According to Photius, it was dedicated to Archelaus
Philopatris who ruled Cappadocia from 36 BCE to 17 CE. 164 Other than this, nothing further is known
about Konon. Then sometime in the ninth-century, the Diegeseis was summarized by Photius (c.810-
c.893), an important Byzantine intellectual who had twice held the patriarchal throne in Constantinople.
His Bibliotheca includes “reviews” of 280 books that Photius had read and was produced at the request
of his brother Tarasius, who seems to have had a propensity for Near Eastern works, in preparation for
the patriarch’s absence while on a diplomatic mission. Wilson speculates that the Bibliotheca was
composed in a hurry with the contents not in any perceivable order and was sent off unfinished and
unrefined to his brother either when time came to leave Constantinople, or because his mission was called
off, and that there was no longer a need for the text.165 Nevertheless, the text was not published until
1601, nor was it widely circulated until this date.166

It has been noted by Hawes that the stories included in the Diegeseis tend to be obscure, demonstrating
that Konon preferred little-known variants and peculiar details.167 We see this same focus on peculiarity
with the account of Semiramis. In this source, Semiramis is said to have ‘in secret and unwittingly’ had
intercourse with her son, with Konon remaining silent on how this curious set of circumstances came
about.168 Upon discovery of this incestuous crime, Semiramis openly took Ninyas as her husband. Now
lawful, it was adopted as a tradition of the Medes and Persians.169 However, it seems that this tradition

161
Pagden 1986: 82; Moreau 2002: 29-52; Isaac 2004: 210-211, 379.
162
Gera 1997: 82. See Bigwood (2009) who demonstrates that the common citation of Achaemenid incest lack evidence,
indicating that it was a motif associated with the tropes of barbarism.
163
Lightfoot 2005: 299.
164
Hawes 2014: 138.
165
Wilson 1994: 3.
166
Wilson 1994: 18-20.
167
Hawes 2014: 138.
168
Phot. Bibl. 186.9.
169
John Malalas (sixth-century) and Constantine Manasses (twelfth-century) recount a slightly different tradition. (Joh. Mal
1.10; Const. Man. 550.) They attribute the tradition of close-kin marriage to Ninyas and Semiramis; however, Ninyas is said
to be the lustful instigator.
32
may have not originated with Semiramis. Photius remarks that Konon ascribes everything that is usually
associated with Atossa—another militaristic, cross-dressing, and Eastern queen—to Semiramis.170 He
was also unsure ‘whether he thought the woman was called by two names or whether he did not know
the stories about Semiramis in another way’.171 We see a similar conflation between these two figures
perpetuated in Caster of Rhodes and Eusebius who both have them ruling together as well as Claudian
who seems to have completely mixed them up.172 Prompting this conflation was the similarities in their
association with inventions as well as their use of clothing to mask their gender and retain power.173
However, Atossa is never associated with incest, instead it seems to be a tradition purely associated with
Semiramis.

Solely associating the incest story with the Babylonian Queen is Justin’s Epitome of Pomepius Trogus’
Philippic Histories. In this work it is apparent that the allegation of incest forms a larger discussion about
her refusal to follow convention and morality. This is manifested in a number of ways in the text and in
other sources. These include her adoption of clothing normally worn by a man, the way she becomes a
sexual predator, and her maternal love that gets reworked as erotic love. This refraction of Semiramis
was highly influential to later Christian authors, such as Orosius, who heavily relied upon
Justin/Pompeius. However, despite the importance and popularity of the epitome, surviving in over two
hundred manuscripts, little is known about either of the authors. The only concrete evidence is that
Pompeius Trogus was a Romanized Gaul writing sometime during the Augustan period and that
sometime after this, the forty-four volumes of the work were epitomized by the Latin historian Justin,
otherwise known as Marcus Junianius Justinus.174 The Philippic Histories, as the title suggests, records
the history of the Macedonian Empire and the Near East. Written in Latin, it concentrates on the deeds
and behaviour of kings and tyrants, as well as the nature of imperialism and succession.175 It is apparent
that Justin took liberties in his epitome of the work for the sake of intrigue and amusement and thus the
version we have is quite different to Pompeius’ original.176

170
For Atossa see Gera 1997: 141-150.
171
Phot. Bibl. 186.9
172
FGrH 250 F1d; Eusb. Chron. 583; Claud. Eutr. 1. 339-42.
173
According to Hellanicus (ADM 7) the Persian Queen was the inventor of eunuchs and wore tiara and trousers to hide her
gender. A similar tradition has Semiramis also using clothing to hide her gender and masquerade as her son to rule. (Just.
Epit. 1.2)
174
Develin 1994: 2-3.
175
Develin 1994: 6-10.
176
See Yardley 2016.
33
One such example is the incest story added to Semiramis’ account. Linguistic analysis has determined
that it was an insertion of Justin, seemingly independent to Konon, and dates to a post-Augustan age.177
More specifically, the phrase concubitum filii petisset shares linguistic parallels to poetry and post-
Augustan prose, often in instances of incest.178 As such, dramatic flair is added to the account by
recounting Semiramis’ attempt to have sexual relationship with her son in the last line of the section on
the Queen.179 Whether this act was consummated or not is unspecified by Justin, leaving it open to
uncertainty and speculation. What is interesting about this account is that incest is the only sexual
transgression mentioned by Justin. Other instances of Semiramis’ sexual excess found in the Bibliotheca
Historica, such as her numerous lovers and their execution, are not found in this account. In Justin’s
account, focus is placed on maintaining power rather than her indulgence in immorality. Riley supports
this stance, arguing that softer rather than harsher language is used to demonstrate that Semiramis was
‘so obsessed with keeping power that she seeks to hold it through a sexual relationship with her son and
so ensures a hardy line of successors strengthened by her genes’.180 As such, we see concubitum, meaning
sexual intercourse, being used over a more pejorative term such as stuprum which indicates a debauched
relationship. This is further reinforced with the two other uses of concubitum in the work. In both
instances, it is used to describe Thalestris, the Amazonian Queen, requesting to have sex with Alexander
in order to conceive a super-warrior child.181

By becoming his mother’s lover, Ninyas is effeminized, and Semiramis takes on the traditional male-
gendered role of the pursuer in romantic relationships. However, Semiramis was not able to retroactively
justify her actions with marriage or law in the same way as Konon. This is because, as remarked by
Justin, during this ancient period people were bound by will and not laws.182 Instead, the inversion of
natural order was corrected in the only other possible way: through the Queen’s violent death at the hands
of her son. Within the whole scheme of the work, Riley shows that Semiramis’ incestuous advances act
as a cautionary tale of female power. At the same time, it also reinforces female rectitude.183 Semiramis,
as the first woman in the work, initiates these themes of female ambition and overbearing mothering that
are then reemphasized by the other seven women in Book One.184 This was particularly relevant to its

177
Yardley 2016: 118-119.
178
Ov. Rem. Am. 399; Ov. Met. 4.206-207; Sen. Ag. 30; Hyg. Fab. 189.2; Suet. Nero. 28.2.
179
Just. Epit. 2.10.
180
Riley 2002: 98, 107.
181
Just. Epit. 12.3.6 (propter expetitum cubitum); 42.3.7 (concubitum Alexandri petisse). See Baynham 2001 for the complex
nature of this episode.
182
Just. Epit. 1.1.
183
Riley 2002.
184
Just. Epit. 1.4.1-8, 1.4.9-12, 1.7.1, 1.7.15-19, 1.8. 2-13, 1.9.15-18, 1.10.14.
34
post-Augustan setting which saw imperium being held by a single individual. As such, incest
demonstrated that Semiramis, like the other women in the work, were not suitable to enter to the political
sphere.

Semiramis’ Incest in the Late Antique and Christian Sources

In Late Antiquity, under Christian dominance, the incest story gets taken up with renewed vigour. During
this period, moral reflections of ecclesiastical writers influenced harsher restrictions and wider definitions
of consanguinity in comparison to previous Roman conceptions. The most influential of these writers
were St Augustine and Ambrose in the fifth- and sixth-centuries, however their reflections were not yet
codified in law. In the Frankish kingdom during the sixth- to seventh-centuries, these views started being
debated in a small number of legal cases and ecclesiastical gatherings, but no clear definition or law was
formulated.185 It was not until the Carolingian period in the ninth-century that codified laws concerning
restriction on marriages came into practice. Christian dogma defined marriage as a permanent legal union
and ecclesiastical ritual undertaken before God which was largely based on New Testament texts, and
rulings by Church Councils, and Church Fathers (in particular St Augustine).186 Marriages were
prohibited up to the seventh degree of consanguinity, with degrees counted in steps between relatives
passing through a common ancestor or ‘as far as memory could go back’.187 To make things even more
complicated, consanguinity included spiritual relationships such as godparents and their family, and
extra-marital bonds. Due to the complicated nature involved with calculating familial ties, a number of
texts were created to help explain marriage prohibitions to avoid incest.188 During this period we likewise
see an increased interest in the legal and moral nature of Semiramis’ incest. Not only does she commit
incest with her son, but she retroactively creates a law to make her actions legal.

The story of how Roman conceptions of consanguinity became more restricted begins with St Augustine.
As previously mentioned, incest plays an important role within this work that will become influential to
later theological discussions and codification of marriage laws. Complying with Biblical scripture,
Augustine’s The City of God states that incest was a necessary and acceptable way for Adam and Noah
to reconstitute the human race in the antediluvian ages.189 However, in later biblical history this practice
was unacceptable and deemed an infraction of the divine law labelled by Augustine as one of the

185
De Jong 1989.
186
Duby 1978; Bof and Leyser 2016.
187
De Jong 1986: 41.
188
Rapp 2016: 231-235.
189
August. De civ. D. 12.
35
‘miseries and evils to which the human race is subject to as a result of the first sin’. 190 By placing
Semiramis as a contemporary to Abraham, Augustine subjects the Queen to these regulations of morals
and laws governed by the Church. He clarifies Justin’s ambiguous assertion and records that Semiramis
did indeed commit incest with her son stating that she ‘dared to pollute him, her son, by incestuous
embrace’.191 By doing this, Semiramis is seen to defy these regulations, eschew correct morality and, as
the ruler of Babylon, epitomize the wickedness and perversion of the antithetical City of God. To which
Archibald states ‘and what more appalling perversion, for a queen and a mother, than to exploit her
tyrannical status by seducing her own son?’192 To reinforce this Augustine relates Ninyas’ matricide
which, in relation to the contemporary setting, is clearly justified in moral terms.

Contemporary to Augustine, the priest and historian, Orosius, also included a narrative of Semiramis in
his The Seven Books of History against the Pagans, covering the deeds of humanity from creation until
his own day in the first quarter of the fifth-century.193 Surviving in 249 manuscripts and extracts, Orosius’
Histories Against the Pagans was continually read throughout the Western Middle Ages and formed the
dominant template for the writing of history in the Medieval period.194 Unlike those before him, Orosius
was writing a secular history from a Christian perspective. Whilst differing from Augustine’s City of God
in this way, Orosius did draw upon elements found in the work. He built upon the image of a degenerate
Babylon personified by the transgressive sexual pleasures of Semiramis by deriving inspiration from the
Whore of Babylon from Revelation.195 Working from Justin and Augustine, he emphasises the Queen’s
abhorrent promiscuity and lust with unmatched vigour and zeal.196 This fervour is maintained throughout
the account. For example, he states that Semiramis ‘lived amid unending fornication and murder’.197 To
reinforce this, he adds the story of the Queen having many lovers, further dramatizing it to also include
her detaining the men as prostitutes and then killing them after ‘enjoying pleasures of the flesh’.198
Orosius also adds that during these promiscuous exploits Semiramis illicitly conceived a son who she
then exposed. However, the pinnacle of these libidinous actions was reached when she unwittingly
committed incest with this son, and upon learning of this transgression covered her ‘personal disgrace’

190
August. De civ. D. 15; Shell 1988: 30.
191
August. De civ. D. 18.2.
192
Archibald 2001a: 47-48.
193
In Fulgentius’ On Ages of the World and of Man, greatly indebted to Orosius, Semiramis knowingly commit incest with
Ninyas and marries him. Demonstrating an inherited progression of adultery. (Fulg. De aetatibus. 3.)
194
See Rohrbacher 2002: 148-149.
195
Fear 2010: 52n145.
196
Samuel 1944: 34; Newman 1996: 98; Archibald 2001a: 39.
197
Oros. 1.4.7.
198
Oros. 1.4.7.
36
by retroactively legitimizing her crime by endorsing complete sexual freedom for her subjects.199 The
law entailed that there should be ‘none of the natural reverence between parents and their children when
it came to seeking a spouse and that everyone should be free to act as he pleased.’200 By doing this, she
inflicted her monstrous crime and unnatural proclivities upon the whole empire. Moreover, differing
from Augustine’s account, Orosius omits Ninyas’ matricide or attempted matricide (nor is Ninyas even
mentioned by name). By removing any instance of matricide, Ninyas appears to be complicit to the crime,
worsening the whole ordeal. This is the lasting impression we have of the queen, her tyranny and
lasciviousness combining to control the sex lives of her subjects.

The popularity and wide readership of the Histories Against the Pagans is also demonstrated by its
abridgment and translation into Old English in the ninth-century and an Arabic translation a century
later.201 The Old English version of Orosius was produced by an unknown Anglo-Saxon author and is
sometimes erroneously attributed to Alfred the Great.202 The work was adapted to suit an Anglo-Saxon
audience by shortening the length, adding explanations and rationalizations, as well as adopting a more
objective but still Christian tone.203 The Semiramis that appears in this text is an extremely feminine one,
prone to emotional outbursts and manipulations through her body. For example, Semiramis is described
as inciting Ninus to war with her lusts and once she took the throne invaded Ethiopia with wiflice nið or
‘womanly spite’.204 The account still contains all the other manifestations of lust and we see the Queen
committing ‘manifold illicit intercourse with most immeasurable wickedness’ by bedding and then
killing anyone she discovered to be of royal blood.205 The account concludes with Semiramis knowingly
committing incest with her son, and establishing the acceptance of incest to get around the condemnation
of subjects.

This depiction of Semiramis aligns with Anglo-Saxon thoughts of leadership, especially the problematic
state of queens following the rule of Queen Eadburh, a divisive figure.206 The ninth-century Welsh monk,
Asser, lists the Queen’s transgressions in his Life of Alfred recounting such crimes as tyrannically
controlling and poisoning her husband King Beorhtric of Wessex and his advisors. Moreover, after

199
Oros. 1.4.7-8.
200
Oros. 1.4.8.
201
Pucci 591
202
See Batley 2015.
203
Kretzschmar 1987.
204
OE. 1.2. 22/8-28.
205
OE. 1.2. 22/8-28.
206
Klein 2006: 12-13.
37
offending Charlemagne she was committed to a nunnery where she was later caught not keeping to her
vows of chastity and was kicked out onto the streets.207 These actions were deemed so bad and
reprehensible that ‘all the inhabitants of that land swore en masse that they would never allow any king
to reign over them who chose to command his queen to sit beside him in his lifetime, on the royal
throne’.208 Consequently, heavy restrictions were put in place to limit female power. For example, the
term for queen, cwen, was rarely given to a king’s wife, and a woman could only gain this position
through marriage as a consort.209 In the Old English version of Orosius we see Semiramis conforming to
these notions of irresponsible queenship. Like Eadburh, Semiramis’ power is expressed in terms of
excessive and deviant lust demonstrating the dangerous potential of extreme and undiluted female
power.210 This includes the dangers of female sexuality, which could result in such atrocities as incest.

Semiramis’ Incest in the Medieval Period

During the Medieval period, we notice a similar interest in incest coinciding with the revival of Greaco-
Roman myths. Moreover, the definition of the crime and its seriousness continued to be a matter of
contention. Whilst restrictions on consanguineous relations continued to be imposed by the Church,
incest was also endorsed as the exemplary sin—péché monstreux—where sinners could only be saved by
repentance and the magnitude of God’s grace.211 We see this reflected in a range of literature, particularly
in romance genres, produced during this period. In these sources, various incestuous stories were
circulated with incest either being unwittingly committed, purposefully committed, or realised at the last
minute.212 In general, when incest was committed, males often achieved high spiritual status after
repenting their sins, whereas females would only ever be reaccepted into society. In the case of the most
serious close-kin crime, mother-son incest, the son often retreated from the world, repented and was
sanctified whereas the mother would confess at the last minute, be absolved, and then die.213

This period also marks a shift away from previous notions of incest as a manifestation of barbarian,
pagan, heretical, tyrannical, or animalistic behaviour. Rather it was believed to be an overwhelming

207
Asser. Al. 14-15.
208
Asser. Al. 13.
209
Klein 2006: 10; Stafford 2006: 144.
210
Walker 2016: 72.
211
Archibald 1999; Archibald 2001a: 27.
212
Forker 1989; Archibald 2001b.
213
Archibald 1999: 168.
38
emotion and evil that could strike anyone, even virtuous Christians.214 This was particularly the case for
women, who were perceived as constant sources of temptation and prone to lust. Christian men, in
contrast, did not have these same faults. Therefore, we see a relative lack of interest in male aggressors
of lust and incest. This is most evident in the Oedipus myth, in which the political implications of incest
overpower the act itself.215 Nevertheless, Classical sources remained as the authoritative sources for such
matters, and well-known stories of incest and lust continued to circulate.216 Sources such as Ovid and
Juvenal were plundered for characters demonstrating the dangers of lust, such as Myrrha, Phaedra,
Canace, and Byblis.217 Sourced from Justin and his legacy, Semiramis was also another character that
was popular for these purposes.218 We see her being listed among other infamous sexually immoral
figures in the works of dominant authors of the period: Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, and Chaucer.219 This
no doubt firmly entrenched Semiramis within the stereotype as the epitome of Babylonian vice and
uncontrollable female desire within the popular imagination.

The impact of St Augustine and Paulus Orosius in setting the foundations of a sexually excessive
Semiramis cannot be stressed enough.220 One of the most pervasive sources to latch onto this construction
of the Babylonian Queen was the immensely influential Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri (c. 1265-321),
which has the richest manuscript tradition for any Medieval vernacular work surviving in over eight-
hundred extant manuscripts.221 Through her association with prostitution, bestiality, castration, cross-
dressing, and incest, we find the Babylonian Queen confined to the second circle of the Inferno reserved
for carnal sinners who ‘subject their reason to their lust’. 222 As punishment they are ceaselessly hounded
by the terrible winds of a violent storm. The defining figure of this canto is the scandalous Francesca da
Rimini who, inspired by the romances of Arthurian legend, re-enacted the erotic embrace of Lancelot
and Guinevere with her brother-in-law Paolo Malatesta. Caught in the act of this adultery, the couple
were murdered by her deformed husband Giovanni Malatesta.223 In comparison, Semiramis is reduced
to an ancillary figure, the first of a catalogue of other great literary figures who succumbed, often fatally,

214
Archibald 2001b: 231.
215
See Archibald 2001a.
216
Pampinella-Cropper 2012; Forker 1989:
217
Archibald 2001b: 68.
218
Samuel 1944: 33. Semiramis is found in Ovid but her incest is not mentioned. (Ov. Am. 5.10)
219
Petr. TL. 3.76-78; Bocc. FW. 2; Dant. Inf. 5.55; Chauc. MLT. 358-59.
220
Samuel 1944: 33; Marchesi 2018: 128.
221
Shaw 2019.
222
Dant. Inf. 5.37.
223
Ledda 2019: 34.
39
to lust.224 They include Dido, Cleopatra, Helen, Achilles, Paris, and Tristan. The presence of Semiramis
in this list is interesting because Phaedra, a figure made famous for her incestuous advances, would have
been more appropriate choice. Not only is she a more infamous figure associated with incestuous
behaviour, but ‘impious’ Phaedra is also the first shade encountered in Aeneid VI during Aeneas’ descent
into the underworld.225 Since this passage of Vergil’s Aeneid formed the geography of the Inferno, we
see Dante discarding and replacing figures from the Aeneid—Semiramis instead of Phaedra. A possible
reason that influenced this substitution was the concept of the translatio studii et imperii (transfer of
learning and power).226 According to this concept, power and knowledge were seen to be inherited from
East to West in a linear narrative that was divinely ordained. Marchesi identifies the catalogue of sinners
in Inferno V working in the same way starting from the ancient east with Semiramis the biblical queen
of Babylon, to the Tyrian/Carthaginian Dido, and the Egyptian Cleopatra. In the second part of the
catalogue, this is continued with Helen, Paris, and Achilles (Greek and Trojan characters), passing
through Tristan (a knight of the Round Table), to reach the contemporary Italian lovers Paolo and
Francesca.227 As such, Semiramis was deemed an appropriate figure to start off this linear progression as
she was both Near Eastern and associated with incestuous carnal desire. Thus, she replaced Phaedra.

When Semiramis is mentioned, Dante identifies her lussuria (lechery or wantonness) as her sin that
consigns her to the second circle. He states:

“The first of those about whom you wish to learn,” he said to me then, “was empress over
many languages. She was so given to lechery that she made lust licit in her law, to take away
the blame she had incurred. She is Semiramis, of whom we read that she succeeded Ninus
and was his wife; she held the land the Sultan rules.228

However, it is not her rapacious and often fatal sex life that is being referred to, but rather the ‘vice of
lust that in her laws made licit’.229 Virtually quoted from Orosius, this alludes to her legalization of sexual
freedom to mask her crime of incest.230 As such, emphasis is placed on the Queen’s self-exculpation—
the legislation that negated sexual restraint rather than the act of incest itself. The magnitude of this crime

224
Kay 2019: 143-145.
225
Verg. Aen. 6.451; Jacoff 1988: 133.
226
Marchesi 2018: 134.
227
Marchesi 2018: 134.
228
Dant. Inf. 5.37.52-58.
229
Dant. Inf. 5.37.52-58. Archibald argues that because Dante is not specific with Semiramis’ crimes that the story of her
incest and infamous marriage law were well known. (Archibald 2001a: 41)
230
Orosius’ ‘ut cuique libitum esset iberum fieret’ becomes ‘libitio fé licito un sua legge’. (Oros. 1.4.8)
40
is also demonstrated with Semiramis’ description as ‘the empress over many languages’.231 By indicating
the sheer size of her empire that is big enough to contain different languages she is seen to inflict this
crime upon a vast amount of people, rather than just her son. Her actions have severe ramifications that
change the course of history, similar to the other figures that accompany her. Thus, a clear juxtaposition
is created for Semiramis between political power and sexual transgressions, similar to the other women
in the circle.232

Contemporary to Dante were two other literary giants of the Medieval period: Francesco Petrarca
(otherwise known as Petrarch) and Giovanni Boccaccio.233 These figures promoted a new appreciation
and acceptance of Greco-Roman literature, pioneering the humanist movement. In the works of Petrarch
we see similar female figures being associated with some, but not all, versions of Semiramis. The
Babylonian Queen could be compartmentalised into two versions, one in which she displays admirable
masculine strengths and another where she displays all the negative traits associated with femininty.
These divisions could be selectively emphasised or omitted by Petrarch to suit the current need. As will
be discussed in Chapter Three, despite being female, Semiramis is included in De viris illustribus, a
catalogue of famous men throughout history.234 In this work, the Queen is applauded for her militaristic,
masculine traits and her lustful ways are somewhat excluded and rationalized in order to be a suitable
entry into the work. In this sense, these actions are gendered female, an example of feminine excess. At
the same time, she is denigrated in other works for these same feminine attributes. One such work is the
Trionfi—a series of poems evoking a Roman triumph in which famous figures from history processed in
honour of the allegorical figures Love, Chastity, Death, Fame, Time, and Eternity. In the Triumph of
Love, Semiramis is listed alongside two other individuals, Byblis and Myrrha, ‘whose love was evil’ and
‘oppressed with shame for their unlawful and distorted love’.235 These figures have been linked together
for their infamous acts of incest. Yet, in the same work the four poems later, Triumph of Fame, Semiramis
is applauded for her valour as a warrior-queen. As such, we see very different versions of Semiramis
appearing in his work—sometimes within the same one. Nevertheless, it is clear that like Dante,
Semiramis’ lust was a point of condemnation in her character.

231
Dant. Inf. 5.54.
232
Jacoff 1988: 132.
233
See Kircher 2015; Bernado 2016.
234
Petr. De viris. 5.
235
Petr. TL. 3.76-78.
41
It is apparent that Petrarch’s De viris illustribus had a lasting influence on the reception and
reinterpretation of the Classical tradition in the Medieval period. This was especially the case for fellow
Renaissance humanist, Giovanni Boccaccio, who regarded Petrarch as a model writer and scholar.236
This is typified in Boccaccio’s modelling of the De mulieribus claris (1361-1362), a catalogue of the
deeds of famous pagan women, to Petrarch’s catalogue on famous men, De viris illustribus.237 Despite
being based on Petrarch’s work, which largely omits any extant reference to Semiramis’ incest,
Boccaccio’s De mulierbius claris brings Semiramis’ sexuality to the fore. The Babylonian Queen
features as the second woman in the work who inherits the sins and consequences of the first woman,
Eve—a woman born to greatness but through feminine fickleness (levitate feminea) who foolishly
(stolide) succumbed to the Devil’s temptation and committed the original sin.238 As such, Holderness
argues that the Babylonian Queen equated to the second fall or failing of the female sex. To demonstrate
this, Semiramis’ positive manly traits are first emphasised but are, in Boccaccio’s words, ‘undone in the
end by her innate feminine licentiousness’.239 The failures of the Queen are recounted in immense detail,
including all varying accounts of her sexual debauchery. These actions are strictly gendered female and,
as such, are seen to be the product of her unbridled femininity. However, not only is she seen to be a
figure of feminine excess, but also a figure who controls the sex lives of all around her. These sexual
transgressions, as well as her desire to control people’s sexual habits, combine and culminate in incest
and the legislation of her crimes. In the end this transgression results in her death at the hands of her son.

After recounting Semiramis’ manly achievements, that are lauded in the first half of the bipartite
structure, this praise quickly turns to chastisement: ‘with one unspeakable act of seduction Semiramis
stained [all her accomplishments]’.240 The proceeding narrative centres on the Babylonian Queen’s
sexual excess that is unfalteringly categorized as female. Semiramis’ downfall is blamed on her ‘carnal
desire’ which she shares with other members of her sex.241 Boccaccio details Semiramis’ downfall in
prurient detail relating her tales of incest, nymphomania, the murder of her lovers, and finally her own
murder by her son and lover Ninyas. These sexual excesses are often linked with gender inversion. By
providing multiple versions concerning her sexuality Boccaccio perpetuates this tradition of excess.242

236
Kolsky 2004: 39.
237
McLeod 1991: 62; Zak 2015: 141.
238
Bocc. FW. 1.
239
Holderness 2004: 97.
240
Bocc. FW. 2.8.
241
Bocc. FW. 2.8.
242
Kolsky 2004: 160.
42
 Figure 7. Portrait of Semiramis holding a chastity belt, Hartmann Schedel,
Nuremburg Chronicle (Nuremberg: Anton Koberger, 1493), fol. 29r.
Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Rar. 287, fol. 29r.
The first of the many stories ascribed to Semiramis is her establishment of the law that lifted any sexual
restraint of her subjects, including her ‘beastly’ relationship with her son.243 Semiramis’ incest is an
extension of the gender inversion, by taking an active role in the sexual relationship she unnaturally
dominates and emasculates him.244 In Justin it was unclear if this consanguineous relationship was ever
consummated or not, whereas Boccaccio takes care to clarify that the incest did occur, thereby worsening
her actions and crime.245 To further play upon this overbearing characterisation of the Queen, she is
attributed the invention of a form of chastity belt the femoralium, Medieval Latin for breeches, which
she is said to have girdled (cinxit) the females of the household to prevent them ‘stealing her son from
her bed’ (Figure 7).246 This further serves as an element of gender reversal as chastity belts were
envisioned as being utilised by husbands in an attempt to control their wives fidelity.247 As such, as stated

243
Bocc. FW. 2.13.
244
Phillippy 1986: 184.
245
Beringer 2016a: 69.
246
MLLM s.v. ‘femoralia’. This unusual part of the narrative can also be found in Boccaccio’s Teseida (7.50 gloss). Beringer
identifies an image of Semiramis holding a chastity belt in Hartmann Schedel’s 1493 Nuremberg Chronicle. (Beringer 2016a:
70n53) However, peculiarly, the belt is not mentioned in his account of the Queen (Figure 7).
247
Classen’s study of the chastity belt in the Medieval period has demonstrated that it was a myth that was largely perpetuated
by eighteenth-century audiences due to its ‘highly curious and salacious nature which might titillate so many an uninformed
reader… evokes numerous images about devious practices, falsely confirming negative evaluations of the past, yet inciting
the erotic fantasy’. (Classen 2007: 17) This promulgation continued up until modern day, taking on a mythic quality not
43
by Archibald, the chastity belt is ‘a mark of her monstrous and perverted nature, and her tyrannical abuse
of power’.248

Another reason for the creation of this law is adapted from Orosius and has her copulating then killing
her many lovers to hide her crimes.249 However, these crimes were occasionally revealed through illicit
pregnancies, therefore the law was put into place to decriminalize her actions. Quilligan argues that
Semiramis is the ‘primal scandal of female shame’ as she does not feel any ill-repute for these actions
and uses her political power to cover her criminal deeds.250 However, this was not always the case. In an
earlier work by Boccaccio, his Teseida (c.1340-1341) written more than twenty years prior, it was shame
imposed by her subjects that drove the Queen to implement the law rather than a desire to hide her
immoral crimes.251 The Teseida consisted of a main storyline and contains supplementary textual glosses
giving further information and description on elements within the work. In one of these textual glosses,
a painting inside a Temple of Venus on Mount Cithaeron is described in immense detail. In the course
of describing the Queen he states:

But although she was otherwise a valiant woman, she was nonetheless enkindled by such a
fire of Venus, that perceiving that her son Ninus was such a comely youth, she went to lie
with him and kept him hidden among her damsels…Finally, when the sin which she had
indulged in for a long time was discovered, and she learned that people talked about her to
her shame, she made a law to remove her shame, decreeing that whatever lewd acts gave
anyone pleasure were lawful.252

In this way, the earlier version of Semiramis expresses remorse to better link her with the accompanying
figures also depicted inside the temple who were tragically afflicted by Venus’ fire: Pyramus and Thisbe,
Hercules and Iole, as well as Biblis and Cauno.253 Other than this notable discrepancy, many of the

matching the historical reality presented by museum artefacts. This has been further reinforced by a more recent study by Ley
which has shown that whilst the chastity belt may have been a figment of fifteenth-century imagination, their actual use was
in the Renaissance and only in rare circumstances. (Ley 2012: 176-177) It was in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-centuries that
these objects appeared as curiosities, jokes, or anti-masturbation devices. (See M.574 in the British Museum.) Moreover,
when it does appear in literature prior to this date it is used as largely anecdotal fashion or in burlesque fiction.
248
Archibald 2001a: 44.
249
Cf. Bocc. FW. 2.17; Orosius. 1.4.7.
250
Quilligan 1991: 89.
251
Bocc. Tes. 7.50 gloss.
252
Bocc. Tes. 7.50 gloss.
253
Chaucer, in his Parlement of Foules, is seen to combine elements of Boccaccio’s description of the temple of Venus with
Dante’s Inferno V to emphasise a combination of love and death. (Smarr 1998: 116.) To the pre-existing list of lovers in the
temple of Venus, Chaucer adds six more names, most of which are taken from Inferno V. The figures include: Semiramis,
Pyramus and Thisbe, Hercules and Iole, Biblis and Cauno, Dido, Tristam and Isaude, Paris, Achilles, Helen, Cleopatra,
Troilus, Silla, and the mother of Romulus. (Chauc. PF. 281-294.)
44
elements in this text will remain the same in the De mulieribus claris, including her retroactive incest
law.

It is this law over the actual act of incest that spurs Ninyas to kill his mother. Again, numerous reasons
are suggested for Ninyas’ actions. Boccaccio states ‘[Ninyas] could not bear to see others share in that
incest that he thought to be his alone, or because his mother’s excesses brought him shame, or perhaps
because he feared the birth of children who would succeed to the throne.’254 The multiple motivations
for Ninyas’ matricide stresses the criminal nature of her actions and its severe ramifications that are seen
to influence not only her son, but her people, and future generations of the empire. As such, Ninyas
selflessly acts for the greater good and eliminates the monstrous Queen to restore moral and public
order.255 This is also reinforced in another tradition stated by Boccaccio that has Ninyas killing
Semiramis ‘stricken with desire’ in her older age when she summoned him to bed.256 The mere attempt
of the act was enough to incite matricide.

We also see Semiramis’ incest briefly alluded to in Boccaccio’s De casibus virorum illustrium (1356 to
1360 and revised in 1373) recounting the biographies of famous men and women, from Adam and Eve
to present-day individuals, who had metaphorically fallen on Fortune's wheel. This work was incredibly
popular and was translated and adapted numerous times, first by the French ecclesiastic clerk, Laurent
de Premierfait (13807-1418). Not only did he translate the work in 1400, and then again in 1409 as De
Cas de Nobles Hommes et Femmes, but he greatly expanded upon the work. Budra notes that the result
of this was a translation that was ‘so free that it should probably be considered a new work’.257 The two
lines in the original texts were expanded upon by de Premierfait, adding biographic information about
Semiramis as well as recounting her incestuous advances towards her son.258 It was this French
translation that became known in England and was translated by John Lydgate into English titled Fall of
Princes between 1432 and 1438, and was published under Boccaccio’s name. Lydgate pledged to stay
true to the version, and as such focused on the Babylonians’ Queen’s rampant sexuality found in de
Premierfait’s version. This is evident in the following:

Queen off Assirie and wiff to kyng Nynus,

And be discent douhter to Neptunus,
254
Bocc. FW. 2.18.
255
Dulac 1978: 320.
256
Bocc. FW. 2.16.
257
Budra 2016: 6.
258
Cf. Bocc. De cas. 1. Fo.XII; de Premierfait.18.26-27.
45
 Semiramis called in hir daies,
Which off all men wolde make assaies.

She nouther spared straunger nor kynreede;

Hir owne sone wat nat sat a-side,
But with hym hadde knowlechyng in deede,
Off which the sclaundre wente abrod ful wide,
For with on man she koude nat a-bide,
Such a fals lust was vpon hir fall,
In hir corage to haue a-do with all.259

Through the popular works of Boccaccio, Laurent de Premierfait, and John Lydgate, it is clear that the
tale of incest associated with Semiramis has remained a point of intrigue that was consistently included
and perpetuated throughout the De casibus tradition. The popularity of these works greatly influenced
the conceptions of the lustful Semiramis as a sexually transgressive figure, particularly in the popular
imagination in Late Medieval England.260

This misogynistic narrative of Boccaccio was completely upturned by Christine de Pizan in her 1405
work The Book of the City of Ladies. De Pizan created a metaphorical, utopian city to protect womenkind
from the misogyny of men by collecting and using an array of historical women as the building blocks.
In order to justify Lady Reason’s selection of Semiramis as the foundation stone of this city, Christine
rationalizes and explains her incest.261 Instead of being contemporary with Abraham, Christine, taking
Boccaccio’s description of the Queen as ‘most ancient’ (vetustissima), places her within a prelapsarian
period at the beginning of time before the Fall of Man, but more importantly before the establishment of
laws.262 By placing Semiramis at a time when ‘people lived according to the law of Nature, where all
people were allowed to do whatever came into their hearts without sinning’ any blame for her incest is
waived.263 However, incest is still condemned by de Pizan and she clarifies that if Semiramis had known
of the wickedness of her actions then she would not have acted in such a way. In this way Christine
deflects the blame from Semiramis, but not from Semiramis’ actions; she transforms the Babylonian
queen’s ‘erreur’ into an object lesson on the importance of education to virtue.264 Despite these efforts

259
Lydg. Fall. 6632-6643
260
Shakespeare. Titus Andronicus. Scene 2. Act 1; Taming of the Shrew. Scene 1. Act 2.
261
Semiramis’ notorious reputation and charges of incest were identified as the reason why she was selected. See Quilligan
1991: 70; Holderness 2004: 98; Carr 2017: 78.
262
De Piz. Le Livre. 1.15.2; Holderness 2005.
263
De Piz. Le Livre. 1.15.2. This is further demonstrated by the erasure of Ninyas’ matricide as well as the exclusion of any
nefarious sexual conduct. Any attempt of matricide would undermine the allegation that the queen was not doing anything
wrong in the eyes of her own society. (Archibald 2001b: 46.)
264
Holderness 2004: 100.
46
by Christine de Pizan to create a new history for Semiramis, her work did not make it very far past the
French court as a piece of peculiar and curious writing because it was written by a woman.

Conclusion

There is a long tradition of Semiramis being constructed in the popular imagination as a sexual figure.
Not only did she exhibit characteristics of sexual excesses in sources such as St Augustine, Orosius,
Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, but she was seen to combine cruelty and immorality. Thus, we see her
being associated with promiscuity, an insatiable sexual appetite, sadistically killing her many lovers,
controlling the sex lives of others with chastity belts, castration, and sex laws, and transgressing natural
and societal boundaries, culminating in bestiality and incest. However, as will be discussed in the
following chapters, Semiramis is a complicated figure, who was lauded for her virtue as often as she was
damned for her vices. However, these positive receptions have been largely dismissed by modern
scholarship who instead unfairly focus on her darker, erotic sides. By doing this, they perpetuate the issue
and claim that the dominant opinion of Semiramis was a negative one.

47
 CHAPTER TWO
Part One: Monumental Construction
What one-eyed Cyclops built all this vast stone mound of Assyrian Semiramis, or what
giants, sons of earth, raised it to reach near to the seven Pleiads, inflexible, unshakable, a
mass weighing on the broad earth like to the peak of Athos?
-Antipater of Sidon265

Throughout Antiquity, Semiramis was known as a builder. Her constructions were complex and varied,
but more importantly, they were monumental. So monumental, in fact, that Antipater compares the works
of the Assyrian queen to the labours of Cyclops or giants, in height reaching the stars, and in size and
strength as steadfast as a mountain built by the gods. Babylon was a great beneficiary of her work. Here,
the Assyrian queen was famed for building city walls of gargantuan proportions, taming the raging
Euphrates, erecting two sumptuous palaces on either side of it, and sometimes even credited with building
three of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, most notably the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
Outside of Babylon her deeds were no less prolific. While the queen campaigned in the east she continued
a similar policy. Constructions that were left behind in her wake included more lavish palaces, exotic
gardens, colossal images carved into the sides of mountains, and numerous mysterious “Mounds of
Semiramis”. However, in our sources these monumental constructions were not always lauded as
achievements. Instead, they were often seen to demonstrate the traits of an Oriental despot.266
Nevertheless, long after the death of this industrious queen her monumental constructions continued to
persevere in the memory of anyone passing through the Middle East.267 The legend of Semiramis the
builder continued to grow. In fact, Berossus, a Babylonian priest in the Hellenistic era, complained that
too many Babylonian monuments were being wrongfully attributed to Semiramis.268 As such, it is

265
Anth. Pal. 7.748. From this inscription, by the second-century BCE Greek poet Antipater of Sidon, it is apparent that he
was aware of the circulating tradition of Semiramis as a builder of monumental projects. Antipater is also known for his list
of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, of which the walls of Babylon and the Hanging Gardens were both listed. At
some time both of these monuments have been attributed to Semiramis. However, they predate the first citations of Semiramis
as a creator.
266
As such, we see this motif associated with other figures. One that is particularly relevant to Semiramis is Alexander the
Great who is also associated with excessive and monumental constructions. See for example, Plutarch’s (De Alex. fort. 4.3.)
commentary on the moral implications of a monumental carving of Alexander into Mount Athos. (See Stewart 1993: 28-29,
37-41)
267
In the sixteenth-century, the Austrian nobleman Georg Christoph Fernberger travelled from Egypt to India and through the
Near East. In his diary Fernberger mentions a dry canal-bed running from Baghdad along the road taken to reach the supposed
Tower of Babel and writes of the ruined remains of an aqueduct that he attributed to Semiramis. Whilst, the dry river bed has
been identified as the Sawqlawiyah canal, Ooghe proposes that Semiramis’ aqueduct seems to have been ‘a figment of the
Austrian's vivid imagination’. (2007: 237) In 1783-5, the French botanist, André Michaux, whilst visiting Baghdad discovered
an elaborately decorated large black stone (later identified as a kudurru or boundary stone) ‘among the ruins of a palace known
by the name of the garden of Semiramis, near the Tigris’. (See Fagan 2007: 20, 26; Finkel and Seymour 2008: 28.)
268
Joseph. CA 1.142.
48
apparent that the association of Semiramis as a builder of monumental constructions was deeply
ingrained in our sources.

This chapter seeks to explain why the figure of Semiramis came to be synonymous with monumental
construction as well as how this theme was utilised in our sources. It will be argued that Semiramis’
constructions were gross exaggerations of reality and reflects how Western sources viewed the East
through an Orientalistic lens by imposing tropes of the Near Eastern despotes onto the Queen. It further
demonstrates that later sources continue to associate Semiramis with monumental construction. This
directly challenges the frequently cited work of Irene Samuel who states that a sexualised Semiramis was
the representation of the Late Antique and Medieval periods.269 This overview provides context for the
case study explored in the second half of this chapter: the monumental tomb of Semiramis.

Semiramis’ Building Programme: Babylon and Beyond

The first major source that recounts the construction deeds of the figure that will be known as Semiramis
is Herodotus’ Histories. Throughout the Histories, Babylon is noted for its wondrous qualities; ἄξιον
θώματος and ἀξιοθέητα.270 Adding to the city’s enduring allure are two Assyrian queens of
noteworthiness. The first is Semiramis, known as Sammu-ramat in Assyrian records.271 The other queen
that is mentioned is Naqia, known as Nitokris in the Histories.272 Both these women are ascribed deeds
of water-related infrastructure. This included the rerouting and embanking the Euphrates River, and the
construction of canals, dykes, and basins.273 To a modern audience these constructions may sound like
impressive achievements, however in the context of Herodotus’ Histories they are also offered as signs
of Oriental decadence, being hubristically monumental, largely self-serving and lavish. In consequence,
they help to perpetuate the idea of Babylon as a “soft” culture.274

The most fruitful source detailing Semiramis’ building programme, both within the city of Babylon and
outside of it, is Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica that was written in the first-century BCE.
Sulimani argues that the intended purpose of the Bibliotheca Historica was to create a geographically

269
Samuel 1944.
270
Hdt. 1.185.3, 1.184.
271
Pettinato 1988: 309-310.
272
Lewy 1952.
273
Hdt. 1.184-187.
274
Munson 2001: 8-9.
49
accurate picture, essentially a literary map, of the inhabited world from the third- to the first-centuries
BCE.275 As such, the parameters of the work were largely defined by the conquered regions of Alexander
the Great and the waning Hellenistic world that had prompted an infatuation with the East. The accounts
of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Scythia, and Arabia, are dominated by detailed descriptions of conspicuous
landmarks, topographical accounts of sites, as well as accounts of their most famous leaders. The history
of Mesopotamia in Book Two of the Bibliotheca Historica, is dominated by Semiramis. This includes a
detailed account of the queen’s building programme that was instigated in Babylon as well as other
notable cities that the queen journeyed to in the East.276

In Herodotus’ Histories and Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica, Semiramis’ building programme
can be divided into two overarching themes: Oriental decadence and the hubristic control over nature.

Oriental Decadence

A major theme that occurs when recounting Semiramis’ constructions is their ornate and superfluous
nature. This is primarily indicated by the opulent materials of the structures, such as precious metals and
gemstones, as well as their weight and monumental size. Moreover, the construction is carried out under
slavish conditions, completed by a large work force in a short amount of time. When compared to their
historical equivalents they are greatly over exaggerated. As such, the description of these monuments
comply with the conventional themes of a soft culture and the barbaric despotes with Semiramis’ position
within these paradigms being reinforced.

i. Foundation of Babylon and the Construction of its Walls

One of the first constructions built by Semiramis, after the tomb of her husband Ninus, is the foundation
of Babylon and the construction of the cities walls. Diodorus’ account of Semiramis’ building programme
is prefaced by the achievements of Ninus, achievements which the queen strived to surpass. After
expanding the Assyrian Empire to its greatest size yet, Ninus ‘was eager to found a city of such
magnitude, that not only would it be the largest of any which then existed in the whole inhabited world,
but also that no other ruler of a later time should, if he undertook such a task, find it easy to surpass
him.’277 In order to do this, he ‘[gathered] his forces from every quarter and all the necessary material’,

275
Sulimani 2005: 63; Sulimani 2011: 165.
276
See Sulimani 2005: 46-51; Sulimani 2011: 204-211.
277
Diod. Sic. 2.3.
50
and founded the city of Nineveh.278 The total length of the fortified city equated to 480 stades, with a
width of three chariots, and 1,500 towers with a height of two-hundred feet. Like her husband, Semiramis
was also ‘eager for great exploits and ambitious to surpass the fame of her predecessor’.279 So, following
his suit Semiramis decided to found her own city, Babylon.280 So in order to outdo the king and to achieve
this mark of excellence, Semiramis had to go above and beyond Ninus. She did this by employing two
million skilled artisans and architects from across the world to build her fortified city. This is an
excessively inflated number of tyrannical proportions that trumps Ninus’ efforts in Nineveh. However,
when the size of Nineveh is compared with the measurements given for Semiramis’ Babylon, Nineveh
is substantially bigger. Despite this, it was Semiramis’ Babylonian walls that were considered to be one
of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

The Walls of Babylon are included as an ancient wonder in the lists of Antipater, Strabo, Philo of
Byzantium, and a few Roman and Christian writers.281 In Babylon, by Nebuchadnezzar II’s reign, these
walls had reached their monumental size, and in Nineveh Sennacherib had also enlarged the fortifications
of the city. Following the same pattern of conflation seen with the deeds of past rulers, Semiramis too,
gets attached to this monument. In fact, the Walls of Babylon are one of the structures most persistently
associated with the queen.282 Using naturally occurring materials from the area (baked mud-bricks and
bitumen) Semiramis was supposedly able to fortify the city on a monumental scale.283 The scale of these
walls vary. Nevertheless, authors take great pleasure in listing their own measurements of the walls,
between 360 to 385 stades long.284 The authors also often describe the size of the walls as being wide
enough for chariots to pass without touching.285 These measurements are embellished over time as the
legend of Babylon and Semiramis became more removed and distant. For example, Julian, writing in the
fourth-century, states that the walls were nearly 500 stades in length. 286 Moreover, the walls become

278
Diod. Sic. 2.3.
279
Diod. Sic. 2.7.
280
Diodorus also attributes Semiramis with founding cities along the Euphrates and Tigris. (Diod. Sic. 2.11.1-3.) In c.100
CE, Semiramis and Ninus also became associated with the foundation of Aphrodisias in Caria, later renamed Ninoe after the
eponymous founder of Nineveh. Reliefs from a basilica in the city depict the two figures. (see Yildrim 2004: 23-52)
281
Diod. Sic. 2.11.5; Anth. Pal. 8. 177; Anth. Pal. 9.58 (Antipater of Sidon); Strab. 16.5. The walls were often substituted by
the Pharos of Alexandria in later lists.
282
FGrH 688 F 1b = Diod. Sic. 2.7; Curt. 5.4.; Ov. Met. 4.55; Strab 16.1; BNJ 93 F 1b; AR 3.18; Fulg. De aetatibus. 3;
Paulus Silentiarius 5.25; Bocc. FW. 2.8; Petr. De viris. 5
283
Amm. Marc. 23.6.23; Just. Epit. 1.2.; Mart. Epigrams. 9.75; Prop. 3.11; Diod. Sic.2.12; Vitr. De arch. 8.3.
284
See Diod. Sic. 2.7; Strab. 16.1.5; Curt. 5.4..
285
Anth. Pal. 9.58; Diod. Sic. 2.7; Porp. 3.11.
286
Julian. Or. 3.127. ()
51
more grandiose with towers and moats being added to the description.287 Despite the discrepancies in the
measurements of the walls, all sources agree that they were monumental. It is due to the monumental
scale of the walls that they were sometimes listed as one of the Ancient Wonders of the World.

Monumental Babylonian walls matching the description of the Classical sources have yet to be found
and it is likely that they never existed in this exaggerated form. Seymour comments that if such a wall
had been built, then it would not have been maintained in the landscape of irrigation canals land swamps
fed by the Euphrates.288 However, archaeological evidence suggests that Herodotus, amongst other
sources, amalgamated the features of two dilapidated walls to create the legendary wall. The first was
the outer enclosure wall excavated by Koldewey that was very wide but only a few kilometres in length,
and the second was Habl as-Sahr, the wall forming the outermost defence of the region which was
narrower but fifty kilometres in length.289 From this archaeological evidence it is evident that the
Classical sources manipulated and exaggerated the measurements of the boundary walls of the
Babylonian region. In fact, Diodorus’ measurements are seven and a half times bigger than the
archaeological remains.290 As such, these sources are seen to conform to the Wests’ perception of the
Oriental East as exotic and excessive in every aspect of their society.

ii. Two Palaces

Another way in which Semiramis surpassed her predecessor was by undertaking massive building
projects in her territory. Muntz comments that many of these projects served to benefit the Queen rather
than her people.291 This is particularly evident with Semiramis’ ornate and monumental palaces.
Diodorus records that on each side of the Euphrates River, Semiramis built not one but two splendid
palaces. One is said to have faced the rising sun, and the other faced the setting sun.292 According to
Diodorus, the motivation to build these palaces was to secure a good view of the entire city. This is also
evident in the work Dio Chrysostum, the first-century Greek orator, who links Semiramis’ enormous and
extravagant palaces with tyranny.293 For example, in the essay Diogenes, or on Tyranny, Dio comments
that man has been softened by luxury ever since Prometheus gave humankind fire. As such, Diogenes,

287
Diod. Sic. 2.7; Claud. Olyb. 160; Const. Man. 5520, 6440; De Piz. Le Livre. 1.15.1
288
Seymour 2008: 114.
289
Seymour 2008: 114.
290
Stronk 2016: 99n.52.
291
Muntz 2017: 161.
292
Diod. Sic. 2.8.
293
Semiramis is used in a similar way alongside Darius and Xerxes’ in the essay On Kingship 2. (Dio Chrys. Or. 2.)
52
who lived his life in poverty is presented as the antithesis of the opulent Persian king, Darius Codomannus
(336-331 BCE). As such, Diogenes endured the harsh Greek seasons in the same clothing while the
Oriental despot moved between palaces, like Babylon, in order to experience pleasant weather. Due to
Diogenes resilient nature he argues that he was the happiest man alive because of his lack of possessions.
In contrast, the Persian king who has everything is said to be the most miserable man alive because he
had everything to lose. 294 As such, ‘the mansions of Semiramis, nor the walls of Babylon were of any help
to him’, implying that he was living in constant fear even within the protection of his own home.295 From
this account, one also gets the sense that Semiramis also preferred to create as many barriers as possible
between herself and the city’s inhabitants. This is further reinforced by Diodorus’ description of her
palaces. The palace facing west, which was more elaborate than the other, had three fortification walls
of great proportions and cost. According to Diodorus’ description, these walls got taller and wider as
they got closer to the palace.296 Moreover a set of triple gates, two of which were bronze, were set into
the walls and opened by a mechanical device.297 However, it is apparent that these details have been
exaggerated to add to the characterisation of the queen as a recluse tyrant. Remains found by Koldewey
at Babylon confirmed that Nebuchadnezzar’s southern palace had three turreted walls.298 However, they
were purely defensive, and not anything sinister or out of the ordinary, as is alluded to by Diodorus.
Nevertheless, Diodorus continues to discuss the exceptional nature of the walls.

Along with being excessively large, the second and third walls were lavishly decorated with colourful
bricks engraved with images of exotic animals and hunting scenes. This included imagery of Semiramis
and Ninus on horseback with the queen hurling a javelin at a leopard whilst the king thrusted a spear at
a lion.299. Similar depictions of animals and humans have been found in excavations in the Near East.
For instance, the renowned Ishtar gate, which connected with the processional way in Babylon, is
decorated by the same colourful glazed bricks recounted by Diodorus. The sacred gate was likewise
decorated with animals including more than five-hundred young bulls (auroch), lions, and dragons

294
Dio Chrys. Or. 6.35.
295
Dio Chrys. Or. 6.
296
From inner to outer walls they increased from twenty, forty, and then stades. (Dio. Sic. 2.8)
297
Diod. Sic. 2.8. Herodotus also attributes a bronze gate in Babylon bearing Semiramis’ name. (Hdt. 3.155.) It has been
argued by Baumgartner that this gate was actually the Ishtar Gate. MacGinnus adds that it is likely that Herodotus knew the
gate by its popular name rather than the official religious name. (Baumgartner 1950: 75; MacGinnis 1986: 70)
298
Koldewey 1914: 139.
299
Diod. Sic. 2.8. In the early third-century CE, Aelian also states that the queen enjoyed hunting, but rather preferred to
capture lionesses rather than killing a lion or leopard. (Ael. VH. 12.39) While excavating the “Persian building” in Babylon,
Koldewey claimed to have found the white face of Semiramis in a hunting scene like the one described by Diodorus Siculus.
(Koldewey 1914: 130-131)
53
 Figure 8. Glazed brick relief of lion, 605-562 BCE Babylon. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Vorderasiatisches Museum,
VA Bab 4376.

Figure 9. Glazed brick relief of lion, 605-562 BCE Babylon. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Vorderasiatisches
Museum, VA Bab 4376.

(sirrush). Moreover, lion and animal hunts were a kingly pursuit of ancient Near Eastern cultures,
54
(sirrush). Moreover, lion and animal hunts were a kingly pursuit of ancient Near Eastern cultures,
including the Assyrians and Persians. In Assyria, these hunts symbolised the obligation of ruling monarch
to his people from the savage wilderness.300 This included the most menacing animal in the region, the
lion. As such, depictions of lion-hunts, were found on royal seals and royal reliefs. For example, dramatic
scenes of lion-hunts survive from Ashurbanipal’s palace at Nineveh (645 BCE). In fact, one relief depicts
Ashurbanipal on horseback thrusting a spear at a lion in a similar fashion to Diodorus’ account of Ninus
(Figure 9). In contrast, the second palace, whilst not being as extravagant as the first, was still very
extravagant. Its walls were smaller (thirty stades) with depictions of battle scenes and hunts, and bronze
statues of Semiramis, Ninus, and Belus. Filling those who gazed upon them with pleasure.301 Foreign
travellers that journeyed to these lands, such as Ctesias, were likewise captivated by these striking
depictions when they gazed upon them or heard stories about them. Consequently, they transmitted them
into their works, explaining them to be the work of the Babylonian ruler they knew to be associated with
construction, Semiramis.

iii. Gardens
Another thing that was particularly associated with Babylonian and Assyrian palaces were gardens, and
Babylon was home to a very famous one, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. The legends surrounding the
Hanging Gardens of Babylon are varied, unclear, and elusive. This has led some scholars to speculate
that they might not have even existed.302 Among these legends are sources that attribute the garden to
Semiramis. For example, Pliny ascribes the garden as either the work of Semiramis or Cyrus, however
he died before discussing it further in another work.303 In contrast, Diodorus Siculus felt obliged to clarify
that the Queen did not have a hand in the garden.304 Instead, he favours the more common legend that an
unknown Babylonian king (later identified as Nebuchadnezzar II) planted the gardens for his Median
wife (Queen Amytis) because she longed for the hills of her homeland.305 Despite this strong tradition,

300
Reade 1998: 72-79.
301
Diod. 2.7.6.
302
Koldewey’s excavation of Babylon found no definitive evidence of the gardens. This led other scholars to suggest that the
gardens may have been located in other cities. Oppert (1863) suggested Amran. In 1920, Budge was the first to put forward
the idea that they never existed. Later Nagel (1979) offered a suitable location of the gardens on the western outwork, a badly
damaged part of the central palace. However, more recently Dalley has argued that the Hanging Gardens were located in
Nineveh (2013).
303
Pliny. 19.19.
304
Diod. Sic. 2.10.
305
Diod. 2.10; Curt. 5.1.35; Joseph. CA. 1.19.
55
it is apparent that a minor legend existed in which Semiramis was among the list of people accredited
with planting the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

Figure 10. Sculptured relief from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal (668-631 BC) at Nineveh in
northern Iraq. BM 124939,a.

Gardens were a distinctive part of the landscape of the ancient Near East and were always a luxurious
and costly royal prerogative due to the arid climate of the region.306 As such, irrigation was necessary in
order to grow any vegetation. This required great technological skill that was refined and perfected for
over two millennia throughout Mesopotamia and Assyria, culminating in technologically advanced
hydraulic systems that made it possible for variety of gardens and parks to be sustained.307 These included
ambassu that were essentially game parks, kiru or orchards, habburu or grass plains, and kirimahu that
were gardens with trees and fruits.308 These feats of engineering and agriculture were often celebrated
by the Assyrian monarchs in inscriptions and reliefs. For example, Sennacherib recalls how he
transformed the once barren landscape of Nineveh to prosperous agricultural land and flourishing
gardens in the Bavian inscription;

306
Finkel and Seymour 2008: 109.
307
See Dalley 2013: 83-106.
308
Tuplin 1996: 83-87.
56
 At this time, I, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, first among all princes, who from the rising sun
to the setting sun, … (with) waters from the canals which I had caused to be dug, [supplied]
Nineveh, together with its neighbourhood. Garden, vineyards, all kinds of … products of all
the mountains the fruits of all lands, … I planted(?), letting out the waters where they did not
reach the thirsty (field), [and reviving] its vegetation, damaged(? By drought) … of all the
orchards, at the entrance … above (the city) and below(?)… from the midst of the town of
Tarbisi to Nineveh, providing, for all time, water for the planting of grain and sesame…309

It was also Sennacherib who arranged an elaborate irrigation system so that he could grow cotton and
exotic wildlife at Nineveh.310 As such, gardens like this were also a display of power and fertility that
would have been memorable to any visitor or traveller to the palace.311 Despite their appeal, many of
these stately gardens have been lost to time because of erosion and the repurposing of stone.312 However,
we are able to reconstruct what these gardens would have looked like from visual representations on
reliefs. See for example, a panel from Ashurbanipal’s palace at Nineveh that depicts a garden consisting
of elaborate wooded hills with varying vegetation fed by canals from an aqueduct (Figure 10).

Gardens were also transmitted into ancient texts as a monarchical preoccupation of eastern rulers.
Semiramis is one such ruler in which this motif materialises. In the account of Diodorus Siculus the
planting of gardens are used to demonstrate the frivolous indulgence of the queen on three separate
occasions.

The first garden mentioned in the Bibliotheca Historica are the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, which are
described in detail by Diodorus. Even though they are not attributed to the Queen, Muntz argues that
they demonstrate how Semiramis’ opulent ways perpetuated with later rulers who also indulged in
projects to benefit themselves rather than the people.313 As such, Semiramis’ planting of gardens also
echoes these sentiments. The first incidence occurred at Bagistanus Mountain, in modern-day Behistun,
between Babylon and Ecbatana. Here she is said to have created a park with a circumference of twelve
stades.314 The park was irrigated from a spring on the plain so that plants could be grown. Another park
was then created at the Median city of Chauon with some extra additions. This time not only was a park
created but ‘lavish buildings’ were erected on a plateau in the middle so she could look down upon the

309
ARAB. Bavian Inscription 5.7. 333.
310
BM 103000.
311
Stonach 1990.
312
Dalley 2008: 172.
313
Muntz 2017: 161.
314
Diod. Sic. 2.13.
57
garden and her encamped army.315 Diodorus states that she did this to ‘satisfy her taste for luxury
(τρυφὴν)’ and it was here that the queen ‘passed a long time and enjoyed to the full every device that
contributed to luxury (τρυφὴν)’, primarily sexual escapades.316 However, it is apparent that her yearning
for luxury was not satiated as at Ecbatana the height of the Queen’s indulgence and hubris is reached.
Here Semiramis went to enormous efforts to bring water to the arid city. A tunnel measuring fifteen feet
wide and forty feet high was cut into the base of the Orontes Mountain in order to get to a lake on the
other side. This mountain was twelve stades away from Ecbatana and twenty-five stades high, and a
massive undertaking. Throughout the account the Queen’s insatiable greed and her daring are seen to
increase with the construction of each park. This consequently presents Semiramis as neglecting or, at
the very least, being distracted from her campaign duties and preferring to indulge in sensual pleasures.

This notion persists into later traditions. For example, the eighth-century Armenian historiographer,
Moses Khorenats‘i, also mentions the queen in regards to creating lavish gardens in his homeland. Posing
as an eyewitness in the fifth-century, Moses blends the oral Armenian tradition with Greco-Roman
sources to create a fictitious history of his homeland in the “Golden Age” of Armenian literature.317 In
the History of the Armenians, Semiramis’ account is largely shaped by Diodorus, Eusebius, Agathangelos
and the Alexander Romance.318 Moses’ account of Semiramis is also largely negative, with the queen’s
engineering feats fitting within this characterization found in Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus. In the
work, the Queen is constantly enamoured by beauty and luxury, both materialistically and in regards to
people. On the plain where the Queen defeated the Armenian King Ara the Beautiful who rejected her
advances, it recorded that Semiramis was enamoured by the plain’s flowering meadows, cascading hills,
and flowing streams. Semiramis’ first response to this natural splendour was to completely despoil it to
build a summer palace.319 By providing a detailed account on the natural beauty of the site subsequently
followed by details on Semiramis’ destruction of it, the Queen is presented as destroying Moses’, and
the audience’s, homeland. This is recounted on a tyrannical scale. The ‘resolute and lascivious’ Queen
is said to have ordered forty-two thousand skilled workers and six-thousand craftsmen to start
construction of the palace at that location. With this huge, subservient workforce the task was completed
in a couple of years. The end result is an awe-inspiring city said to be the most majestic out of all the

315
Diod. Sic. 2.13.
316
Diod. Sic. 2.13.
317
Darling Young 2018.
318
Thomson 1980: 20-61.
319
Mos. Khor. 2.16.
58
royal sites.320 Adding to the beautification of the palace were exotic gardens, symbolising her wanton
luxury;

She diverted part of the river through the city to severe every necessity and for the irrigation
of the parks and flower gardens. The rest she made run along the edge of the lake to the right
and left, to water the city and all the surrounding area. All the regions in the east, north, and
south of the city she adorned with villas and with lefty trees that produced varied fruit and
foliage. There she planted many fruitful vineyards.321

Once again, Semiramis’ motivation for taking the necessary steps to bring irrigation to a site was to grow
gardens. However, Moses clarifies that the aqueduct she implemented in order to do this denigrated into
hideouts for thieves.322 As such, Moses’ account demonstrates that gardens, like the palaces, were viewed
as a purely superfluous, exotic project. Moreover, in this case the superfluousness of the garden is
exaggerated even further due to the pre-existing natural splendour of the site. Once more we see this
behaviour aligning with the concept of Oriental decadence and despotism typified by the queen’s lavish
constructions.

iv. Temples
After building herself two elaborate palaces securely enclosed within impenetrable walls, the queen
diverted her attention to the heavens. An ornate temple to the Babylonian god Bel or Belus is erected in the
centre of the city.323 The temple described follows the outline of a ziggurat, a rectangular stepped tower.
According to cuneiform and archaeological evidence a ziggurat referred to as Etemenanki, known as the
Tower of Babel in the Bible, is said to have stood in ancient Babylon.324 The original Etemenanki, of
unknown date was destroyed by Sennacherib in his razing of the city in 689 BCE. It was then rebuilt by
Nebuchadnezzar II, reaching 91 meters with a temple situated at the top.325 In the Bibliotheca Historicia
the temple is described as being adorned with ‘silver, gold, other metals, stone, enamelled bricks, fir,
pine, and copper bricks’.326 There is some historical truth to this. The temple was indeed subjected to
lavish attention of Neo-Babylonian kings after its reconstruction.327 However, this is greatly embellished
in Diodorus’ account who states that the queen, sparing no expense, built the exceedingly high structure

320
Mos. Khor.2.16. The city has been identified as the Armenian city of Van, which in the Middle Ages was called
Shamiramagerd or the “created by Semiramis” in the local dialect. (Salvini 1992: 67-80)
321
Mos. Khor. 2.16.
322
Mos. Khor. 2.16.
323
Diod. Sic. 2.9.4.
324
MET 86.11.284.
325
MET 86.11.284.
326
Diod. Sic. 2.9.4.
327
The top of the temple was clad in blue tiles. (VAB Nebuch. 14.i.42.)
59
with baked brick and bitumen. In addition, it was adorned with three golden statues of Zeus, Hera, and
Rhea. Each of the statues dimensions and weight are given, all of them being extravagant and costly.328
In front of the gods was a golden table with drinking cups, censors and bowls in the same metal.
Herodotus also mentions a golden statue of Bel sitting on a throne with a table in the lower temple of the
complex.329 Statues of this description have not survived, however fragments of their adornment—lapis
lazuli, shell and onyx inlays as well as traces of a throne made from wood and gold—have been identified
by Koldewey.330 In both accounts, the allure of the gold proved to be too tempting to the Persians.
Herodotus mentions two occasions in which the Persians endeavoured to plunder the temple. The first
was Darius, who attempted to take a golden statue of Bel but was unsuccessful because his courage failed
him. However, later in revolt of 482 BCE, Xerxes successfully removed the statue, slaughtering a priest
who got in his way.331 On the other hand, Diodorus states that at some point all of these items were taken
as none were said to have survived the Persian invasion.332 The timeline of this behaviour is particularly
important in the sources as it demonstrates the corrupting nature of the Assyrians, initiated by Semiramis.
This extravagant behaviour is seen to intensify over time, reaching its pinnacle with the last Assyrian
monarch Sardanapalus, and is finally inherited by the successors to the Assyrian Empire, the
Achaemenids.333

From the examples discussed it is apparent that the constructions of Semiramis conform to the typical
tropes associated with despotic Eastern rulers in our sources. They are monumental, ornate, costly, and
done quickly with a large work force under slavish conditions. As such, Semiramis is not particularly
different from other barbaric figures found in the Histories or the Bibliotheca Historica. Herodotus’
account is littered with these barbaric figures, in particular the Persian kings—Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes,
Cambyses—who on multiple occasions were seen to embody the τρυφή of their Assyrian precursors.
Likewise, in the first two books of Bibliotheca Historica pertaining to the region of the Near East,
barbarian sovereigns such as the Egyptian king, Sesostris, the last Assyrian king, Sardanapalus, and of
course Ninus, Semiramis’ husband and predecessor, also exhibited the same barbaric behaviour as the
Queen. In consequence, Semiramis is seen to add to the representation of these Near Eastern regions as
being “soft” cultures ruled by despots.

328
Diod. Sic. 2.9.7.
329
Hdt. 1.183.
330
Koldewey 1914: 222.
331
Hdt. 1.183.
332
See the acquisition of the “Semiramis vase” by Cyrus. (Plin. HN. 33.15.)
333
Muntz 2017: 162.
60
 Controlling Nature: Hydraulics and Masonry

In our sources, another main theme apparent in Semiramis’ constructions is the controlling of nature.
This is evident on numerous occasions. The most prolific occurrence is the manipulation of water,
particularly in the Histories. In the Bibliotheca Historica exploitation of nature through masonry is also
added to the endeavours of the queen. Normally these types of activities are reserved for mythical heroes,
like Heracles who rerouted the Alpheus and Peneus Rivers to cleanse the Augean stables. As such, by
controlling nature, the mortal Queen is seen to be acting like a mythical hero. Thus, in both of these
accounts these actions are cast as negative and are intrinsically linked to hubris.

i. Hydraulics and the Manipulation of Water

The hydraulic systems implemented by Semiramis are complex in both their mechanics as well as their
literary representations. In Book One, Herodotus attributes hydraulics to the two Babylonian queens that
will be amalgamated under the name of Semiramis. The earlier queen, Semiramis, is credited with
building dykes outside of Babylon to control flooding deemed by Herodotus as being ἀξιοθέητα, a
notable work.334 The other queen Nitokris is preoccupied with manipulating the water flow to defend
Babylon from the approaching Medes, who had already taken Nineveh, and to stop them mixing with her
people. By increasing the height of the canals she was able to add bends to the straight river and change
its course. As such, one could pass the city of Ardericca thrice on the route to Babylon. She also accredited
with embanking the river which Herodotus calls ‘marvellous for its greatness and height’ (ἄξιον θώματος
μέγαθος καὶ ὕψος).335 In order to do this, the earth was repurposed from the digging of a basin. The basin
itself had a circumference of 420 furlongs and slowed the current of the river. When Herodotus outlines
the remarkable feats (ἀξιοθέατος) of the two Babylonian queens his attitude seems to be positive.336
However, Gould and Hartog have shown that these manipulations of nature were often seen as
transgressions and ambiguous achievements.337 The problem with these actions was that they were easy
to portray as acts of hubris that were typical of despotes.338 As such, these two instances of hydraulic

334
Hdt. 1.184.
335
Hdt. 1.185.
336
Similar terminology is also used to describe the building of a Temple of Hephaestus on reclaimed land of the Nile (Hdt. 2.99),
the pyramids (Hdt 2.101) and three works of the Samians; tunnel, artificial harbour, and the biggest temple in Greece (Hdt. 3.60).
337
Gould 1989: 106-109.
338
Hartog 1988: 330-339.
61
engineering in Babylon, particularly by Nitokris, contributes to the wider purpose of the ethnography of
Babylon and the empires of the East, especially Persia.

Transgressions of nature by Persian kings are apparent on numerous occasions throughout the Histories,
often triggering subsequent disasters.339 For example, Cyrus reduced the Gyndes to a weak stream after
his sacred white horse was swept away by the current.340 He did this in a similar fashion to Nitokris by
dividing the river into eighty channels. Later, when Cyrus builds another bridge to cross the Araxes to
attack the Massagetae, he gets his just desserts and is killed by their queen, Tomyris. 341 In comparison,
Nitokris’ tampering with the Euphrates was a defensive act to protect Babylon from the Medes. In this
sense, Nitokris’ actions were justified in comparison with the purely selfish and hubristic actions of the
Persian king. Nevertheless, Nitokris’ actions were still a transgression and so retribution for her actions
followed. This came in the form of Cyrus’ capture of Babylon, marking the end of Babylonian sovereignty.
However, this occurs after Semiramis’ death and is inflicted upon the Babylonian citizens and her son,
Labynetus. To add further insult to injury, it is through Nitokris’ engineering that the city was captured.342
While the Babylonians were preoccupied with the festivities of the New Year, Cyrus drained the Euphrates
into Nitokris’ basin and entered the city via the riverbed.343 S. Saïd suggests that this was undertaken by
Cyrus to demonstrate the vanity of precautions taken by Nitokris to protect the city.344 Thus, in this way,
Nitokris’ transgressions are eventually punished, as seen with similar hubristic acts by Persian kings.

Another instance of Nitokris’ transgressions against nature in the Histories is the construction of a bridge
across the Euphrates. According to Herodotus, previous Babylonian rulers had to cross the Euphrates by
boat, this was importune for the queen, and thus a bridge was commissioned to ease her commute.345
Building bridges over water are a material sign of transgressions of natural limits in the Histories.346 Like
other hubristic actions, this was often followed by the demise of the transgressor. Again, this hubristic
behaviour is demonstrated with the Persian despots. For example; Cyrus is decapitated by Queen
Tomyris after building a bridge to cross the Araxes to attack the Massagetae; Xerxes’ bridge over the

339
Gould 1989: 107.
340
Hdt 1.189.
341
Hdt. 1.205.
342
Hdt. 1.191.3.
343
Frontinus mentions that this was done by Semiramis when the city was rebelling, and that Alexander entered the city in a
similar way. (Frontin. Str. 3.7)
344
Saïd 1980: 120.
345
Hdt. 1.186.
346
Hartog 1988: 331; Gould 1989: 107.
62
Hellespont is destroyed by storm; and Darius crosses the Bosporus and the Ister and is defeated in
Europe.347 However, in the case of Nitokris, the bridge was temporary, consisting of removable planks
of timber. Due to this, the transgression is not as severe as the previous examples. In fact, the story seems
to play more into the character of Nitokris as a trickster rather than hubris. Herodotus records that the
purpose of the removable planks, that were taken away each night, was to prevent Babylonians from
crossing the bridge and stealing from one another.348 This preoccupation of theft is a common theme for
the queen running throughout Herodotus’ account.349 As such, it foreshadows the concluding tale of the
queen: the story of her tomb.350 In this moralizing tale Nitokris entices Darius to open her tomb only to
reprimand his greed. Herodotus states that this trick (ἀπάτην), gives an insight into the character of the
Babylonian queen, conforming to the common trope of the “clever, vengeful queen” found throughout
the Histories. As the name suggests, women involved in this trope exhibit intelligence, perceptiveness,
self-control, and calculation with (varied) success in contrast to the folly and impetuosity of the male
figures in the story.351 Thus, we see another vengeful queen associated with using hydraulics as a weapon
in 2.100 of the Histories. This woman was the Egyptian queen of the same name, Nitokris, who avenged
the death of her brother by flooding an underground chamber with the Nile whilst the responsible culprits
feasted. The similarities between these two women are purposeful, creating a metanarrative gloss with
the Babylonian Nitokris. Whilst the Egyptian Nitokris seeks revenge for the death of her brother, the
Babylonian Nitokris gets the last laugh on Darius who she tricks into opening her tomb.

In the Bibliotheca Historica, Diodorus provides an alternative account and motivation for the
construction of the bridge. Like other Babylonian monuments, the bridge and accompanying quays were
exceptionally large and expensive.352 The bridge is said to have spanned five stades with the piers being
sunk into the riverbed twelve feet apart.353 Once more, Diodorus provides great detail on how Semiramis’
skilful engineering is used to achieve this feat. The stones were set together with lead—the same
technology as in the Classical period—and had tapered cutwaters to soften the flow of water.354 Isolated,
this demonstrates the queen’s intelligence, however, it later becomes apparent that the Queen’s motives

347
Hdt. 1.205, 7.34, 4.85-90.
348
Hdt. 1.186.
349
Gera 1997: 111-112.
350
Hdt. 1.187.
351
Flory 1987: 42; Dillery 1992: 30-38.
352
Diod. Sic. 2.8.; Hdt. 1.180.
353
Diod. Sic. 2.8.
354
Oldfather 1933: 375 n18.
63
for this were purely selfish. This is evident in Semiramis’ other hydraulic projects that are discussed in
the proceeding passages of the Bibliotheca Historica.

Later in the narrative, Diodorus reveals that the main purpose of Semiramis’ hydraulic system was to
build a private passageway between her two palaces. In order to do this, the entire Euphrates needed to
be diverted into a square reservoir so construction could begin. In this sense, Semiramis’ previous
hydraulic works, that are initially seen to be beneficial to the Babylonian people, enables the construction
of the passageway that only benefited the queen.355 After diverting the river the queen was able to
construct the passageway that was twenty bricks thick and twelve feet high with barrel vaulted ceilings.356
At the end of the passageway were bronze gates that were said to have stood until the time of Persian
rule. This construction was finished within seven days and the river was released back to its original
course, completely covering the passageway.357 The superfluous nature of underwater walkway is
highlighted in Diodorus’ account because of the bridge that connected the two halves of the city had
already been mentioned. Thus, by creating this passageway Semiramis was able to move from palace to
the other without having to interact with any of her subjects. Thus, the characterisation of the queen as
evasive, detached from her subjects, and content within the walls of her palace becomes fully realised.

ii. Monumental Earthworks

As previously stated, Semiramis is associated with tampering with the natural order of things. This is
demonstrated on numerous occasions with hydraulics and bodies of water. Another example evident
throughout the Bibliotheca Historica is the interference with mountains. These instances of earthworks
occur outside of Babylon when the queen was on campaign. In most of these situations the mountains
are obstacles that impede the Queen in some way. The way in which she overcomes these physical
obstacles are hubristic in the Greco-Roman tradition, going against the natural order.

The first occurrence of masonry occurred in Babylon with the Queen quarrying monolithic stones from
the mountains of Armenia to the city to erect an obelisk. This obelisk was judged to be marvellous enough
by Diodorus Siculus to be labelled as one of the Seven Wonders of the World.358 Like many of its fellow

355
Muntz 2017: 161.
356
Diod. Sic. 2.9.
357
In the second and fourth-centuries CE the tunnel is attributed to an unnamed woman. See Philostr. VA.1.25; Julian. Or.
3.127.
358
Diod. Sic. 2.11.4-5.
64
structures on the list, it was impressively large. As such, Diodorus Siculus describes the great proportions
of the monument and the great lengths the Queen went to create it to justify his selection;

Semiramis quarried out stone from the mountains of Armenia which was one hundred and
thirty feet long and twenty-five feet wide and thick; and this he hauled by means of many
multitudes of yokes of mules and oxen to the river and there loaded it on a raft, on which she
brought it down the stream to Babylonia; she then set it up beside the famous street, an
astonishing sight to all who pass by. And this stone is called by some an obelisk from its
shape, and they number it among the Seven Wonders of the World.359

Despite this effort, the obelisk failed to make it onto the canonical list of Wonders and is only mentioned
in the Bibliotheca Historica. In fact, the existence of this monument is dubious as there are no cuneiform
references to a monument matching this description. In addition, whilst there were obelisks in Babylon
and Assyria, they were more common in Egypt.360 Thus, Diodorus may have been conflating some
aspects of Egyptian and Babylonian architecture. Furthermore, on four separate occasions Diodorus
relates that Semiramis defaced mountains either for irrigation, to create obelisks such as this, and even
to memorialise herself with images and inscriptions. Thus, the frequent association with the Queen and
monumental stonework may have been a contributing factor to its inclusion. Nevertheless, the inclusion
of such an object in his description of Semiramis’ Babylon reveals strong connotations of Oriental
exoticism of excessively large monuments as well as her hubristic interference with nature to carry out
these feats. In fact, Semiramis’ obelisk foreshadows other instances of stonework throughout her reign,
and like other constructions we have seen, the pomp and grandeur of these feats crescendo over time.

One such instance is Semiramis’ actions at Bagistanus. Diodorus records that when the Queen arrived at
the mountain which was sacred to Zeus and seventeen stades high, she engraved an image of herself with
a hundred of her spearmen into it.361 This was clearly a sacrilegious act from a Greek perspective.362 To
make this even more blasphemous, she included an inscription which read; ‘Semiramis, with the pack-
saddles of the beasts of burden in her army, built up a mound from the plain and hereby climbed this
precipice, even to this very ridge’.363 This anecdote has been transmitted into the Bibliotheca Historica
from Ctesias, who travelled through the Near East as the personal physician to the Artaxerxes, and saw
many monuments and infrastructure, such as this, that he ascribed to Semiramis. However, the actual

359
Diod. Sic. 2.11.
360
See BM 118898; BM 118885; BM 118807; BM 118800.
361
Diod. Sic. 2.13.2.
362
See Plut. Mor. De Alex. Fort. 2.2-3.
363
Diod. Sic. 2.13.2.
65
 monument was in fact the Behistun Inscription of Darius the Great which was located on the mountain
of the same name in western Iran between Babylon and Ecbatana (Figure 11).364 The multilingual
inscription details how Darius the Great assumed the role of king and lists his subsequent military
achievements, especially the subjugation of rebellions and conspirators.365 Accompanying this
inscription is a life-sized image of the king stepping on a man, thought to be the pretender Gaumata.
Personifications of the subdued nations are also present with their hands bound together and a rope
around their necks. Accordingly, Diodorus’ description was somewhat similar to the genuine version but
with details changed or misconstrued to suit the Queen. Nevertheless, this monument demonstrates that
some deeds by Persian kings in the Near East became amalgamated under the name of Semiramis over
time due to proximity.

Figure 11. Left: Behistun Inscription, relief with inscription, Right: close-up of the relief.

In the next two instances Semiramis’ behaviour escalates and her motives become more arrogant and
egocentric. For example, at Mount Zarcaeus, the Zagros Mountains spanning the western border of Iran,
Semiramis cuts through the mountains to create a shorter path because she was frustrated by the length
of the range. Diodorus also mentions an ulterior motive for this, that she ‘became ambitious to leave an
immortal monument of herself’, and as such was still focused on self-aggrandizement.366 Moreover, as
previously mentioned, the Queen tunnelled through Mount Orontes ‘with much hardship and expense’
to bring water to Ecbatana. The mountain is described as being unusual for its ‘ruggedness’ and

364
Oldfather 393 n.1. This has been questioned by Philips (1968) who finds other reliefs of Ishtar and other goddesses in Iran
that may have inspired Ctesias’ account.
365
Cf. Polyaenus, Strat. 8.26.
366
Diod. Sic. 2.13.5. Cf. Diod. Sic. 1.56 on the Egyptian king Sesoösis.
66
‘enormous height’ of twenty-five stades, making it the biggest mountain encountered on her journey.367
As with Semiramis’ other constructions her greed and daring are seen to increase and not be satiated
throughout her reign. In fact, after this her obsession reaches its pinnacle—visiting Persis and all of the
other countries in her empire, cutting through mountains and cliffs without a second thought to clear
paths for ‘expensive roads’.368 This lack of restraint indicates the ultimate descent into luxury.

The Legacy of Semiramis

Evidence of Semiramis’ fame as a builder of works can be found in the myth that attends to the “Mounds
of Semiramis” or “Works of Semiramis”. These mounds were tells or kurds, the accumulation of debris
from human habitation, that are distinctive parts of the Near East landscape.369 However in the
imagination of our sources they become echoes of the queen’s sojourns across the region. 370 To Diodorus
they were the plains on which the queen camped, the tombs for her generals, and the locations in which
she founded cities.371 To the Byzantine chronicler Syncellus they were the tombs of her lovers, adding
tangible evidence to the pre-existing mythology of Semiramis as an insatiably lustful woman unable to
control her bodily desires.372 This was perpetuated by Sir James Frazer’s The Golden Bough at the turn
of the twentieth-century, which drew upon ancient sources such as Dio Chrysostom, to explain the
mounds as the graves of the scapegoat king from the yearly Sacaea festival.373

Another instance that echoes our sources is the explanation given by Michael the Great, the twelfth-
century patriarch of the Syriac Orthodox Church. In this work, Michael intended to refute the polemical
attacks of Greek Orthodox Church against the Syriac Orthodoxy by ‘removing the poisonous, inaccurate,
and irrelevant material - the darkness of ignorance… with the breath of the Holy Spirit’. 374 As such,
Michael was attempting to create a canonical tradition of historical and theological concepts of the Syriac
Orthodox Church. This was achieved by equating the Greek Orthodox Church with the history of the
vain and prideful Greeks, and the Syriac Orthodox with the powerful and older empires of the Near East
accounted for in written records and the Holy Scriptures. However, it is apparent that the tradition he had

367
Diod. Sic. 2.13.7.
368
Diod. Sic. 2.14.1.
369
Eilers 1971: 22-3; Oldfather 1933: 397: n36.
370
Many authors claim these mounds could still be seen during their own time. (Strab. 3.155, 16.1.2; Diod. Sic. 2.14.1.)
371
Diod. Sic. 2.14.1. Similar conjecture is made by Strabo, claiming that the cities of Tyana and Zela were built upon these
mounds and fortified with walls. (Strab. 12.2.)
372
Syncell. Chron, p 119, 11 = Ctes. Pers. F. Ii.
373
Frazer 2009: 644-651.
374
Michael Syrus. Chron. 1.
67
access to for Semiramis was the Armenian version, as recorded by Moses Khorenats‘i.375 This
Semiramis, known as Shamiram, was inherently evil and lustful. Thus, he describes the mounds in the
following way in his ecclesiastical history;

She fashioned earthen mounds, called tils as a precaution against [flooding caused by] rain,
and for defence. However, we have discovered another explanation for these tils. It is said
that when idol-worship had increased throughout the world, god became furious with the
demons and caused hurricanes which shook the earth to its foundations, and demolished cities
and homes. Here and there the storms buried the idols and the demons under these earthen
mounds. The demons dwell in them, being tormented to this day. And we hear that witches
practice their arts especially near these mounds, and that the thunderous sounds of the demons
arise therefrom.376

Here, the Classical echoes of the Queen as a builder of hydraulic systems are being rejected in favour of
a Biblical explanation. Moreover, there are also allusions to the Armenian version in which Semiramis,
dabbling in witchcraft, attempted to resurrect the dead king, Ara, but was unsuccessful. 377 In this sense,
Semiramis’ status as a lustful Queen is irreconcilably different to the history of Near Eastern dominance
that Michael is trying to promote. Thus, even though Semiramis was an Assyrian her deeds are
rationalized by other methods, the Holy Scriptures, with alternative histories discredited. Nevertheless,
the sheer range in the theories of these mounds overtime reflects how ingrained Semiramis was in Greco-
Roman sources as a builder of monumental proportions.

Conclusion
The monumental constructions of Semiramis were more than just physical remnants from her reign. In
a number of our ancient sources, primarily Herodotus’ Histories and Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca
Historica, these monuments were the actions of an Oriental despot. They were excessively large,
extravagant, costly, superfluous, self-serving, and bordered on the grotesque in relation to the more
modest works of others. Furthermore, in order to build many of these constructions the Babylonian queen
often transgressed boundaries of nature, the tell-tale faux pas of a Herodotean despotes. In our sources,
a general trend that arises is the corrupting nature of Semiramis’ luxury that originates from her building
programme and is particularly germane in the case study of this theme: the tomb of Semiramis.

375
Indicated by her Armenian name and similarities to the narrative of Moses Khorenats‘i.
376
Michael Syrus. Chron. 16.
377
Mos. Khor. 1.15.
68
 Part Two: The Tomb of Semiramis

Figure 12. Maarten van Heemskerck, 1572, engraving by Philips Galle, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in
the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche
Kunstsammlungen Dresden. 5601.101:7.

In late sixteenth-century, the Dutch artist Maarten van Heemskerck produced a series of illustrations
titled The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World. Ever since Antiquity, such lists of wonders have been in
Figure 13. A close up of the statue of Semiramis in front of the tomb. Philips Galle, 1572, Maerten
van378Heemskerck, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World’,
circulation. This series by van Heemskerck capitalizes on this interest. His list is slightly unusual in
engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden. 5601.101:7.Figure 12. Maarten van
that usually there were
Heemskerck, onlyengraving
1572, seven wonders
by Philipslisted,
Galle, and,
‘The reflecting the biases
Walls of Babylon’ in theofseries
their‘The
Greek origins, the
Eight
Wonders of the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden.
lists did not include any Roman monuments. 379 In contrast, van Heemskerck’s list included
traditional5601.101:7.
the Colosseum (possibly a reflection of the time the artist spent in Rome), along with the Colossus of
Rhodes, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia,
Figure
the Temple 13. A at
of Diana close up of thethe
Ephesus, statue of Semiramis
Egyptian in frontand
Pyramids, of thethe
tomb. Philips
Walls Galle, 1572,While
of Babylon. Maerten
immensely
van Heemskerck, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World’,
popular inengraving,
their own period, modern
Amsterdam, Staatlichecritics have not been
Kunstsammlungen to van Heemskerck’s illustrations. They
kind5601.101:7.
Dresden.

378
Anth. Pal. 9. 58; Diod. Sic. 2.11.5; Hyg. Fab. 223.
379
Clayton and Price 1988: 5-12; Jordan 2002: 4-6.
Figure 15. Nine Worthies depicted on the west to north walls of the sala baronale at the Castello della
Manta, Manta, Italy.Figure 13. A close up of the statue of Semiramis in front of the tomb. Philips
69
Galle, 1572, Maerten van Heemskerck, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight Wonders of
the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden.
5601.101:7.Figure 12. Maarten van Heemskerck, 1572, engraving by Philips Galle, ‘The Walls of
Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight Wonders of the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche
have censured their artificiality and describe them as ‘pretty fanciful creations of which it may be said
not one of them bears any resemblance at all to what the real Wonders could have been’.380 What today’s
critics fail to realise is that while these works may not depict monuments as they existed, they are
nevertheless products of deep learning. As a humanist, van Heemskerck drew upon the rich history of
ancient texts, as well as the sights and statues that he encountered during his visit to Rome in the mid-
sixteenth-century.381 The Rome that he encountered had been dilapidated, war-torn, and plundered, by
the mutinous troops of Charles V in 1527. Despite this, van Heemskerck wished to depict the glory,
wealth and ambition of an ancient pagan culture. We see this clearly in his depiction of Ancient Babylon.

The illustration of the wondrous city walls depicts the Babylonian cityscape peopled with recognizable
figures and buildings described by Classical and Medieval authors. Situated in the middle of the
illustration is one of the two Babylonian palaces mentioned in our sources. The building is surrounded
by the huge, decorative walls covered with wild animals and hunting scenes mentioned by Ctesias, and
later Diodorus Siculus and Aelian.382 In the foreground, one of these scenes is being acted out: a mounted
Semiramis is posed in mid-action, just before she releases an arrow targeted at a nearby lion. In the top
right corner are the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, which were often featured as an ancient wonder on its
own.383 The bridge that connected the two halves of the city as described by Herodotus, Propertius, and
Quintus Curtius, sits below this.384 Rising up on the right is the spiralled Temple of Bel, which is
described by Herodotus and also features as the backdrop for the Biblical story of Daniel and the Dragon
in the extended Book of Daniel.385 Lastly, in the bottom left corner is the tomb of Semiramis labelled
“Sepulchrum Semiramidis”. Conforming to Herodotus’ account, the tomb is situated on top of a city
gate, under which two figures walk. In particular, the tomb demonstrates humanist learning by drawing
upon a variety of stylistic components from Greco-Roman, Mesopotamian, and contemporary society.
The tomb is a hybrid of a Greco-Roman sarcophagus base with an obelisk on top. In front, the tomb bears
a nude Semiramis with a cloak draped around her shoulders, holding a sceptre and a bird in the other.
Her nudity and pose are classically inspired, and the bird is from Babylonian folklore.386 At some point

380
Jordan 2002: 153.
381
See Bangs 1977: 9.
382
FGrH 688 F1b 8.6; Ael. VH. 12.39; Diod. Sic. 2.8.
383
BNJ 688 F 1.4-20; Curt. 5.1.24-35; Plin. NH. 19.19.
384
Hdt. 1.186; Prop. 3.11; Curt. 5.1.24-35.
385
Hdt. 1.181; Dan. 14.
386
Diodorus records that Semiramis was reared by doves and after her death she transformed into a dove. (Diod. Sic. 2.4,
2.20; Hyg. Fab. 197; Xen. An. 1.4; Luc. Syr. D. 14,33.) See Lightfoot 2003: 351-355.
70
throughout history, all of the structures illustrated in the Babylonian cityscape by van Heemskerck have
been attributed to the Assyrian queen. It is clear that this is Semiramis’ Babylon.

Figure 13. A close up of the statue of Semiramis in front of the tomb. Philips Galle,
1572, Maerten van Heemskerck, ‘The Walls of Babylon’ in the series ‘The Eight
Wonders of the Ancient World’, engraving, Amsterdam, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen
Dresden. 5601.101:7.

This chapter focuses on an identifiable element of the topography of Semiramis’ Babylon, the tomb of the
Queen. The earliest description of the tomb is found in Herodotus and in the later account by Plutarch.
Through the story of the tomb, authors are able to discuss issues of virtuous behaviour regarding decision
making and treatment of the dead. The works that employ this story are often didactic, particularly for
political leaders with Semiramis as a positive exemplum. It shall be argued that in the works of Plutarch
and Herodotus the Queen conforms to topoi that involve women being used to demonstrate the failures of
Persian men. She is thus interchangeable, we see this occurring in the shift from the story being attributed
to Nitokris in Herodotus to Semiramis in Plutarch.

Herodotus on the Tomb of Nitokris

The earliest description of the monument that will become known as Semiramis’ tomb is found in
Herodotus. In his Histories, the tomb is attributed to Nitokris, one of the two Assyrian queens that feature
in the account. Herodotus attributes many acts to the Queen, among which is the building of her own
monumental tomb situated above a busy city gate in Babylon. It is said that upon the exterior of the tomb
is engraved the following inscription;
71
 If any king of Babylon who comes after me needs money, let him open this tomb and take as
much money as he wants. Let him not, however, open it unless he is truly in need. If he opens
it for any other reason it will not go well with him.387

According to Herodotus, the only ruler whoever took up the invitation on the tomb was Darius. Upon
entering, he found nothing except a corpse and another inscription;

You would not open up the graves of the dead if you were not so insatiate and shamefully
greedy.388

Here, Herodotus uses the story of the tomb to comment on Darius’ lack of respect for nomoi, or cultural
boundaries. It forms part of a much larger project in Herodotus, namely the delineation of Darius’
character and an exploration of the rules that govern society.

Throughout his history, Herodotus is fascinated by the idea of tomb robbing and the violation of burial
protocols. This is most clearly demonstrated in Book Three where Darius conducts his famous
investigation of burial customs in his empire. The story goes as follows; Darius summons Indians from
the eastern fringes of his empire and Greeks from the west; he asks the Greeks if they would eat their
dead fathers, and the Indians if they would burn them, and both react to the questions with equal horror.389
So, says Herodotus, Pindar was right, nomos is king of all. Here Herodotus establishes that the burial
rites are the definitive state of nomoi, or ‘arbitrary rules of culture common to all men’.390 Therefore, an
act such as tomb violation equated to the disregard of nomoi. For Herodotus, the mistreatment of bodies
and burials is typical of the most heinous act, often associated with insanity or barbarity. In these
circumstances, the persons who forgot or transgressed these nomoi, or normal barriers of society, are
punished.391 Herodotus’ text is littered with examples of men who violate these principles.

For Cambyses, his disregard for burial nomoi proved that he was insane. Included in his long list of
transgressions was Cambyses’ disregard of Egyptian burial practices in Memphis. 392 Here the king
ordered the opening of ancient tombs so he could examine the bodies inside.393 Earlier in the book,

387
Hdt. 1.187.
388
Hdt. 1.187.
389
Hdt. 3.38.
390
Humphreys 1987: 211-220.
391
Humphreys 1987: 214; Hartog 1988; 110, 158, 337.
392
See Hdt. 3.30, 32, 27,29, 37.
393
Hdt. 3.37.
72
Herodotus reveals that the king not only opened the tombs for curiosity’s sake, but he also tampered with
the bodies that lay within. In revenge for deceiving the Persian king, it is stated that Cambyses had the
body of Amasis, the former king of Egypt, taken from its tomb. He then ordered his servants to ‘whip
the corpse, prick it with goads, pluck out its hair, and inflict every other indignity upon it’. 394 To add
further insult, the corpse was then burnt, violating Cambyses’ own religion, as well as the beliefs of the
Egyptians. To Herodotus, these actions proved that Cambyses’ was mad; ‘else he would never have set
himself to deride religion and custom’.395 In consequence for his cultural transgressions, Cambyses’
death mirrors another sacrilegious act he committed: the killing of the sacred Apis calf.396 Particularly
for Cambyses, the act of violation of burial customs was an indicator of madness used to reflect on the
Persian king’s character.397

The theme of burial violation was also associated with barbarity. Hartog explains that the mutilation of
a corpse by decapitation was a mark of aristeia for the Scythians, used as a trophy for their achievement
in battle. This sharply contrasts with the strict regulations behind the proclamations of aristeia in fifth-
century Athenian society where prizes were awarded by vote.398 Therefore, the Scythians, being the
antithesis of Greek culture in Herodotus, were quintessentially barbarous in their treatment of the dead.
However, this barbaric act is not restricted to the Scythians. The Persian Xerxes has the head of the
Spartan king Leonidas cut off and impaled. This is evidence for Herodotus that the Persian king ‘was
more angry with him than with any other man; for otherwise he would never have departed from custom
about the corpse’.399 When the Leonidas’ brother seeks revenge, he stays true to Greek social boundaries
and refuses to commit the same barbarous act as Xerxes as he believed ‘such things befit barbarians
rather than Greeks’.400 Consequentially, it is evident that throughout the Histories, Herodotus is
fascinated by the idea of tomb robbing and the violation of burial protocols and often uses this theme to
reflect on the character of an individual as either insane or barbarous if they partake in this sacrilegious
act.

394
Hdt. 3.1, 16.
395
Hdt. 3.38.
396
Hdt. 3.64.
397
Avery 1972: 529-546.
398
Hartog 1988: 162-165.
399
Hdt 7.238.
400
Hdt 9.79.
73
The importance of tomb robbing and burial violation is stressed by Herodotus by the positioning of these
stories within the Histories. In fact, the tomb story of Nitokris and Darius is the first instance of burial
violation that arises within the text.401 Since this story is the first account, it establishes a precedent for
the immorality of burial violation that is carried throughout the Histories. The trap that Nitokris lays is
successful in testing Darius. When he fails this test, he is met with a chastising remark. From here on it
is made clear that under no circumstances should burials be tampered with. This then progresses in later
examples, as demonstrated with the Scythians and Cambyses, to show that people who willingly commit
this crime are either a barbarian or insane. The importance of the recurrent theme of tomb and burial
violation is further indicated with the selection of a thrilling tomb story for the conclusion of The
Histories. In the climax, Herodotus recounts the fate of the clever, but corrupt Artaÿctes, who committed
numerous sacrilegious crimes. Among these crimes was the robbing the tomb of Protesilaus, son of
Iphiculus and hero of the Iliad.402 In revenge for this heinous act, Artaÿctes was crucified. Moreover, his
son was stoned to death before his own eyes by the Elaesians who he had transgressed.403 This last instance,
before the conclusion of the work, hammers home the seriousness and graphic fate awaiting anyone who
dares to commit this crime.

In addition to the violation of nomos, Darius’ crimes were particularly abhorrent because they were
seemingly unnecessary. Throughout his account, Herodotus stresses the wealth of Babylon. Preceding
the tomb story, the wealth of Babylon is alluded to in the description of the city. According to the
Chaldeans, a statue of Zeus Belos alone was said to have amounted to eight-hundred talents of gold.404
Moreover, in his description of the city, Herodotus also describes the pomp and grandeur of the
Babylonian festivals and sacrifices, which involved an annual burning of a thousand talents worth of
frankincense.405 Darius’ conquest of the city, and his opening of Nitokris’ tomb followed this description
of Babylon’s wealth. As previously stated, the first inscription on the exterior of the tomb specifies that
the opener of the grave should be in need of wealth.406 It is evident that Darius does not fall into this
category. This juxtaposition is demonstrated further after the tomb story. When discussing the functions

401
Before this, there are two instances of interference with human remains. However, in both occasions, the perpetrators were
abiding by the word of the gods and gave the bodies a proper burial. The first is carried out by the sons of the Athenians, held
hostage by the tyrant Pisistratus who ‘cleansed’ the island of Delos following the instructions of an oracle. (Hdt. 1.66) In the
second case, the Spartans, under the instruction of a disciple of the gods, were promised victory if they brought home the
bones of Agamemnon’s son, Orestes.
402
Hdt. 9.16.
403
Hdt. 9.120-121.
404
Hdt. 1. 181-183, 1.192.
405
Hdt 1.183.
406
Hdt. 1.187.
74
of satrapies, Herodotus divulges that Babylon provides Persia with a third of the resources of Asia,
singularly supporting the army for four months.407 By placing this information surrounding the tomb
story, Darius’ actions are highlighted as superfluous.408 Moreover, it is stressed by Herodotus that the
tomb of Semiramis had not been opened by a previous king.409 This means that an equally pressed Cyrus
had made the judgment to not open the tomb during this occupation of the city. Therefore, it seems that
it is the fault of the judgment of Darius that he opted to violate the tomb. This reflection on the progression
of greed of Persian kings fits into a larger theme throughout the Histories where the vices of luxury and
greed directly correlate to weakness and the decline of the Persians.410

Throughout the Histories, Herodotus is able to explore the theme of tomb robbing and the violation of
burial protocols. The theme is often associated with insanity or barbarity, due to the lack of respect for
cultural customs, or nomoi, needed to commit this act. This misconduct is essential in contributing to a
larger project in Herodotus, the delineation of the Darius’ character, as well as the exploration of the
rules that govern society. In this circumstance, Nitokris is constructed as the vengeful queen who
catalyses this series of events.411 Therefore, the tomb story of Nitokris was far more important for the
overall progression of The Histories rather than the figure of the Babylonian queen herself.

The Legacy of Herodotus’ Tomb Story

While it is clear that the tomb story is important to advancing Herodotus’ characterisation of Darius, the
later reception of the story tends to focus on the ingenuity of the Queen rather than the questionable
morals of the Persians. We see this in an anonymous work thought to be dated to the second-century
BCE, Tractatus De Mulieribus Claris In Bello.412 The work consists of fourteen short biographies on
extraordinary women, often martial rulers.413 A number of motives have been proposed for the purpose
of the work. One argument is that this work was produced as a series of exempla for contemporary
Hellenistic queens i.e. Eurydice, Berenice II, and Cleopatra, who actively participated in governing or
took to the battlefield.414 At the very least this catalogue demonstrates the capabilities of women. As
such, we see the genre and audience of the texts being influential in the way the narratives within can be

407
Hdt.1.192.
408
Hart 1982: 114-115.
409
Hdt. 1.87.
410
Gammie 1986: 183; Hall 1989: 80.
411
Flory 1987: 42-44; Dillery 1992: 30-38; Gray 1995: 185-210.
412
Ehlers 1966: 30.
413
Semiramis also appears in this work. However, the bibliographic information is sourced from Ctesias.
414
See Gera 1997: 32-61.
75
used. This is particularly apparent with Nitokris, whose biography is summarised from the Histories. In
this isolated context, her feats, including the tomb story, are viewed as positive deeds of a ruler. This is
in contrast to the Histories that sees the tomb story as purely serving the purpose of delineating Persian
decline in morals and increase of greed.

We see a similar instance in our next source, Plutarch’s Moralia in the essay on the ‘Sayings of King and
Commanders’. Despite writing approximately five centuries after Herodotus, the Greek biographer and
essayist largely stays true to Herodotus’ account, as seen below;

Semiramis caused a great tomb to be prepared for herself, and on it this inscription:
“Whatsoever king finds himself in need of money may break into this monument and take as
much as he wishes.” Darius accordingly broke into it, but found no money; he did, however,
come upon another inscription reading as follows: “If you were not a wicked man with an
insatiate greed for money, you would not be disturbing the places where the dead are laid.” 415

In Plutarch, Semiramis is used for the same moralizing purpose as Herodotus but within a different socio-
political climate. This text is more explicitly educative and didactic for the intended audience.

The marked difference between the account of the tomb story in Plutarch compared to Herodotus is the
name given to the Assyrian Queen. As shown in the previous chapter, the works of Nitokris and Semiramis,
the only two Assyrian queens in the Histories, are very similar. So much so that by the first-century
Diodorus Siculus amalgamates the two under the name of Semiramis in his Bibliotheca Historica.
Momigliano and Kuhrt theorise that these two women were in fact the same woman.416 Similarly, Dalley
argues that the name ‘Semiramis’ became an archetype for extraordinary Babylonian queens that
originated from the historical figure of Sammu-ramat.417 To fulfil this Assyrian archetype of queenship,
later rulers such as Naqi’a (the Herodotean Nitokris) and Satronice emulated the memorable queen.418
Consequently, a variety of legends are attached to the name ‘Semiramis’ in Classical sources, and the
use of the name for more than one woman can be explained by this tradition.

Other than the differences in the name of the Assyrian queen, the tomb story is similarly used as a
moralizing text as discussed by Herodotus. However, in Plutarch’s account, the moralistic theme

415
Plut. Mor. 173.
416
Momigliano 1969: 183-186; Kuhrt 1987: 543.
417
Dalley 2005: 11-22; Dalley 2013a: 107-126;
418
Dalley 2013b: 120-126.
76
becomes more explicitly educative and didactic to suit his agenda. In Plutarch’s Moralia, the tomb story
of Semiramis features in the ethical essay on ‘Sayings of Kings and Commanders’. This essay consists
of brief biographical anecdotes to reflect on the character of prominent Greek and Persian figures. The
Moralia were written, in great part, before the Lives, but the two works have much in common. Both
works intended to reflect, understand, and judge the character of the subject by the recounting of the
deeds and anecdotes of the individual to improve the morals of the reader. 419 However the structure of
the Moralia greatly differed from the biography of the Lives. The Moralia were produced in a more
accessible, condensed format in the form of dialogues, letters, and lectures in which concrete stories were
used to discuss reactions to ethical situations.420 For the ‘Sayings of Kings and Commanders’ the content
has been produced in a summarized format suited for the intended audience. This purpose is revealed in
the dedicatory letter to Trajan, preceding the catalogue of axioms. The language used in this dedicatory
letter, previously thought to be a forgery, explicitly urges the Emperor to read his abridged version of the
Lives.421

In the Lives the pronouncements of the men have the story of the men’s actions adjoined in the
same pages, and so must wait for the time when one has the desire to read in a leisurely way;
but here the remarks, made into a separate collection quite by themselves, serving, so to speak,
as samples and primal elements of the men’s lives, will not, I think, be any serious tax on your
time, and you will get in brief compass an opportunity to pass in review many men who have
proved themselves worthy of being remembered. 422

From this dedicatory letter, it is evident that Plutarch intended to help guide the emperor’s moral compass
when he is faced with difficult moral and ethical situations. Consequently, these sayings educate the
emperor and other readers on the correct, virtuous reactions for different ethical circumstances that are
to be emulated, as well as incorrect, immoral reactions that are to be avoided. In particular, these
precedents of warring kings and commanders would be especially applicable to the soldier-emperor
during his campaigns against Dacia and the Parthian Empire to expand the Roman Empire. By urging
Trajan to read and comprehend the Sayings of Kings and Commanders, Plutarch urges the emperor to
learn from the famous rulers of the past, including figures such as Semiramis.423

419
Duff 1999: 5.
420
Babbitt 1927: xii.
421
Volkmann 1869: 215; Paribeni 1926: 19; Rawson 1989: 251.
422
Plut. Mor. 173.
423
Stadter 2013: 20.
77
Due to the passages’ origins in Herodotus, the same moralizing message of self-control and moderation
is present in the text of Plutarch, but for a predominantly Imperial Roman audience. As previously stated,
Plutarch was concerned with commenting on contemporary Roman society by analyzing the past. Thus,
even though Semiramis is not Roman, her actions are examined within the context of Roman societal
norms.424 Like most societies, respect for the dead, especially family members and ancestors, was integral
to Roman society and the mos maiorum. It was essential that this duty towards ancestors, pietas, was
maintained.425 The correct procedure of dealing with the dead started as soon as the soul left the body
with the last breath, and included numerous steps to correctly prepare and purify the body before
cremation.426 For the elite, elaborate processions (pompa funebris) then occurred followed by the
eulogy (laudatio funebris) as well as sacrifice or libation.427 This practice of respect for the dead then
continued after the body was buried. In the annual death festivals Parentalia and Feralia, meals and wine
were offered to the deceased in the location of internment.428 Patricians were also constantly reminded
of their ancestors by portrait busts of family members, the images, were displayed in the atria, or
courtyard, of the home.429 These portraits were also brought out in other ritualistic settings. Similarly,
tombs were intended as a permanent commemoration and place of rest of the dead whilst also
demonstrating the wealth of the deceased. These tombs were vital indicators of family identity that
simultaneously obeyed the proper burial rituals of the dead whilst providing a location for rituals to
honour the dead and the gods.430 Therefore, the desecration of burials and tombs were viewed as great
insults to the deceased and their families.431 Even those who lacked support of a family to carry out these
burial practices could have a proper funeral if they were a member of guilds or collegia. The punishment
for tampering with bodies and graves was severe, including the death penalty, or sentencing to the
mines.432 Therefore, it is unsurprising that cases of tomb violation and mistreatment of corpses in the
Roman world were met with disdain.

424
Tombs of non-Romans did not hold any cultural significance. Therefore, if Semiramis was being viewed as a non-Roman
the desecration would be warranted. (See Dig. 47.12.4.)
425
Heid 2007: 408.
426
Corbeill 2004: 90-91.
427
Suter 2008: 258; Scheid 2007: 264, 270.
428
Gee 2008: 62.
429
Walker and Burnett 1981: 9.
430
Gee 2008: 59; Tulloch 2010: 544.
431
Hope 2000: 114.
432
Dig. 47.12.3.7, 47.12.11.
78
One such example is the dictator Sulla, who infamously destroyed the tomb of Marius to exert his power
over his deceased enemy.433 Fearing the repercussions of his actions, Sulla left strict instructions
regarding his own cremation and burial to avoid the same fate that he had inflicted upon his rival. In the
later imperial period, Suetonius records Caligula broke into the tomb of Alexander the Great to steal a
breast plate.434 There are also countless examples of Roman emperors denying the burial rights of their
victims. This included the method to which they were killed, such as crucifixion, burning alive, and being
thrown to the beasts, and mutilation after death via exposure, dragging, and decapitation. 435 The strict
rituals concerning the dead makes it apparent that burial rites was just as important, if not more, in Roman
society. Therefore, the idea of Semiramis’ tomb being desecrated is likewise an abhorrent and shocking
act.

This tradition of using tomb stories as moralizing exempla continued into the later empire. Under the
Severan dynasty in the second- to third- centuries, the Roman author Aelian recorded a story that paralleled
the events that occurred with Semiramis’ tomb. This story of tomb violation and retribution was included
in Aelian’s Varia Historia. On the surface, this work seems to be a jumbled composition of anecdotes,
biographies, and other types of miscellaneous information with no overall theme. However, on closer
inspection it is this variation of material which is most telling. The common theme which draws the work
together is the assortment of ethical messages and moral conclusions.436 In this work, there is a striking
resemblance with Darius’ violation of Semiramis’ tomb and the actions of Xerxes in the Temple of Belus
in Babylon. Aelian records that the Persian king, Xerxes purposefully went out of his way to break into
the giant pyramid of the Babylonian god. When he entered the tomb, he found a body encased in a
glass sarcophagus filled almost to the rim with olive oil. Similarly, with Semiramis, the inscription
associated with the tomb tempted and welcomed interaction with the reader. The inscription nearby the
body in the Temple of Bel read; ‘“For the man who opens the tomb and does not fill the sarcophagus things
will not improve.”’437 According to Aelian, this frightened Xerxes, so the Persian king attempted to fill the
sarcophagus but the levels of oil remained the same. Defeated, Xerxes gave up on trying to follow the
commands of the inscription. The story concludes with the statement that Xerxes did in fact meet the very
worst end, as the inscription had warned, and he was murdered in his bed by his son. Stamm has argued
the moralizing tone of the Varia Historia reflects Aelian’s perception, as well as contemporary authors,

433
Plin. NH. 7.1.87; Cic. Leg. 2.22.56-7.
434
Suet. Aug. 18; Suet. Cal. 52.
435
Hope 200: 112-127.
436
Johnson 1997: 212.
437
Ael. VH. 13.3.
79
that luxuria had reached its peak in Rome during the reign of Elagabalus.438 Therefore, it would seem that
this story was included in the collection as a negative exempla intended to steer the ostentatious Romans,
and their emperor, from the greed that was causing the decline of the empire. Moreover, the long tradition
of tomb stories as negative exempla for Roman emperors starting from the time of Plutarch in the first-
century to Aelian, indicates that this topic was important and something that the emperors need to be
attuned to.

The tomb story of Plutarch participates in a wider debate about the circumstances in which overriding
the rules is justifiable. It was questioned if all laws sacrosanct in every circumstance, did the ends always
justify the means? Therefore, the primary intention of the tomb story in the ‘Sayings of Kings and
Commanders’ is to test what is acceptable or unacceptable in an extreme crisis, the moment when you
most need to rely on your moral compass. In this circumstance, Darius finds himself in an ethical
predicament. It is clear from the inscription that Semiramis explicitly invited a future ruler to open her
tomb if he was in need of money. This inscription calls upon the Persian king to make a judgment on
whether gain of wealth is an acceptable reason to break the rules. The second inscription, discovered
upon entering the tomb, demonstrates that ‘an insatiate greed for money’ is not a reasonable excuse to
desecrate a burial.439 Therefore, the self-control of Darius as well as his ethical judgment is under scrutiny
in this passage and Semiramis is applauded for exposing the greedy actions of the Persian king. Therefore,
the text provides both a positive example of a virtuous ruler, Semiramis, whilst also condemning negative
behaviours of the tomb robber, Darius. It was intended by Plutarch that the emperor Trajan should learn
from these moralizing examples. The didactic purpose of this anecdote is for the emperor to understand
what rules can be broken when he finds himself in moments of crisis. It was to be understood by the
emperor that some prohibitions are so important that no matter the circumstances that they should be
respected. Therefore, under no circumstances or moments of crisis is it is justifiable to ignore innate
social customs such as respecting the dead. Tomb violation was to be avoided under any circumstance.

Conclusion
As we have seen, in Antiquity the tomb of Semiramis is only mentioned by Herodotus and Plutarch. The
story is not found in any Late Antique or Medieval texts.440 In comparison with other narratives
associated with the Queen the tomb story of Semiramis does not have a very diverse and long history.

438
Stamm 2003: 36-42.
439
Plut. Mor. 173.
440
For a summary of Persians in the Medieval Period see Cary 1956.
80
The first time we encounter the tomb story is in Herodotus’ Histories. In this account, it is used to
delineate the character of Darius. It also added to a larger project in the work, the decline of the Persians.
This was achieved by using the theme of burial and corpse interference. Throughout the Histories, burial
and corpse interference were clear markers of the breaching of nomoi. Therefore, Darius’ actions were
understood to be immoral and more importantly, un-Greek. Dillery has convincingly argued that the story
was a fabrication constructed by Herodotus in which the literary trope of the vengeful queen was used to
catalyse the storyline of the Histories.441 As such, it is apparent that Semiramis was a means to an end in
the story of tomb violation. She could have easily been swapped out for any other vengeful queen and
the story would have still achieved its goal in the overall progression of the Histories. Nevertheless, in
later sources the tomb story continues to be attached to the Assyrian queen, Semiramis.

The next instances in which the story reappears is in the anonymous Tractatus De Mulieribus Claris and
Plutarch’s Sayings of Kings and Commanders. In contrast with Herodotus, this text was purely didactic
that reflects the change in the intended audience. For the anonymous work this audience can only be
speculated. However, for Plutarch it is much clearer. The main objective for the Moralia was to guide
the moral compass of the Roman emperor, Trajan. In this period, the beliefs concerning burial customs
were still relevant, if not more relevant, than in fifth-century Greece. The act of burial violation itself
became the main concern of the passage. Semiramis is used as a voice of reason, chastising the immoral
actions of the greedy Darius. This can be seen to reflect the views of Plutarch, as well as Roman imperial
ideologies on the topic of the sanctity of burial rites. It was to be understood, that under no circumstances,
even in times of war and need, should burials be interfered with. Again, in this instance, Semiramis was
not the primary feature of the story. Instead, she acted as the catalyst for the chain of events.

In summary, in both of the sources examined, the primary purpose of these strong, Oriental women was to
demonstrate the weakness of Persian men that are outsmarted by women. In this way, Nitokris and
Semiramis are seen to conform to a trope within Greek literature of women whose purpose is to illustrate
the flaws and failures of Persian rulers.442 As such, these women are not the focus of this anecdote, and are
interchangeable. Thus, we see a shift from Nitokris in Herodotus to Semiramis in Plutarch. After this the
anecdote disappears from the Semiramis narrative, but we continue to see a similar story in Aelian’s
Historical Miscellany. Since the tomb story of Semiramis does not have a diverse history it is evident

441
Dillery 1992: 30-38.
442
Brosius 1996: 195-198.
81
that it did not significantly contribute to Semiramis’ reputation as a builder of monumental architecture,
nor did it add to other popular conceptions of the Queen that promoted Orientalist discourse. It is due to
these reasons that we see this narrative become detached from the Queen and fall out of use.

82
 CHAPTER THREE
Part One: Military Exploits

Lo here Semiramys Queene of great Babylon

Most generous gem and floure of lonely favour
Whose excellent power fro Mede unto septentrion
Flourished in her regally as mighty conqueror
Subdued al Barbary: and Zorast that king of honor
She skue in Ethiop, and conquered Armony in Inde,
In which non entred but Alexaner and she I finde.443

In this quote we see the prolific balladeer, Eustache Deschamps, describing Semiramis as a mighty
conqueror. Deschamps’ work The ix. Ladies worthie written in the late fourteenth-century, represents an
important stage of Semiramis’ representation. It was inspired by the querelle de femmes, or the woman
question—a debate on the moral, social, and intellectual capabilities and character of women in
comparison to men that occurred throughout the fourteenth- to the seventh-centuries.444 In this poem
Deschamps selected and grouped together nine pagan women—Semiramis, Tomyris, Teuta, Penthesilea,
Hippolyte, Lampedo, Sinope, Deiphile, and Etiope—and termed them the Female Worthies, Neuf Preuse,
or Femmes Fortes. This group was introduced to complement the pre-existing Nine (male) Worthies or
Les Neuf Preux that first appeared in Jacques de Longuyon’s Vows of the Peacock (1312).445 The nine
men traditionally included three sets of pagan, Jewish and Christian figures; Hector, Alexander the Great,
Julius Caesar, Joshua, David, Judas Maccabeus, King Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey of Bouillon,
who were seen to personify the chivalrous moral virtues of courage and generalship. Like their male
counterparts, the Female Worthies were Amazons or women that embodied masculine qualities. Like the
male Worthies before her, the militaristic Semiramis was someone for rulers to emulate in this setting,
especially women in positions of power that needed to display traditionally masculine attributes.446

This chapter will examine how the tradition that Deschamps engages with develops over time. It will be
demonstrated that Semiramis, comparable to Alexander the Great in military success and ability, is a
product of post-Hellenistic sources such as Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica. However, in this

443
Desch. 403.
444
Dropick 2010: 468-469.
445
Desch. 403.
446
See Vasselin 1994. A similar positive shift in Semiramis’ military achievements occurs in the late fifteenth-century genre
of the grands rhétoriqueurs—a political and didactic writing in French-speaking regions. As demonstrated by Armstrong
(2004), this genre tended to foreground her public achievements, particularly military prowess, and underplay or completely
omit any element of sexual depravity.
83
source she continues to be associated with despotism, manifesting in her ambition and greed in warfare.
In the Late Antique to the Medieval period, Semiramis’ martial ambition transitions into a thirst for blood
and sexual promiscuity. However, this drastically shifts to an overwhelmingly positive attitude in the
works of Boccaccio and de Pizan. Moreover, by providing this overview of Semiramis as a warrior-
queen, it provides context for the case study for this chapter—Semiramis’ actions upon receiving word
of a rebellion—which engages heavily with the querelle des femmes mentioned above.

The Sources: Cleitarchus and Diodorus

Aforementioned in Chapter Two, Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica is the most extant version of
the Semiramis legend in the ancient literary tradition. Diodorus compiled his history in the first-century
BCE, most likely between 60 to 30 BCE. The purpose of his Bibliotheca Historica was to explore the
moral nature of humankind. Recent scholarship, such as Charles E. Muntz’ Diodorus Siculus and the
World of the Late Roman Republic and Iris Sulimani’s Diodorus’ Mythistory and the Pagan Mission,
have demonstrated that Diodorus did not just stick to one source or indolently copy texts.447 Instead, he
selected and manipulated a variety of texts to fit his moral discourse. This is evident in his version of
Semiramis. Ctesias of Cnidus, the Greek physician to the Achaemenids, was the primary source that was
consulted for Semiramis’ deeds in construction. However, Diodorus Siculus can be seen to diverge from
the Vulgate of Assyrian history, recorded by Ctesias, for Semiramis’ military deeds.448 Instead, for this,
he consults one of the Alexander historians, Cleitarchus.

Information about Cleitarchus is scarce and largely speculative.449 What is known is that he was the son
of Dinon of Colophon—the author of a fragmentary history of Persia. Like Ctesias, Cleitarchus’ work
on the History of Alexander is fragmentary. He is believed to have written his work in consulation with
the accounts of Callisthenes, Onesicritus, Nearchus, and Aristobulus in the fist third or half of the third-
cenutry BCE.450 Cleitarchus is the main source of the Vulgate on Alexander’s life and is transmitted
through the works of Quintus Curtius Rufus, Diodorus Siculus, Justin, the Metz Epitome and, in part,
Plutarch. Despite the lack of remaining fragments of his work, Cleitarchus was a well-known author,
particularly to Roman authors such as Cicero and Quintilian. However, their opinion of him was not

447
Llewellyn-Jones and Robson 2009: 38; Sulimani 2011: 21-162; Muntz 2017.
448
Pearson 1983: 217; Gardiner-Garden 1987: 4-9; Stronk 2007: 32-33; Llewellyn-Jones and Robson 2009: 38-39; Parker
2009: 28-55; Waters 2017: 45.
449
See Baynham 1998: 78-80.
450
Refer to Parker 2009: 28-55.
84
particularly flattering, deeming him as an untrustworthy author of Alexander’s life.451 The Greek writers
were even more critical of his work. For instance, Demetrius describes his writing style as ‘repulsive and
frigid’.452 These criticisms were not without cause as it is apparent that he was prone to romanticising
events.453 Thus, it not surprising that Cleitarchus had a notorious reputation among ancient scholars for
the accuracy of his history, and yet achieved great popularity with the literary public for these entertaining
accounts.

As previously stated, despite its popularity, Cleitarchus’ work is fragmentary and survives to some extent
in Diodorus Siculus, and in particular the account of Semiramis. It has been established by modern
scholars that elements of Cleitarchus’ account of Alexander the Great’s campaigns in the East served as
inspiration for the military deeds of Semiramis in Diodorus. 454 This will be discussed in greater depth
later in this chapter. But before the military figures of Semiramis and Alexander can be compared and
discussed, it is necessary to provide a brief overview of Semiramis’ military deeds in Diodorus Siculus’
Bibliotheca Historica.

The Narrative of Diodorus Siculus

Diodorus starts the history of Asia with the first notable king, Ninus. Ninus conquers many lands and
eventually weds Semiramis after she captures his attention while on campaign in Bactria. During the
siege of Bactra, Semiramis leads a small force of rock climbers up to the acropolis of the town and
captures the city.455 It is during this event where we are first introduced to Semiramis as well as her
military ingenuity. After the death of Ninus, Semiramis ascends and follows in the footsteps of her late
husband. She visits Media, Ecbatana, Persis, and Egypt, and adds Libya and Ethiopia to the empire, and
sets her eyes on India as her next conquest. To combat the large Indian army led by king Stabrobates,
Semiramis amasses an excessively large army, including stuffed elephant puppets. After being initially
successful in a naval battle, the Assyrians are lured into making a pontoon bridge to cross the Indus River.
Again, the troops are initially successful in combat, but then the battle takes a turn for the worst. The
elephant puppets fail, and her army is forced to retreat across the river. Many casualties of Assyrian

451
Quintil. Inst. Or. 10.1.74; Cic. De Legg. 1.7.
452
Demetr. 304.
453
Cf. Diod. Sic. 17.77; Plut. Alex. 46.
454
Pearson 1983: 217; Gardiner-Garden 1987: 4-9; Comploi 2000: 223-44; Stronk 2007: 32-33; Llewellyn-Jones and Robson
2009: 38-39; Waters 2017: 45.
455
Diod. Sic. 2.6.
85
troops result from the bottle-necking of the large force on the bridge.456 This defeat marks the end of
Semiramis’ military career and she returns to Bactra.

Within this narrative, distinct themes arise. These themes change over time according to the motivations
of the authors and will be outlined in the proceeding sections.

Semiramis’ Ambition and Greed

In the Classical period, there is a strong association of ambition and greed as Semiramis’ primary
motivation for war.457 This is established by the Queen’s husband, King Ninus, who as seen as her
precursor. According to Diodorus, King Ninus was the first Assyrian ruler of noteworthiness. During
his twelve-year reign, he subdued a number of territories, creating an Assyrian empire that spanned from
Egypt to the Caspian Gates.458 After the death of Ninus, his successor Semiramis was described as one
who was ‘ambitious by nature and eager to surpass’ the reputation and deeds of her late husband.459
Semiramis, like her husband, had a desire to add unconquered regions to the Assyrian empire. As queen
and commander of the Assyrian army, Semiramis ‘trampled on’ Libya and Ethiopia, adding them to her
territory.460 For a number of sources, these conquests are a significant achievement. One such source is
Pliny, who places Semiramis equal to Hercules, Dionysus, Cyrus, and Alexander, in regards to
expansion.461 However, these successes did not seem to be enough to satisfy the Assyrian queen, and so
she decided to make war on India.

It is in the account of the campaign against India in which the warrior-queen’s ambition and greed come
to the fore. Gera states that Diodorus presents the campaign in moralistic terms where ‘the hubristic,
overly successful leader finally meets her match.’462 According to Diodorus, Semiramis was motivated
to attack India due to her φιλοτίμως or ambitious nature, as well as the inactivity of her army caused by
the peace of her empire. Therefore, ‘she was keen to achieve some remarkable exploit in the field of

456
Diod Sic. 2.16-19.
457
Baynham (1998: 166) has noted that Alexander is similarly motivated by ambitio in Quintus Curtius. See “Semiramis and
Alexander” in this chapter.
458
Diod. Sic. 2.1.4-2.4; Euseb. Chron. 53-65.
459
Diod. Sic. 2.7.2.
460
Diod. Sic. 2.14.3-4; Just. Epit. 1.2.
461
Plin. HN. 6.18.
462
Gera 1997: 81.
86
war’.463 It is only after learning that ‘the Indians were the largest race in the inhabited world and that
they lived in the largest and most beautiful land’ that it is decided by Semiramis to lead an expedition
against them.464 Furthermore, the reader is again reminded of the warrior-Queen’s motivations in the
correspondence between Semiramis and the Indian king Stabrobates. In a letter from the Indian king,
Semiramis is accused of starting the war without provocation and Stabrobates threatens to crucify her
once he is victorious. Nevertheless, Semiramis ignored these warnings.465 It is her ambition and greed
which motivates Semiramis to make war on India. Diodorus presents this stance as an immoral one, and
Semiramis is thus established as the progenitor of the Assyrian decline into luxury and indulgence. In
this account, Semiramis begins a trend that will climax with Sardanapalus whose corrupt and decadent
lifestyle causes the downfall of the Assyrian Empire.

In later texts, the ambition of Semiramis transitions into demonstrating the excess of the Orient in both
war and sex. In the epitome of Augustan historian Pompeius Trogus, produced by Justin, it is stated that
it was the custom of kings to defend, rather than to expand, their empire. Ninus, and later Semiramis,
were the first rulers to break from this tradition and instead selfishly imposed ‘an extravagant desire of
ruling’.466 Then in the Late Antique period, this pairing takes on a treacherous gothic quality. In the fifth-
century CE, St Augustine, in The City of God Against the Pagans, identifies these two rulers as the
exemplars of bad faith.467 According to the Christian authors St Augustine and Orosius, Semiramis,
having ‘her husband’s spirit’, is viewed as succumbing to her pagan ways, and is said by these authors
to have not only conquered Ethiopia but ‘crushed’ it and ‘drenched it in blood’.468 This excess is also
associated with sexual excess, with charges of incest and the slaughter of her sexual partners appearing
alongside her insatiable bloodlust.469

These ideologies are promulgated in the fourteenth-century by the Renaissance humanist, Giovanni
Boccaccio (1313-1375), who builds upon his sources, Justin and Orosius. Boccaccio primarily composed
poetry, however, in the later stages of his life he shifted his focus to writing compendiums of Classical
encyclopaedias and biographies in Latin. This was undoubtedly influenced by Petrarch, often considered

463
Diod. Sic. 2.16.1. Semiramis’ motive in Diodorus’ account can be likened to the Egyptian king, Sesostris, as discussed by
Muntz. However, in Semiramis’ case it is stressed that the campaign was unprovoked. (Muntz 2017: 1)
464
Diod. Sic. 2.16.2.
465
Diod. Sic. 2.18.2.
466
Just. Epit. 1.1.
467
August. De civitate Dei. 18.2.
468
Oros. 1.4.
469
Oros. 1.4; St Aug. 18.2; Just. 1.2.
87
the founder of humanism, whom Boccaccio regarded as a model writer and scholar. 470 This is typified
in Boccaccio’s modelling of a catalogue of the deeds of famous pagan women, De mulieribus claris
(1361-1362), to Petrarch’s catalogue on famous men, De viris illustribus. Boccaccio used the works of
the Church Fathers, such as Justin and Orosius, to create a chronology of these pagan individuals within
a Christian context. Even though he was using mostly pagan women as exempla, the work reinforced
Christian morals, with women presented on a spectrum. As such, Boccaccio selected both “good” and
“bad” women for his catalogue and explains his reasoning in the Preface;

I have decided to insert at various places in these stories some pleasant exhortations to virtue
and to add incentives for avoiding and detesting wickedness. Thus holy profit will mix with
entertainment and so steal insensibly into my readers’ minds.471

Boccaccio claims that the purpose of the work was to be didactic with the behaviour of the assembled
women intending to spur on virtue and curb vice. Migiel explains that women were considered most
worthy by Boccaccio when they exhibited traditionally masculine behaviour (primarily military and
political prowess) and denied their sexuality. Thus, when they exhibited behaviour contrary to this
standard they were denigrated.472 Nonetheless, this standard of exemplary behaviour put the women in
a “double bind” as it both raised them above their sex and constituted a threat to men. This form of
contradictory or a “double bind” account was a common method used by Boccaccio throughout his
work.473 In these accounts the narrative of an individual was often at first framed in a positive light, this
was then followed by an account of their failing, often caused by their own hand. This “double bind” is
evident in the narrative of Semiramis.

Following the aforementioned template, Boccaccio describes Semiramis in a positive light. The
Florentine writer gives Semiramis the highest accolade that he can give a woman—equalling or
surpassing the achievements of men—recounting that the Assyrian Queen took up arms with a ‘manly
spirit’ to expand the empire while casting aside ‘her womanly pursuits’.474 This masculine terminology
is also used to describe her other examples of military prowess and political aptitude. 475 However, this
praise quickly turns to the chastisement of the queen’s sexual licentiousness. By ending on this negative

470
Kolsky 2004: 39.
471
Bocc. FW. Preface. 7.
472
Migiel 2015: 180.
473
Migiel 2015: 173.
474
Bocc. FW. 2.8-10; Brown 2011: xix.
475
Simms Holderness 2004: 97, 101.
88
aspect, the reputation of the queen and the audiences’ perception of her is essentially tainted and overall
persona of the queen is negative.476

Engaging in the querelle des femmes nearly a century later, Christine de Pizan (1364-1430?) rebuked the
many negative allegations against women written by Jean de Meun in Roman de la Rose (c.1275),
Mathéolus’ Lamentations, and Giovanni Boccaccio’s Famous Women, with The Book of the City of the
Ladies (1405). It was argued by de Pizan that women were valued participants in society who should be
properly educated. To elucidate this thesis, de Pizan, incited by personified Reason, Rectitude, and
Justice, built an allegorical city made from famous women throughout history to protect womenkind of
the past, present, and future, from the misogyny of men. In this allegorical city, famous women
throughout history formed the building blocks. The first woman mentioned, functioning as the foundation
of the city, was Semiramis. De Pizan’s version of the Assyrian Queen was overtly positive, branding her
as a brave widow who surpassed all men in vigour and strength.477 The opening line of the biography
places the Assyrian queen within this militaristic context which is then continued throughout the account.
It is stated that Semiramis had extraordinary military strength and courage on both land and sea. This is
substantiated by de Pizan who states that the pagans attributed this military aptitude to her Olympian
ancestry as a daughter of Jupiter. Following this, it is stated that Semiramis ruled and conquered alongside
her husband Ninus. Subsequently, after his death, she continued to take up arms ‘with greater courage
than before’ and maintained power over the empire and added new territories to it.478 In contrast to
previous sources, de Pizan greatly exaggerates the areas conquered by Semiramis, allocating the
subjugation of the entire Orient to the warrior-Queen. Moreover, the order of events in the biography is
unusual in comparison to other traditions. According to de Pizan, once these conquests were made
Semiramis turned her attention to building projects within the empire. In most of the preceding sources,
Semiramis’ building achievements in Babylon, such as the city walls, are mentioned before her conquests
outside of the empire, rather than after the military deeds as described by de Pizan. Thus, this area of
achievement is de-emphasized in comparison to other sources that have been discussed in Chapter Two.
From this it is clear that Christine de Pizan’s Semiramis was a militaristic queen, whose courage was
drawn upon to forge the foundations of the utopian city being created.

476
Migiel 2015: 181.
477
Throughout the biographical entry, the adjective of courage is continuously repeated. (Simms Holderness 2004: 101.)
478
De Piz. Le Livre. 1.15.1.
89
 Military Skills of Semiramis

It takes more than ambition to achieve military success, and in addition to her unwomanly desire for
conquest, authors have also marvelled at the military skills of the queen. An early example of this
involves the account of Semiramis’ scaling of the acropolis at Bactra. This was a significant achievement
as Semiramis’ first husband Onnes had failed to seize the city on numerous occasions. According to
Diodorus, Semiramis’ success was the product of ‘intelligence, daring and all the other qualities which
make a person exceptional’.479

After this, as Semiramis became the sole ruler of Assyria and commander of the army, giving her more
opportunities to display her ingenuity in war. This is demonstrated with the Assyrian queen’s elephant
puppets during her campaign against the Indian king Stabrobates. In an attempt to level the playing field
and strike fear into the Indian king, Semiramis was motivated to give the illusion of having elephants, as
Stabrobates himself had many elephants and believed that none existed outside of India. These mock
elephants were created from the hides of 300,000 black cows that were shaped and stuffed with straw.480
The elephants were then controlled from the inside by a man and carried by a camel. Moreover, further
measures were made to ensure success by training the horses to get used to the smell of the foreign camels
so that they would not spook in battle. According to Diodorus, this was later replicated by Perseus, the
Macedonian king in the Third Macedonian War, 171-167 B.C, against the Romans. Polyaenus and
Zonaras describe these elephants as wooden dummies, smeared with an ointment ‘to the give a dreadful
odour’, and that a man within them imitated their trumpeting.481 The horses of the Macedonians were
also accustomed to the smell, sound and appearance of these dummies.

It is stressed by Diodorus that Semiramis went to great length to keep this cunning plan a secret. The
elephants were pieced together by craftsmen in a walled enclosure and the gates of the enclosure were
diligently watched to ensure that no craftsmen left, or anyone prohibited entered.482 However, this plan
went awry when a number of troops neglected their guard duty, and fearing their punishment, defected
to the Indians. Upon learning of the mock elephants, Stabrobates charged relentlessly at the elephants on
the front line and forced the Assyrians to retreat. However, it is implied by Diodorus that Semiramis’

479
Diod. Sic. 2.6.5.
480
Diod. Sic. 2.16.9. Stoneman (2008: 141) comments that Semiramis elephant dummies recall Alexander’s stratagem of
using red-hot dummies to fight elephants.
481
Poly. Strat. 4.21; Zonaras 9.22.
482
Diod. Sic. 2.16.10.
90
plan would have worked if the enemy had not been told of their forgery as the Indian army had been
tricked by the life-like elephants and were perplexed by the vast number of them.483 Thus, the version of
Semiramis we have here establishes her as a prominent military leader with ingenuity and skill in war.

Semiramis and Alexander

The final important theme that will be noted in the representation of Semiramis as a military commander
is her role as a forerunner to Alexander. Quintus Curtius states that Alexander believed that ‘there were
no other of those nations whom he admired more than [Cyrus] and Semiramis, who he believed had far
excelled all others in the greatness of their courage and the glory of their deeds’.484 According to Arrian,
Strabo, and Megasthenes, Alexander’s admiration for Semiramis, also motivated him to invade India to
surpass her failed attempt.485 However, these sentiments seem to be a product of Hellenistic and Roman
authors writing after the death of Alexander. These authors constructed Semiramis as a precursor to
Alexander providing material for him to emulate and surpass. Consequently, these similarities between
the two are only apparent in the accounts of Semiramis’ myth written after the death of Alexander.
Diodorus Siculus, Nicolaus of Damascus and Pompeius Trogus, show visible traces of Alexander but are
absent in the works prior to Alexander i.e. Herodotus and Deinon.486

Since Semiramis was seen as a precursor to Alexander, it is apparent that the Assyrian queen was an
appealing model for the king. But what made her a viable option over others? It is unlikely that
Semiramis’ reputation as a warrior queen was the cause for this connection as our current sources indicate
that this aspect of her legend was only developed in the early Hellenistic period. However, as outlined in
Chapter Two, the Assyrian queen was inextricably tied to the East in the same regions Alexander was
attempting to conquer. Moreover, Semiramis was synonymous with the city of Babylon, and Babylon
too held particular importance to Alexander. Sources speculate that Alexander intended the city to be the
new capital of his empire, and more famously Babylon was the place of the king’s death. 487 Therefore, it
was her association with the same geographical area in which Alexander campaigned that can be seen to
be the primary motivation of this pairing.488 This is evident in many sources. For example, Semiramis is

483
Diod. Sic. 2.17.
484
Curt. 7.6.20.
485
Arr. Anab. 6.24.2; Strab. 15.1.5.
486
Hdt. 1.184; FGrH IIIC 690 F7.
487
Curt. 10.2.7; Strab. 15.3.8-10.
488
Sulimani 2005: 62-63.
91
specifically evoked by Curtius in a speech by Alexander to his close friends in India after he was wounded
in battle;

I pray you, think that you have come to lands in which the name of a woman is renowned
because of her valour. What cities did Semiramis build! What nations did she reduce to
submission! What great works did she accomplish! We have not yet equalled a woman in
glory.489

In this passage, Semiramis is specifically associated with India, and Alexander is eager to surpass her
deeds.

The first similarity that arises in the Bibliotheca Historica between the two figures is the siege of a
Bactrian city. In Diodorus’ account, Semiramis captures Bactra with a small force of men by climbing
the Acropolis of the city to seize the citadel, and in the process proves herself a capable military leader.
This military success is clearly predicated on and mimics the success of Alexander’s siege of the Sogdian
rock or Ariamazes’ Rock.490 In the account of Curtius, Baynham argues that this tale similarly emphasises
Alexander’s ambitio.491 According to our sources, a rocky outcrop in the region of Sogdiana was being
held by rebellious enemy troops. This stronghold was believed to be impenetrable due to its great height
and dangerous terrain. Curtius wrote that Alexander, after seeing the unnavigable terrain of the rock, was
‘overcome by a desire to bring even nature to her knees’.492 When Alexander asked the defenders to
surrender, they refused, telling him that he would need “men with wings” to capture it.493 By bribing his
troops, Alexander urged his “flying troops” to climb to the top of the outcrop using iron pegs and ropes.
Using this arduous method, they scaled the rocky terrain and were able to overcome the rebels and signal
Macedonian victory.494 We see the same rhetoric colouring the account of Semiramis’ siege. Diodorus
recounts that Semiramis likewise led a small assault on Bactra, south of Sogdia, by climbing up the steep
slope of the acropolis in the same manner and then subsequently signalling her conquest.495

489
Curt. 9.6.23.
490
Alexander is also associated with numerous sieges of rocks where similar tactics are used in the Bactrian region: Sogdian
Rock, Rock of Chorienes (Arr. 21.1,6-10), Rock of Arimazes (Curt. 7.11.1-19; Metz Epit. 15-18; Polyaen. 4.3.29; Diod. Sic.
17; Starb. 11.11.4) and the Rock of Sisimithres (Curt. 8.2.19-33; Plut. Al 58.3; Strabo. 11.11.4).
491
Baynham 1998: 94.
492
Curt. 7.11.4. Quintus Curtius Rufus is deemed more reliable account for this event over Arrian. See Bosworth 1995:124-
130 and Baynham 1998: 92-95.
493
Curt. 7.11.6.
494
Curt. 7.11.7-21.
495
Diod. Sic. 2.6.1-10.
92
The next time we see similarities drawn between Semiramis and Alexander is in Diodorus’ description
of Semiramis’ conquests as queen of Assyria. The cities that Semiramis is meant to have visited or subdued
are seen to trace the routes taken by Persian kings, Seleucids, and above all, Alexander the Great in their
campaigns into the East.496 These include Babylon, Ecbatana, Egypt, Libya, the oracle of Zeus Ammon,
Bactra, and Ethiopia. Sulimani notes that there are also similarities between the language used to describe
Semiramis’ travels, and that of Alexander.497 After Semiramis visited Persis she then is said to have
travelled to ‘all the other land in Asia under her control’ (ἐπῆλθε … τὴν ἄλλην χώραν ἅπασαν ἧς ἐπῆρχε
κατὰ τὴν Ἀσίαν).498 Significantly similar is the wording of Alexander’s visitation to much of Asia, ἐπῆλθε
πολλήν χώραν.499 Sulimani proposes that these similarities were purposeful, and demonstrates that
Diodorus had Alexander’s expeditions in mind as he was composing his mythical hero, Semiramis.500

This is then reinforced later in the narrative where Semiramis is seen to make mistakes that Alexander
does not. In Diodorus’ account of the battle, Semiramis and her troops were initially victorious in battle,
and many men were taken prisoner.501 However, after this, Stabrobates tactfully retreated into Indian
territory to lure the Assyrian army across the river. In consequence, Semiramis had a ‘large and costly’
pontoon bridge constructed.502 After crossing they once more engaged in combat. Again Semiramis was
able to gain the upper-hand with her mock puppets and the unfamiliar smell of the camels sent the Indian
horses into disarray, but soon the favour shifted to Stabrobates with his real elephants, resulting in a
considerable slaughter of Assyrian troops. As the Assyrians withdrew to the pontoon bridge, the troops
bottle-necked as the huge army tried to cross the river. Semiramis and her troops met a disastrous fate
and a large number of casualties ensued, many drowned or were trampled.503 Once they reached the other
side, Semiramis cut the tethers of the bridge, killing Indians who pursued. After this defeat, Semiramis
exchanged prisoners and returned to Bactra, having lost two-thirds of her force.504

496
See Sulimani 2005.
497
Sulimani 2005: 53.
498
Diod. Sic. 2.14.1.
499
Diod. Sic. 17.104.4.
500
Sulimani 2005: 53.
501
Diod. Sic. 2.18.5.
502
Diod. Sic. 2.18.6.
503
Diod. Sic. 2.19.9. As discussed in Chapter Two, the crossing and attempt to tame rivers equated to a transgression of nomos
and a display of hubris, as well as the motif of Persian expansion of peaceful peoples. As such, the transgressor is punished.
(Flory 1987: 54-61, 94-95.) See Hdt. 1.208,4.89,7.34,7.56.
504
Diod. Sic. 2.19.10.
93
This is seen to be the opposite of Alexander’s campaign in the same region. By using intelligence instead
of brashness, Alexander was able to safely cross the river and engage the Indian army in battle. Arrian
records that to cross the large and dangerous Hydaspes River, Alexander ordered his troops to find a
safer route upstream. When this location was found the troops used floatation devices made from stuffed
hide tents to get across.505 After this, Alexander created a decoy so that a smaller squadron could cross
the river and make a surprise attack.506 Thus, in comparison, it was Alexander who the tricked the Indians
to gain an upper hand, in contrast to Semiramis who fell victim to Stabrobates deception. Moreover, in
Arrian’s account Alexander anticipated that the horses would spook from the unfamiliar elephants, thus
he planned his assault around this.507 Instead, it is the Indians who were trampled by their own elephants
in the confusion of battle when the elephants fled back into the ranks.508 Furthermore, in Curtius’ account,
the Macedonians were able to overcome the war elephants with axes and sickle-like swords, driving them
back into the Indian ranks.509 When these two campaigns are compared, it is clear that Alexander’s
campaigns have been used as inspiration for the description of Semiramis’ campaign in the same region.
Furthermore, it is apparent that Alexander succeeded in surpassing the military of deeds of Semiramis as
he led a more successful campaign into India than her.

However, Alexander’s campagin in this region was not without complications. After his invasion of
India, Arrian recounts the Macedonian king’s journey into the Gedrosian Desert—a expedition that was
deemed harder than all of Alexander’s campaigns in the past ten years combined.510 Arrian describes in
detail how Alexander’s men and animals were progressively lost to exhaustion, starvation, dehydration,
and exposure to the elements over the sixty-day journey through the inhospitable terrain of the desert.511
According to Nearchus in the accounts of Arrian’s Anabasis and Strabo, Alexander was inspired to take
this route because Semiramis (on her retreat from India) and Cyrus had been the only individuals to cross
the desert.512 However, both of their armies had been decimated in the process with only twenty soldiers
and seven soldiers surviving, respectively. Following the path of these rulers, Alexander is also recorded

505
Arr. Anab. 5.9.2.
506
Arr. Anab. 5.12.1-4.
507
Arr. Anab. 5.10.2.
508
Arr. Anab. 5.17.4-6.
509
Curt. 8.13.23-30.
510
Arr. Anab. 6.24.1; Arr. Ind. 26.1. For a summary of arguments to whether Aristobulus or Nearchus was the source for this
episode in Arrian see Schepens 1989: 22-24.
511
Arr. Anab. 6.23.4-6.
512
Arr. Anab. 6.23.6; Strab 15.1.5, 15.2.5. However, in Arrian’s Indica, he adopts Megasthenes’ tradition in which Semiramis
is said to have died before making the attempt to invade India. (Arr. Ind. 5.4-7.)
94
to have lost a devastingly large number of men and animals.513 However, unlike the accounts of Cyrus
and Semiramis, within Arrian’s narrative Alexander displays behaviour that is deemed to be ‘a testament
to his endurance and leadership’.514 Like his men, Alexander walks on foot instead of travelling by horse
and even manages to navigate the army to the ocean and find water when the guides get lost.515 But most
famously, Alexander refuses to drink water brought to him by soldiers, tipping it out in front his army,
when there is not enough water for everyone.516 In the vulgate, this incident is said to have occurred in
Sogdiana.517 As explained by Bayhnam, by inserting the story in the Gedrosian Desert crossing, Nearchus
and Arrian ‘emphasize the heroic and quasi-divine aspects of Alexander’s leadership and emphasize the
superiority of his achievement over the achievements of Cyrus and Semiramis.’518 As, such Alexander
is seen to chose the route he did to prove his pre-eminence as a leader of armies and ‘final proof of his
superiorty to mortal fraility’.519 However, as we have seen Alexander was only partially successful in
doing so.520 Like Semiramis and Cyrus, Alexander suffered an unspecified number of casualties with the
surviving men arriving in Pura worse for wear. However, they were soon rehabilitated and Alexander’s
reign proceeded without any noticeable disruption. Similarly to his invasion into India, this episode
demonstrates Alexander’s Homeric quest for glory and his claim of invincibility. Like Cyrus, Perseus,
the Dioscuri, Heracles, and Dionysus, Semiramis was another name of the list of figures he sought to
emulate and surpass.521

Conclusion

Semiramis is a renowned female, military leader, especially in the Near East. As we have seen, the use
and reception of this facet of her identity changes over time, adapting to the needs of the author and time
period. In the Greco-Roman tradition she is representative of a woman who embodies the qualities
associated with manliness. This is evident in our most extant Classical source on this theme, Diodorus
Siculus. In the Bibliotheca Historica comparisons to Alexander the Great start to appear and are
promulgated by later sources. In the Late Antique to the Medieval period, Semiramis’ martial ambition

513
Eventhough this number is unspecified in the sources, modern scholars have made estimated calculations of casualities
ranging from 45,000-50,000 out of 60,000-70,000 men, and even larger. See Engels 1978: 114-115; Strasburger 1982-1990:
479-480; Bosworth 1996: 169-170.
514
Arr. Anab. 6.26.3.
515
Arr. Anab. 6.26.4-5.
516
Arr. Anab. 6.26.1-3.
517
Curt. 7.4.9-12.
518
Baynham 1998: 82. Also see Bosworth 1996: 166-185. This is made clear in Strabo (15.1.5.).
519
Bosworth 1996: 183.
520
Bosworth 2000: 34-35.
521
Roisman 2003: 283-285.
95
transitions into a thirst for blood and sexual promiscuity. In the works of Boccaccio and de Pizan that
engage with the querelle des femmes, Semiramis’ military deeds drastically shift to an overwhelmingly
positive attitude. Nevertheless, it is apparent that Semiramis had a ceaseless appeal in the literary tradition
concerning warfare, attracting numerous writers over thousands of years and provoking a variety of
reactions. Keeping this history in mind, it is now possible to look at a specific example on this military
theme: the revolt story.

96
 Part Two: The Revolt Story

Figure 14. Manta, castle, sala baronale, north wall the Nine Worthies and Female Worthies (photo: Fratelli Alinari,
Florence)

In the late fourteenth-century in the northern region of Italy, the people of the Piedmont and the House
of Savoy were at war. While in the neighbouring comune of Monasterolo the Marquess of Suluzzo,
Thomas III, was captured and imprisoned by the nearby troops allied to Amédée VIII of Savoy. During
his time of imprisonment between 1394 and 1396, the marquess wrote Le Chevalier errant or The
Wandering Knight.522 Conforming to, and promoting, widely accepted contemporary generic
conventions, The Wandering Knight recounts the tale of a fictitious knight who journeys around the world
under the instruction of Lady Cognoissance.523 On his journey, he endures pain in order to attain honour
and salvation. As well as being an important text on medieval chivalry, it also held political significance
to the del Vasto family to which the marquess belonged. In the novel, Thomas draws comparisons in the
work to the Nine Worthies (preux) and Lady Worthies (preuses).524 By doing this, Thomas authenticated
and increased the prestige of the family whilst they were vying for the position of marquess of northern
Italy. However, this never came to fruition as he was made to swear loyalty to Amédée VIII of Savoy in
1413 and all claims to the land were severed. Despite this, in 1417, Valeriano—the illegitimate but
beloved son of Thomas III of Suluzzo—inherited the family estate of Castello della Manta and continued

522
Bouchet 2009: 120.
523
Enderlein 2013: 250.
524
Refer to Bouchet 2009: 127-128.
97
 his fathers’ strategy path of familial aggrandizement.525 In the 1420s, Valeriano commissioned the
baronial hall or sala to be decorated with frescoes of the nine preux and preuses by the so-called “Master
of Manta”.526 These eighteen figures dominate the long walls of this significant room. The selection of
this iconography was a deliberate display of power, wealth, and knowledge, as well as an attempt for
Valeriano to connect himself to his father by alluding to his famous piece of literature, The Wandering
Knight.527

Figure 15. Nine Worthies depicted on the west to north walls of the sala baronale at the Castello della Manta, Manta, Italy.

Figure 16. Female Worthies depicted on the north to east walls of the sala baronale at the Castello della Manta, Manta, Italy.

525
Bouchet 2009: 127.
526
For other artistic depictions of this motif across Europe see Cassagnes-Brouquet 2004: 171-179.
527
Enderlein 2013: 244.
98
In the room, the male Worthies are ordered into their tripartite categories to symbolize a new age. The
first are earliest individuals, Hector and the other pagan heroes, this is then followed by the Jewish group
and the three Christian men. The Worthies are depicted in a fertile garden, elegantly spaced by fruit-
bearing trees symbolizing nobilitas and good leadership.528 To fit this vast array of figures into the space
the two remaining figures of the preux and preuses continues onto the connecting walls.

In depicting the preux, the “Master of Manta” modelled his subjects on the Marquess of Saluzzo; Manfred
I becomes Godfrey de Bouillon, Thomas I is depicted as King Arthur, Manfred IV as Judas Maccabeus,
Thomas III as Alexander the Great, and Valeriano himself is transfigured into the figure of Hector,
situated in the focal point of the room.529 In contrast, the models for the preuses are less clear. Only one
figure is believed to have been modelled after a family member of the del Vasto family. This is
Penthesilea who is depicted as Valeriano's wife, Mentia.530 Indeed, it has been argued by Enderlein that
the female Worthies were an afterthought to the males.531 Since the women were all pagan they did not
develop the ideas of human age and history that the male figures achieved, Enderlein argues that they
were included for symmetry and to complement the room’s theme of erotic passion manifested in the
Fountain of Youth fresco on the opposing wall.532

As the male figures wrap around to the adjoining wall the figures transition into the nine women. The
preuses, who are exclusively pagan in this early stage, are not ordered in any perceivable chronology. As
discussed in the previous chapter, all the Lady Worthies were seen to embody the manly traits associated
with medieval knights and kings. But since these women all shared very similar attributes, and could
individually be put under the bracket of an “Amazonesque woman”, how do we tell one militaristic
woman from another? This question does not become any clearer when looking at the imagery of the
women in the fresco. All nine of the female figures are dressed in contemporary, fifteenth-century attire
consisting of a headdress (either a crown, wreath or hennin), cloak and dress. However, it is the extra
objects that each of the women carry which enables the audience to identify who’s who.

528
Enderlein 2013: 244.
529
Anderson 2005: 233; Bouchet 2009: 128; Johnston 2011: 433.
530
Enderlein 2013: 247.
531
Enderlein 2013: 246.
532
Enderlein 2013: 246.
99
 Figure 17. Semiramis depicted on the north wall of the sala baronale at the Castello della Manta, Manta, Italy.

For example, we see Tomyris, the famed leader of the Massagetae, brandishing an executioner’s axe that
she used to decapitate Cyrus the Great. Likewise, Teuta, the Queen of Illyria and invader of Rome, holds
a feather to allude to her ancestry from the Ardean kingdom (derived from the Latin for heron, ardea).533
When it comes to Semiramis, her identifying features is her hair. As depicted in this fresco, one half of
her hair is braided, and the other half is free-flowing. This unfinished half is being combed by the queen
as she looks suspiciously to her left. The iconography evokes one of the most famous stories told about
the Queen, namely that upon hearing of a revolt during her toilette, the Queen immediately left to

533
See McMillan 1979: 116-118 on the identification of these women.
100
suppress the rebellion with her hair in this half-finished style. With her hair half-braided she marched
upon her enemies. It is a story of valour, not vanity. And it is these characteristics taken from the revolt
story that act as visual cues and make Semiramis an easily identifiable figure out of the eight other
militaristic queens depicted.

It is this story, the rebellion, that will be the focus of the case study for the militaristic facet of Semiramis’
identity. By looking at the literary sources that precede visual representations of the queen, like the fresco
in the Castello de Manta, the development of the story into the present version will be traced. It will be
demonstrated that the story has an extremely rich and diverse history and is used in a variety of ways. It
can be used to bring her gender to the fore, or to denigrate her Oriental origins. On the other hand, the
revolt story can be viewed positively as an exemplum of good leadership during times of crisis, with her
gender and nationality being largely unimportant. This is a particularly popular representation that is
used during times of political contention. Thus, it is apparent from the vast number of differing sources
throughout our timespan that the story could be adapted and manipulated to appeal to a number of
audiences and situations.

Rhodogyne and Semiramis

The image of the woman thrust from domesticity into battle seems to have been a popular one in
Antiquity. We find a thematically similar depiction described by the second-century travel writer,
Pausanias. In the Guide to Greece, Pausanias describes a stone relief of the poetess Telesilla in front of
the sanctuary of Aphrodite in Corinth. According to Pausanias, in the relief Telesilla is captured in mid-
action with her books, that she was reading only a moment before, now thrown to the side at her feet.
Abandoning this domestic pursuit, she now gazes at a helmet in her hands which she is about to put on.534
The battle that she is about to enter is against the Spartans, led by Cleomenes, who has killed and
entrapped many of her fellow Argives. The moment captured in the relief is when she receives word of
the approach of the enemy, and orders for all house slaves, old men, boys, and women to take up arms
to defend the city. As such, the relief neatly captures the dualities of the moment (feminine domesticity
opposed to masculine militarism, intellect to brawn) by juxtaposing the books and helmet. It is this
duality which will see not only represented in descriptions of her commemorative statue, detailed in the
anonymous Tractatus De Mulieribus Claris In Bello and Polyaenus’ Strategmata, but also in her physical

534
Paus. 2.20.7.
101
description, as vividly detailed in Philostratus’ Imagines. However, with Semiramis, this duality is
apparent with her feminine beautification during her toilette, and masculine militarism when she receives
word of revolt.

Our earliest accounts of the revolt story do not associate it with Semiramis, but rather with a largely
unknown figure, Rhodogyne. References to Rhodogyne are scant in the Classical tradition, thus little is
known about her or the historicity behind her character. However, Rhodogyne seems to be a popular
name within the Persian royal family as numerous sources list her as a daughter or wife of a prominent
Persian.535 A short biography of Rhodogyne features in an anonymous work thought to be dated to the
second-century BCE, Tractatus De Mulieribus Claris In Bello.536 The text features fourteen short
biographies on extraordinary women, often martial rulers, including Rhodogyne.537 The short biography
of Rhodogyne reads as follows:

Rhodogyne, queen of the Persians, as Aeschines the philosopher says, made the Persian
kingdom most powerful. For she was, he says, so brave in her deeds and so frightening that
once, while in the midst of arranging her hair, she heard that several tribes had rebelled. She
left her hair semi-braided and did not braid it until she had captured and subdued the
aforementioned tribes. That is why a golden statue of her was dedicated, with half her hair
braided round her head and the other half flowing loose.538

This account stresses the militarism of Rhodogyne. It is through her military prowess, epitomized by the
revolt story, that Rhodogyne was able to strengthen the political position of the Persian Empire.
According to the anonymous author, the Persian queen drops everything she is doing, even her womanly
pursuits, and dons a peculiar hairstyle and bravely charges into battle. These deeds were deemed to be
particularly praiseworthy enough that she was commemorated with a lasting monument, a bronze statue.

The source cited for this biography is Aeschines of Sphettos, the orator and student of Socrates.
Rhodogyne is referenced in his dialogue on Aspasia, a fragmentary dialogue on the famous partner of
Perikles that was composed in 393-384 BCE. The dialogue discusses the merits of Aspasia outside of
motherhood and her relationship with Perikles that was the subject of comedies. Henry argues that

535
See Ctesias, Persica = FGrH 688 F13 24; Plut. Vit. Artax. 27.6-9; Xen. An. 2.4.1-2; Jer. Adv. Iovinian. 1.45; App. Syr. 67
f; Just. Epit. 38.9; AR. 2.12, 22. Rhodogyne also features as a beautiful Persian in the fragmentary Hellenistic romance novel,
Chaereas and Callirhoe, by Chariton which dates to the first-century BCE. In this novel she loses to Callirhoe in a beauty
contest. See Moyer 2010: 601-620; Llewellyn-Jones 2013a. However, in these sources Rhodogyne is a passive figure who is
detached from her militaristic persona.
536
Ehlers 1966: 30.
537
Semiramis, sourced from Ctesias, appears in this work. However, the revolt story is only attributed to Rhodogyne.
538
ADM.8.
102
Aeschines is the first ancient writer to create an overall positive Aspasia ‘in whom eros and the search
for arete are fused’.539 The dialogue is populated by powerful and sexual women that reflect Aspasia’s
nature. To demonstrate this point Rhodogyne is mentioned alongside Thargelia of Miletus, the hetaera.
Both these figures demonstrate political aptitude as well as extremes of eros. Rhodogyne, as a Persian
queen eschews eros and instead focuses solely on her position. This differs from Thargelia who uses eros
to gain political power by supposedly persuading many Greeks to ally themselves with Xerxes, and in
turn, was given a part of Thessaly to rule.540 Both women are used to explore different facets of Aspasia,
whether positively or negatively is unknown due to the fragmentary nature of the text.541

Thereafter, the revolt story is used interchangeably between Rhodogyne or Semiramis. This
interchangeability is understandable, and we see it in all different texts. Rhodogyne and Semiramis share
many similarities. Both women originate from the Eastern regions associated with the Other, Persia and
Babylon respectively. Both women are associated with great military deeds and aggressive expansion of
these empires. Finally, both women display ambivalent attitudes toward men and have anomalous sex
lives—Rhodogyne, the man-hating virgin has no interest in men at all, and Semiramis, the lustful widow
is highly sexual. Thus, it is unsurprising that these two women are paired and conflated in our sources.
In Valerius Maximus the revolt story is attributed to Semiramis, Poleyaenus in his Strategmata attributes
it to both women, then in Philostratus’ Imagines the story is attributed to Rhodogyne.

In the Classical period, there is only one source that associates Semiramis, individually, with the revolt
story. This reference is in Valerius Maximus’ Memorable Sayings and Doings. This extant work was
written under the reign of Tiberius in the first-century and consists of historical anecdotes categorized
into topical essays. These essays ranged from very broad topics and concepts such as “Dreams”,
“Courage”, and “Gratitude”, to more specific instances such as “Electoral Defeats” and “Famous Men
who indulged in more Freedom of Dress or Appearance than was Traditionally Acceptable”. In the past,
scholars have dismissed these essays as an insignificant compendium of sources that were designed to
be plundered by rhetors and students.542 However, in more recent revisionist scholarship, it has been
argued that the work is far more nuanced. For instance, Skidmore and Mueller have proposed that the
anecdotes in the work formed a paradigm for moral guidance, the elementa virtutis.543 As such, a

539
Henry 1995: 41.
540
Plut. Vit. Per. 24.
541
See Dittmar 1912 and Ehlers 1966.
542
Howatson 1989; Bloomer 1992; Vessey 2008.
543
Val. Max. 3. praef; Mueller 2012.
103
continuous historical narrative was not of primary importance. Instead, there was a focus on cherry-
picking specific anecdotes about individuals that could be interpreted to suit the moralistic theme of each
essay.544 Within these essays, Roman examples (domestica) were discussed followed by a brief account
of non-Roman examples (externa) which were primarily Greek. In the collection, attention is given to
both positive as well as negative exempla. In most cases, the negative exempla refer to past, violent
dangers, external or internal, and are used to create a historical backdrop of instability and disorder
preceding the principate. By doing this, Valerius conveys the transition to the princeps as a positive shift
in Rome’s history.545 Moreover, the exempla are used as a reminder of the possible challenges that
Tiberius may face during his reign and thus was intended to be a didactic guide to a successful
principate.546 In Antiquity, Valerius had what Shackleton Bailey describes as a ‘modest vogue’,
increasing in popularity in the Medieval period.547 This is demonstrated in the thirty surviving
manuscripts dating up until the twelfth-century with more produced in the late fifteenth-century onwards,
provideing easily digestible information about episodes and customs in the Classical world.548 As such,
we see Valerius Maximus becoming an increasingly important source on Semiramis in works from these
periods.

The first eight books of the work recount examples of virtuous behaviour (virtus). Throughout these
chapters, moral behaviour is rewarded with public approval and spectacle, laus, typical of Roman
society.549 In contrast, in situations where the immoral actions of an individual threaten the very fabric
of society, they are met with reprehensio or criticism.550 This is the main focus of the final book that
recounts examples of vice (vitia). Therefore, by presenting instances of vice linked with negative
consequences the book aims to encourage readers to repent and mend their ways. 551 Thus, examples of
vice are just as important as examples of good moral behaviour. This is evident with the essay from Book
Nine, “On Anger and Hatred”, containing the revolt story attributed to Semiramis.

Like most of the other essays, “On Anger and Hatred” starts with a preface that introduces the topic and
the moral message. In this section, Valerius exclaims: ‘How often anger has been victorious over

544
Maslakov 1984: 446.
545
Maslakov 1984: 438-9.
546
Maslakov 1984: 438-9, 451-452.
547
Berlincourt 1972: 361-387; Shackleton Bailey 2000: 4.
548
Briscoe 1993: 395.
549
Skidmore 1997: 56.
550
Skidmore 1997: 57.
551
Val. Max. 9.1. praef; Maslakov 1984: 446.
104
victory’.552 Here it is implied that the success of the Roman Empire has been achieved in times of
levelheadedness and moderation as opposed to the irrationality caused by anger and hatred. This moral
message is then reinforced throughout the essay through the evocation of exempla. In the externa section
Valerius recounts non-Roman examples of instances in which anger and hatred have led to the demise
of certain individuals. The first is Alexander, whose irascible slaughter of Lysimachus, Clitus and
Callisthenes is said to have ‘almost snatched him from heaven’ and turned ‘three great victories into
defeats’.553 Valerius also explains that Hannibal Barca’s personal vendetta against Rome was ingrained
in him by his father, Hamilcar, and caused the destruction of Carthage and the downfall of the Empire.
In these two circumstances, both Alexander and Hannibal were acting on their own accord for personal
gain to the detriment of their society. This does not fit in with Valerius’ code of moral conduct. Thus,
they equate to negative exemplum.

However, this is not the case with Semiramis, the next exempla ending the externa passage and chapter. At
the outset, Semiramis is used to exemplify that anger can overcome women as well as men. Linking the
two examples together is the following passage: ‘such was the force of hate in a boy’s heart, but in a
woman’s too it was no less potent.’554 However, after this, the similarities deviate. In contrast to the two
other men, Semiramis’ actions seem to have no immediate negative consequences. In fact, the opposite
occurs, and her deeds are commemorated with a statue:

Samiramis, queen of Assyria, was busy doing her hair when news came that Babylon had
revolted. Leaving one half of it loose, she immediately ran to storm the city and did not restore
her coiffure to a seemly order before she brought it back into her power. For that reason, her
statue was set up in Babylon showing her as she moved in precipitate haste to take her
vengeance.555

In this circumstance, Semiramis was motivated by rage to subdue the rebellious peoples and re-establish
the status quo in the empire and her actions are perceived as positive, aligning with the moral conduct of
Valerius Maximus by restoring the fabric of society. In consequence, Semiramis receives a
commemorative statue, an example of laus. Semiramis’ positive exemplum concludes the essay after
numerous negative exempla, both domestica and externa, that are used to dissuade angry and hateful

552
Val. Max. 9.3.5.
553
Val. Max. 9.3.ext.2.
554
Val. Max. 9.3.ext.4.
555
Val. Max. 9.3.ext.4.
105
behaviour. As such, the audience is left with an example of what constitutes the appropriate situations and
use of these emotions: Semiramis’ vengeance to protect the equilibrium of society.

This is further reinforced with the terminology used to describe Semiramis’ actions in contrast to the other
exempla in the essay. In other instances of the essay the term used to describe the emotion behind an
individual’s actions are derived from the words odi, hate, and ira, anger. However, in the case of Semiramis
the term ultio, revenge, is used. Broadly speaking, this term has the meaning of taking action after being
wronged.556 However, during the early imperial period, the term holds a more specific meaning. The term
is used extensively in Seneca the Elder’s Declamations or Controversiae, a work discussing seventy-four
thematic and imaginary legal cases that was contemporary to Valerius Maximus’ own time. In this work,
ultio was strongly associated with women exacting vengeance as well as reestablishment of peace after
civil strife.557 Therefore, ultio is an apt term to describe Semiramis subduing a rebellion as it carries
connotations of civil unrest whilst also demarcating her gender. By deviating from the vocabulary used
elsewhere in the essay, a clear divide is established between the positive representation of Semiramis and
the negative exemplum.

Moreover, the term ultio is particularly loaded in the early principate. Under Augustus, the new emperor
was required to act as ultor, avenger, after the death of his adoptive father, Julius Caesar.558 Succeeding
Augustus, Tiberius too promoted ultio in a similar way. Tiberius had to step into the shoes of ultor in two
instances during his reign. The first internal threat during the reign of Tiberius was Gnaius Calpurnius Piso
who was placed on trial for poisoning the heir to Augustus, Germanicus.559 Moreover, in 31CE Sejanus,
the ambitious soldier and right-hand man to the emperor, was condemned to death after overstepping his
boundaries and threatening the position of the principate. Strict measures were put in place to quell anyone
who had a hand in the affair. Cassius Dio uses the term τιμωρίας (retribution or vengeance) to describe
the vengeful actions undertaken by Tiberius.560 This involved the Senate condemning Sejanus to death
by strangulation and his body unceremoniously cast onto the Gemonian stairs where ‘the rabble [is said
to have] abused it for three whole days and afterwards threw it into the river’.561 Following this, riots

556
OLD s.v. ‘ultio’ a.
557
Refer to the following for other instances in the work where the term is used in regards to civil strife (Sen. Controv. 3.8; 7.12;
10.8.) and for associated with females (Sen. Controv.1.6; 1.7; 2.18; 9.6.18).
558
See Aug. RG. 21.
559
Tac. Ann. 2.71; Dowling 2006: 170.
560
Cass. Dio. 58.12.
561
Cass. Dio. 58.11.
106
ensued, in which crowds hunted and killed anyone they could link to Sejanus. The Senate also issued the
execution of Sejanus’ children and Livillia as well as damnatio memoriae against his name.562 This
extreme action was necessary in order to restore balance and power to the empire and serve as a warning
to any other future usurpers. Thus, by utilising ultio, Tiberius eliminated potential threats to his position
on two separate occasions. This is the same message that was promoted by Valerius Maximus. The
exempla of Semiramis, the Assyrian queen, also restored equilibrium to society through an act of
vengeance. As such, in Valerius Maximus, Semiramis’ gender is not particularly essential to the story.
Instead, Semiramis is portrayed as an authoritative figure who restores order to society.

In contrast, other sources use the tale to reflect on the Oriental femininity associated with hair and
beautification. This is evident with the use of Rhodogyne by Dio Chrysostom, the first-century Greek
orator, in his essay On Beauty as a part of the Discourses—a compilation of essays on political, moral,
and philosophical subjects. On Beauty discusses Dio’s thoughts on beauty and his belief that the beautiful
depiction of men declined after the Classical period due to a variety of reasons including the lack of skill
of sculptures, the decline in character of their subjects being depicted, as well as a general underappreciation
for beauty.563 As a result of this, Dio argues that the beauty of women increased and that the Greeks were
starting to adopt Persian ideologies of feminine beauty for males. Here Persian men were so extreme that
men were being castrated to reach feminine appeal. Discussion on the Persians and their practice of
castration then lead Dio to speak of Nero and his sexual deviancy, especially his castration of a young
boy and his adoption of feminine attire and a female name. The interlocutor he is having the discussion
with asks for the name of Nero’s eunuch, to which Dio replies;

What concern of yours is that? At any rate she was not called Rhodogyne. But that youth of
Nero’s actually wore his hair parted, young women attended him whenever he went for a walk,
he wore women’s clothes, and was forced to do everything else a woman does in the same
way.564

By describing the eunuch’s appearance as having his hair parted like Rhodogyne in the rebellion story,
clear connections are made with Oriental decadence and femininity. This version of Rhodogyne starkly
contrasts to her representation elsewhere in Dio Chyrsostom’s work where she is noted as a great warrior.
In another work by Dio, On Fortune 2, Rhodogyne and Semiramis are linked together as women of
distinction; Rhodogyne as a warrior (Ῥοδογούνην πολεμικήν) and Semiramis as a queen (Σεμίραμιν

562
Tac. Ann. 6.2.
563
Dio Chry. Or. 21.
564
Dio Chrys. Or. 21.7.
107
βασιλικήν).565 Other women that feature in this list include Sappho for her poetry, Timandra for her
beauty, and Demonassa for her statesmanship and law-giving.566 Two different versions of Rhodogyne are
apparent in Dio Chrysostom’s work, one connected to Oriental decadence and femininity, and the other
noted for military prowess which is typically ascribed as a masculine deed.

The rebellion story is purely associated with military skill in the next source, Polyaenus’ Strategmata.
Polyaenus was a Macedonian rhetor writing in the second century CE. The Strategmata is one of the two
surviving stratagem collections from the Hellenistic to Roman periods, along with Frontinus. 567 The
underlying theme of this work was didactic, presenting examples of military deeds from a wide range of
peoples and time periods.568 The exempla include gods, heroes, and famous men and women, grouped
together ethnographically and prosopographically. In the work, Polyaenus writes of Semiramis and
Rhodogyne in two individual, successive passages, and attributes the rebellion story to both of them. The
accounts of the two warrior-queens are especially interesting because the two separate accounts are
virtually the same.

Listed first in Book 8 are the military achievements of Semiramis. The revolt story is condensed to one
line of the entry. The passage goes as follows: ‘While taking a bath, Semiramis heard of the Siracians’
revolt and immediately, barefoot and without even braiding her hair, went out for war.’569 After this
summary of the revolt story, Polyaenus recalls the inscription of her stele commemorating her many
deeds throughout her reign. Immediately following this is another rendition of the revolt story, but this
time attributed to Rhodogyne. In contrast, this version is considerably more elaborate and detailed than
the preceding version. The complete section on Rhodogyne goes as follows;

Rhodogyne was washing her hair while taking a bath. Someone came with a report that “a
subject nation has revolted”. Without completing her shampoo but tying her hair up just as it
was, she mounted her horse, led out an army, and swore not to wash her hair before she
mastered the rebels. And so she prevailed in a long campaign. After the victory she bathed
and thoroughly washed her hair. The Persian kings have as their royal seal an image of
Rhodogyne with her hair tied up.570

565
Dio Chrys. Or. 64.2. Julian, too, groups these two together along with Tomyris and Nitokris as famed builders. (Julian.
Or. 3. 127.)
566
Dio Chrys. Or. 64.2.
567
Krentz and Wheeler 1994: viii; Hanson 2007: 1.
568
Roberts 2007.
569
Poly. Strat. 8.26.
570
Poly. Strat. 8.27.
108
The resemblance between these two passages is obvious, especially considering the immediate proximity
of the sections. However, there are also differing aspects that may indicate varying oral traditions.571 One
notable variation is the way in which the Queen’s deeds were commemorated by her fellow Persians. In
the earlier tradition, the Queen receives a bronze statue displaying her quick actions, which depicts her
hair half-completed. In Rhodogyne’s mythology, Polynaeus states that she is commemorated with her
hair tied up on a royal seal that is used by the Persian kings. Whilst seals could be owned by elite women,
they did not often feature imagery of royalty. Instead, imagery of lions, lion-griffons, religious rituals,
and heroic hunting scenes were utilised to denoted Persian royalty and prowess. 572 Nevertheless, both
the seal and the statue of the Queen that are mentioned in our sources promulgate the same message, her
military prowess and the temporary abnegation of femininity. Other differences in Polyaenus’ tradition
include the identification of the rebellious nation as the Siracians in Semiramis’ account, while those
rebelling against Rhodogyne are unnamed. Moreover, Semiramis went into battle with her hair
unbraided, while Rhodogyne’s hair was wet, soapy and hurriedly tied up. In this sense, the two stories
presented in the Strategmata are a division of the half-braided version of Aeschines where each half of
the hair is represented with a story, Semiramis’ hair is unbound, Rhodogyne’s is tied up. Therefore, it
seems that Polyaenus has possibly separated the story to stretch it over the two females or was confused
to whom the story was accredited to.

The discrepancies within the Strategmata itself can be explained by the methodology of Polyaenus. At
the beginning of Book 8, Poleyaenus dedicated the treatise to the emperors Marcus Antonius and Lucius
Verus stating that he hoped the treatise would be beneficial to the emperors, the Roman Empire, and the
Greeks, in times of war and peace.573 The war that he is referring to can be identified as the Parthian
campaign c. 162 CE. In the lead up to the war in 161, the Parthians had invaded Armenia and deposed
the Roman nominee on the Armenian throne. In Cappadocia, the governor, M. Sedatius Severianus, had
been ambushed and killed along with his whole legion at Armenian Elegeia, meaning that the Roman
province of Syria was also threatened. The Eastern front, that had been pacified under Trajan, was now
tumultuous and in need of military response. It was under this stress that proved to be the perfect
opportunity for Polyaenus to dedicate his military treatise. Krentz and Wheeler propose that it was
probable that the treatise had already been started by this point but needed to be completed before the
emperors went on campaign. Moreover, it is speculated that if the first book appeared in mid or late

571
Gera 1997: 155.
572
Dusinberre 2010: 326.
573
Poly. Strat. 8.
109
autumn of 161, then Polyaenus produced six books, three-quarters of the entire work, in nine months.574
Under this high-pressure deadline, it is reasonable that Polyaenus might have conflated the entries on
Rhodogyne and Semiramis.575 Furthermore, it would have strengthened his work to include as many
pertinent examples of military strategies from areas near the Parthian Empire, which bordered the Near
East, where the emperors were campaigning. As such, Alexander the Great, the great strategist and
conqueror of the East, is heavily featured in the work and his deeds are even improved in some areas to
make a stratagem more effective or striking.576 Nevertheless, both Semiramis and Rhodogyne provide
exempla of military prowess to be wary of while campaigning into the Eastern frontier.

Our next source in the Classical tradition is Philostratus’ Imagines in which the multi-faceted nature of
Rhodogyne’s persona is brought to the fore through the revolt story. Philostratus was a writer of
philosophic dialogues in the early third-century CE.577 Along with the Imagines, Philostratus has
produced major works such as the Lives of the Sophists and the Life of Apollonius.578 He was a member
of the intellectual and artistic circle of Julia Domna, the second wife of Septimius Severus and staunch
patron of the arts in Rome.579 It was under these supportive conditions that intellectual works, such as
Philostratus’ Imagines, flourished.

The Imagines are the most extant example of ekphrasis in Antiquity. Ekphrasis, literally meaning
“speaking out”, is a process in which vivid verbal descriptions transform into an apparition in one’s mind,
a form of seeing through hearing.580 The Imagines consist of forty-eight vivid descriptions of fictional
mythological and epic scenes that were portrayed as paintings hung in the porticoes of a Neapolitan
gallery, however they were purely fictional.581 These paintings are described by a narrator, understood
by the audience to be a sophist, visiting the city who after being pestered by the youths of the city agrees
to make a discourse, epideixis, for the young men so that ‘they may learn to interpret paintings and to
appreciate what is esteemed in them’.582 A range of dramatic and rich visual scenes concerning love, war,
death, birth, and education such as the death of Ajax, and the birth of Venus are described in the text. In

574
Krentz and Wheeler 1994: xi-xii.
575
Gera 1997: 155.
576
Hammond 1996: 23-53.
577
Suda, s.v. Φιλόστρατος 421-3. Refer to Bowie 2009: 19-32.
578
For a full list of works see Bowie 2009: 29-32.
579
Philostr. VA 1.3. Cassius Dio compares the Syrian born Julia Domna to Nitokris and Semiramis (Cass. Dio. 78.23.3) See
Mallan 2013.
580
Hermog. Prog. 10.47; Squire 2013: 100.
581
Philostr. Imag. Proem 4; Lehmann-Hartleben 1941.
582
Philostr. Imag. Preface 3.
110
accordance with the aesthetic values of the Second Sophistic, the excellence of these pictures lay in their
effectiveness to delineate character, in the pathos of the situation, or in the play of emotion they
represented.583 As such, these fictional paintings were used to show art criticism, to demonstrate the
proper way to view and interpret images, as well as to demonstrate how images can be used for sophistic
declamations.584 This is apparent in the description of “Rhodogyne Victorious” in Book 2 of the
Imagines.

The tone of the scene is immediately set in the opening line of the description of Rhodogyne. The
landscape is described in a state of chaos; the battlefield is polluted with blood and fallen men, littered
with bronze weapons, and horses fleeing from the scene—clearly establishing that a battle had occurred,
whilst also piquing the interest of the young men.585 Next, the historical explanation of the scene is given.
As seen in other passages within the book, the narrator uses literary texts to overcome thauma, the
powerful aesthetic effect that paintings can have on viewers, so that the students can critically analyse
and intellectually interact with the painting. In this circumstance, the immediate thauma of the scene are
the graphic details of the scene that threatens to dominate the interest of the viewer. To overcome this,
Philostratus draws upon and reinterprets past literary texts associated with the scene. By doing this he
provided supplementary information to consider alongside the painting whilst also acting as a showpiece
to reveal the author's intellectual credentials.586

Modern scholarship has ascertained that the Imagines was purely a rhetorical text, and therefore
described fictional paintings by drawing upon fictional sources.587 The most frequently cited and alluded
to authors found in the work are Homer, Euripides, and Pindar.588 Given the nature of the text, it is not
clear what sources Philostratus is drawing upon for his scene of Rhodogyne. As the narrator explains,
Rhodogyne’s exploits are celebrated ‘with the lyre and flutes wherever there are Greeks’, giving the
illusion that the sources for this scene are from a form of epic poetry or the like.589 However, a genuine
source that Philostratus could possibly be interacting with for this scene is Aeschines’ Aspasia.
According to a letter to the empress, Julia Domna, Philostratus was acquainted with this work.590 Thus,

583
Fairbanks 1931: xviii.
584
Dubel 2009: 318; Newby 2009: 323.
585
Philostr. 2.5.1; Webb 2003: 125.
586
Newby 2009: 327.
587
Webb 2006: 113-133.
588
Newby 2009: 324.
589
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.9.
590
Philostratus, epist. 73 = Aeschines fr. 22 Dittmar.
111
it is not without reason to suggest that Aeschines may have been a source that was consulted. Moreover,
this reiteration of the tale seems to build upon the pre-existing story found in Aeschines with slight
variation. These similarities include her biographic information such as ethnicity, rank and name, and
most notably the storyline of the half-braided hair. Moreover, there are many details in Philostratus’
description of the painting that are not mentioned in extant texts. Whether these are inventions of
Philostratus or belong to an earlier tradition remains unclear. For example, Philostratus identifies the
rebellious people as Armenians rebelling against the empire and consequently breaking the treaty that
had been established between them.591 This is unique to this source. Nevertheless, literary sources played
an essential part of the Imagines as a display of erudition as well as another verbal component to obtain
“sight” of the scene.

After the scene has been described, the audience is introduced to Rhodogyne. Leading the Persian force,
and in fact, the only Persian mentioned or described in the passage is Rhodogyne. After introducing the
Oriental queen, her identifier is revealed: the one that ‘[having not] allowed herself to tarry long enough
to fasten up the right side of her hair’.592 In this instance, Rhodogyne casts aside her femininity in a time
of crisis where masculinity is needed. This is then reinforced and elaborated upon with the description
of the Queen’s appearance and interaction within the scene in which her Orientalism is brought to the
fore. This is first indicated by the description of the superfluous ornamentation and beauty of her
warhorse. By placing this description before the one of the queen, it anticipates the elaborate Oriental
features of the queen. When the narrator finally gets to describing the queen, only her attire is focused
upon. Like the mare, Rhodogyne’s girdle, chiton and trousers are described in equal ornateness; they are
patterned, made from expensive fabric, and bejewelled.593 The narrator makes a clear distinction that
Rhodogyne’s short chiton should not be confused with the attire of Amazonian women.594 By deliberately
bringing this similarity to the attention of the audience her liminality is highlighted. The chiton places
her on the borderline between civilized and Amazon-like “otherness”.595 It is clear from these descriptive
queues that we are dealing with an Oriental queen. The Oriental nature of the scene is unsurprising as it
was a common cultural stereotyping of Persians found in Greek culture.596 As such, this description of

591
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.1.
592
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.1.
593
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.2.
594
On Amazonian dress see Veness 2002: 95-109. The short chiton could also be compared to a huntress’s outfit. See Parisinou
2002: 59-60.
595
Gera 1997: 153.
596
Tuplin 1996: 132-177.
112
the queen amplifies the dual nature of her character. She is simultaneously a fierce warrior ready for
battle at a moment’s notice and a woman, but not just any woman. She is an Oriental queen, a race famed
for their softness and effeminacy.

The queen’s Oriental “Otherness” is added upon by her actions within the scene. It is explained that the
artist has drawn the Persian queen in the midst of prayer and pouring a libation for her victory over
Armenia. It is conjectured by Dittmar that this deviation from our extant sources comes from
Philostratus’ own imagination.597 In his exegesis, the narrator explains the significance of this act; ‘She
prays to conquer me, even as she has now conquered them; for I do not think she loves to be loved.’598
Here love, desire, and conquest combine. It is a potent confection that blends eroticism with gender
ambiguity—the war-loving, not-quite-Amazon, still partially dressed with her hair cascading down
making a sacrifice to love and war surrounded by the dead bodies of men who have dared to rebel from
under her rule.

Unlike the other sources, Philostratus engages with contemporary beliefs on hair that, among other parts
of a female’s head (mouth, eyes, and ears), were perceived as potentially disruptive and dangerous areas
of female contamination or miasma. The way a female had her hair—exposed or veiled, tied up or
loose—reflected on her social status (e.g. wife, hetaira, prostitute), temporal status (e.g. bride, cult
participant, festival goer) or location (e.g. home or in public).599 In the case of the Persian Queen, her
hair is described in the following way; ‘The part of her hair that is fastened up is arranged with a modesty
that tempers her high spirit, while that which hangs loose gives her vigour and the look of a bacchant.’600
The restrained hair connoted restraint in character and (to a certain extent) aidōs, whilst the unbound hair
connoted her wild, untamed and dangerous feminine sexuality, like that of a Bacchae of Maenads who
worshipped Dionysus by indulging in dancing and wine until they were in a state of ecstatic frenzy. This
duality of character corresponding to differing physical attributes is also represented in the colours of her
hair: ‘Yellow, even yellower than gold, is her disarranged hair; while the hair on the other side differs
also somewhat in hue because of its orderly arrangement.’601

597
Dittmar 1912: 43.
598
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.4.
599
Llewellyn-Jones 2003: 262-265.
600
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.4.
601
Philostr. Imag. 2.5.4.
113
Such physical descriptions are particularly loaded in this text as Philostratus is clearly influenced by the
contemporary discourse of physiognomics, the method of determining a person’s characteristics from
their physical appearance. This pseudoscience especially garnered interest in the second-century when
the sophist Polemo produced a treatise on physiognomics that focused on the study of eyes. 602 In the
Imagines, Philostratus himself suggests that the painter was familiar with physiognomy due to the
treatment of the eyes in the paintings.603 This is the case for Rhodogyne whose eyes are described as
varying from light blue to black, further expressing her multi-faceted nature. It also expresses her
sexuality as women’s eyes, more specifically their gaze, were perceived to be erotically charged and
threatening to men.604 If we are to use this form of interpretation, which the narrator and painter both
want us to, we would come to the conclusion that the figure embodies two distinct characters; restrained
and wild, masculine and feminine.

Philostratus more than any other source that we have seen so far is able to effectively and vividly explain
the character of Rhodogyne through her appearance and actions. This is achieved through the contrasting
nature apparent primarily in her hairstyle and other facial features, and to a lesser extent, her clothing
and actions. These features add to the duality of Rhodogyne that is being promoted by the rebellion story,
primarily her Oriental and female lavishness and vanity in contrast to the masculine, militaristic
character. As we have seen with other examples from the Greco-Roman period, this duality is not always
foregrounded in the sources but rather one facet is either promoted (e.g. military prowess) while the other
(e.g. Oriental beautification) is dismissed to suit the agenda of the author.

Semiramis and the Revolt Story: Medieval Period

In the Medieval period, the revolt story gets taken up with renewed interest. For example, we see the
rebellion story being alluded to in numerous works of Petrarch, though Rhodogyne has now been
replaced by Semiramis. The most comprehensive being the De viris illustribus (c.1337-1374), a series of
biographies on extraordinary men. Over the decades it took to compile this work, Petrarch changed the
scope and subjects of the work four times, with each change reflecting the authors changing views on
Antiquity.605 However, the work remained unfinished by the time of Petrarch’s death in 1374 and was

602
Barton 1994: 95-131, 102f.
603
Philostr. Imag. Proem 2.
604
See Llewellyn-Jones 2003: 263.
605
See Kohl 1974.
114
compiled by Lombardo della Seta in 1379 into the "secular-heroes plan", in which it remains today.606
This version of the work was divided into two books: the first included 36 moral biographies of Greeks
and Romans, with an emphasis on Roman Republican figures from Romulus to Trajan.607 The second
book, detailed twelve moral biographies of biblical and mythical figures. In this work, Semiramis is
categorized alongside other notable biblical and pagan figures including Adam, Noah, Nimrod, Ninus,
Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Jason and Hercules.

This selection of figures is quite different from the other versions. The preface of the Adam-Caesar
version (1351-1353) elucidates upon Petrarch’s choice of biographies and demonstrates that it was
inspired by Livy’s Ab Urbe Condita and Valerius Maximus that are echoed in the text.608 Here, Petrarch
explains, identical to Livy, that he has selected ‘illustrious men who flourished with outstanding glory’.609
In Petrarch’s view, this is a stark contrast to the men of his own time. Petrarch harshly critiques his
contemporary politician’s ineptitude stating that they ‘contribute material not for history but for satire’.610
These leaders were seen to be lacking in will and ability of greatness that constituted an “illustrious man”.
In addition, Petrarch rationalizes their successes, explaining that any victory on the battlefield was
attributed to luck or an inevitable result of the even greater incompetence of enemies. In particular,
Petrarch had been disillusioned with politics, and republicanism in general, after the fall of Cola da
Rienzo, a Roman politician who had attempted to unify Italy and create a new Roman Empire, but failed
and was imprisoned and murdered by the mob.611 Therefore, Petrarch explains that he has selected
ancient examples far removed from his own time. These ancient examples were deemed worthy of
emulation and study because they achieved their greatness through action rather than fortune.612 In turn,
these exempla were intended to provide examples of leadership for his Carrara patron, Francesco il
Vecchio, and his fellow contemporaries.613

The unusual thing about this work is the inclusion of Semiramis, a woman, in a work centred on the
deeds of men. In fact, Semiramis is the sole woman with a biography in the work and, along with Joseph

606
Kohl 1974: 133; Witt 2008: 108n37.
607
Witt 2008: 103-108.
608
cf. Livy, Epit. 10; Val. Max. 9.
609
Petr. De viris. Preface.
610
Petr. De viris. Preface.
611
Witt 2009: 110.
612
Kohl 1975: 136.
613
Kohl 1975: 137; Witt 2009: 104.
115
in the second book, has the longest biography.614 In order to justify selecting her for the catalogue
Petrarch stresses the masculine traits of the Queen throughout her biography. These traits primarily
include credence as a good sovereign and military leader, describing her as ‘woman certainly in the
body, but a man in the soul’.615 This is then reinforced throughout the first half of the biography that
narrates Semiramis’ rise to power after the death of Ninus (the previous subject) and then her deeds as
queen, such as military skill and expansion of the empire.616 After this, her deeds achieved in peacetime
are recounted. This includes the construction of the walls of Babylon and the revolt story. Petrarch’s
account of the revolt story goes as follows;

Precisely here Semiramis gave a famous example of a certain value rather than feminine:
while she was intent on styling her hair according to female customs, she was told that the
Babylonians had revolted, and she, as she was, with half of her hair still untied, snatching out
of the hands of the handmaidens and gripping the weapons she marched to assault the city of
Babylon. So noble impetus remained worthy of success the disordered hair was not
recomposed before the rebel city returned to obedience. A statue with the same shape, with
its hair divided in half, was placed in memory of the fact in a very popular place in the place
and offered a distinguished spectacle for many.617

This version of the biography is an embellished account of Valerius Maximus, demonstrating that he did
not want to simply restate sources word for word but rephrase them and fill in gaps with others sources,
creating one seamlessness and accurate biography.618 In this instance, he has made the tale, once brief,
more lucid. As such, handmaidens have been added to the story, presumably overseeing her toilette as
the queen herself is said to be doing her hair. Moreover, the rebelling city is named as Babylon, making
it seem like a personal slight to the Queen. However, the primary purpose of this anecdote is to exemplify
Semiramis’ ability to forego her own gender and adopt a masculine persona. Petrarch states that
‘precisely here Semiramis gave a famous example of a certain value rather than feminine’.619 Thus, the

614
Semiramis was chosen due to Petrarch’s exposure to her at the time of the composition. Petrarch had already written on
her military feats in the Trionfi immediately preceding this work. Moreover, the figures selected in the second book of the
work were notable for playing an important role in the foundation of western society. In this collection, Noah, Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses are virtuous men sent by God, Nimrod is the architect, Ninus and Semiramis are seen as the
early founders of civilization, and Jason and Hercules equated to the heroes of a virtue aimed at the civilization of humanity.
(Malta 2008: XVI.) Valerius Maximus, a popular source in in the medieval period that was heavily relied on for the biography,
contained the revolt story. (Berlincourt 1972: 361-387.) Due to this, Semiramis was a strong option of exemplum of an
illustrious man.
615
Petr. De viris. 5.1-2.
616
Petr. De viris. 5. 1-27.
617
Petr. De viris. 5.33-40.
618
Petr. De viris. Preface; Malta 2008: CCX.
619
Petr. De viris. 5.32.
116
soldierly adeptness that is represented in this anecdote typifies the Queen’s nature which makes her
eligible for this catalogue.

Semiramis also features in the fourth poem of the Trionfi, the Triumph of Fame that was written by
Petrarch during the same period as the “ancient heroes” version of the De viris illustribus. This poem
included Classical figures processing in Fame’s triumph, including eleven out of twelve of the biblical
and mythological figures in the De viris illustribus including Semiramis. These figures were grouped
into the following categories; Roman heroes down to Marcus Aurelius; Greek, Carthaginian and Persian
heroes; biblical heroes; famous women; and ancient eastern and modern European kings. According to
Martellotti, this indicates a widening of Petrarch’s research as well as an appreciation of history outside
of Rome.620 All of the figures in the Triumph of Fame have obtained fame through valour and virtue.621
This includes a militaristic Semiramis who is alluded to in the following;

And even by her went that hardy Lady

That halfe her fayre here bounde up curiously
And let the tother for to hange beside
Tyll she abatyd the Babilonicall pryde622

The reference being made is Semiramis’ quelling of the rebellion in Babylon. Moreover, it indicates that
the rebellion story was an easily identifiable story, in which the queen’s name does not even need to be
mentioned for the audience, albeit an erudite one, to understand the reference.

As previously stated, Giovanni Boccaccio modelled his De mulieribus claris on Petrarch’s De viris
illustribus. One of the main sources used for each of these sources was Valerius Maximus’ Memorable
Doings and Sayings. We see this manifest in their accounts of Semiramis, associating her with the revolt
story that is used to promote her masculinity. As such, in the De mulieribus claris, like Petrarch’s De
viris illustribus, the Queen is presented in a bipartite structure. The first half of the biography recounts
Semiramis’ military and political deeds, followed by her sexual proclivities which are viewed as
contamination of her reputation and a consequence of her pagan nature. The first half of the structure,
centring around traditionally masculine activities such as war and politics, are perceived as positive,
whereas the second half is negative, with sex and excess associated with femininity. The revolt story sits

620
Martellotti 1964.
621
Petr. TF. 1. 26.
622
Petr. TF. 2. 140-142.
117
in between these two halves and marks the transition of Semiramis’ character from the praiseworthy
leader into the indulgent and erotically charged figure. Boccaccio’s version goes as follows;

Of Semiramis’ many deeds we shall single out the one most worthy of remembrance,
and the following story is reported as fact. One day, when all was peaceful and she
was enjoying a leisurely rest, she was combing hair with the dexterity of her sex.
Surrounded by her maids, she was plaiting it into braids according to native custom.
Her hair was not yet half finished when she was told that Babylon had defected to
her stepson. So distressed was Semiramis by this news that she threw aside her comb
and instantly rose in anger from her womanly pursuits, took up arms, and led her
troops to a siege of the powerful city. She did not finish arranging her hair until she
had forced the surrender of the mighty palace, weakened by a long blockade, and
brought it back under her power by a force of arms. A huge bronze statue of a woman
with her half braided on one side and loose on the other stood in Babylon for a long
time as witness to this brave deed.623

Throughout this account, Boccaccio stresses the liminality of Semiramis’ gender to mark the transition
between the first half of the biography that focuses on masculine activities, to the second half that deals
with Semiramis’ feminine activities.624 For example, Boccaccio, following Petrarch’s suit, supplements
Valerius’ account with the addition of handmaidens. Moreover, Boccaccio also emphasizes Semiramis’
dexterity in her ‘womanly pursuits’.625 As a result, the feminine nature of the scene is embellished and
accentuated. However, this is contrasted with the presence of the militaristic features of the story and by
Boccaccio labelling it as Semiramis’ ‘deed most worthy of remembrance’ as well as a ‘brave deed’.626
Thus, through the story Semiramis is presented as both masculine and feminine to mark the transition
from the masculine to feminine halves of the biography.

Another change in the story from previous versions is the clarification that the rebellion had been led by
Semiramis’ step-son. It is stated earlier in the biography that Semiramis only bore one son, Ninyas, with
Ninus, meaning that the identity of this interloper must be from a previous marriage of the late king.627
This is used to reflect negatively on the character of Semiramis by playing into the stereotypes of step-
mothers. Watson has demonstrated in Greco-Roman literature that stepchildren, and in particular step-

623
Bocc. FW. 2.9-11.
624
McLeod 1991: 66.
625
Bocc. FW. 2.9-11.
626
Bocc. FW. 2.9.
627
In the 1473 German translation of the text by Heinrich Steinhöwel the step-son is named Trebeta. (Steinhowel, Boccaccio
de claris mulieribus, 27.) In Manfredi Carmina attributed to Bede, he is meant to have founded the city of Trèves. (Bedae
opera. i. 449.) This was then perpetuated by medieval scholars. Refer to Barnouw 1935: 187-194 and Samuel 1944: 38-40.
118
sons, were often portrayed as the victims of villainous step-mothers.628 This stereotype particularly arose
in situations of inheritance, such as this, in which the step-mother’s biological children were
disadvantaged by children from a previous marriage. This culminated in a spectrum of reactions from
the stepmother, from mild unpleasantness to murder or even sexual desire. In Boccaccio’s account,
Semiramis reacts to her step-son leading the uprising by summoning an army to eliminate the threat to
her (and consequently her son’s) power. This attitude persisted into Christian sources such as Jerome, a
source which Boccaccio heavily drew upon.629 In these sources widows were discouraged to take a
second husband, and a widow who did remarry was seen to be motivated by carnal pleasure or greed.630
As such, these negative connotations of step-mothers, especially the association with physical violence
and incest, foreshadow the second half of Semiramis’ biography that focuses on her feminine downfalls,
her insatiable lust. Thus, once again the rebellion story is used to demonstrate the liminal nature of
Semiramis and to foreshadow proceeding facets of her character.

Almost half a century later, Christine de Pizan wrote The Book of the City of the Ladies (1405) to counter
the misogyny in Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris. Semiramis can be regarded as the most important
figure in de Pizan’s work, as she was the foundational stone of the metaphorical city. As such, she needed
to be strong and resilient to refute the previous misogyny perpetuated by past writers, such as Boccaccio.
But, most of all, she needed to set a high standard for the ensuing women of the city. In order to do this,
Semiramis is portrayed almost completely positively by transfixing on the theme of courage. In addition,
Semiramis’ femininity, both physically and morally, is largely omitted rather than denigrated and only
used grammatically.631 For example, her militaristic and political aptitude are brought to the fore and, as
previously demonstrated, any negative aspects, such as the alleged incest with her son and other instances
of sexual deviancy are rationalized or explained. This is typified in the revolt story.

Once, when Semiramis was in her chamber surrounded by her maidens who were braiding
her hair, news came that one of her kingdoms had revolted against her. She stood up
immediately and swore by her power that the other lock of her hair which remained to be
braided would not be braided until she had avenged this injustice and brought this land back
under her dominion. She had amassed troops quickly armed and advanced on the rebels and,
thanks to great force and strength, brought them back under her authority. She so frightened
these rebels and all her other subjects that ever after no one dared revolt. A large and richly
gilt cast-bronze statue on a high pillar in Babylon which portrayed a princess holding a sword,

628
Watson 1995: 213.
629
McLeod 1991: 38-47; Watson 1995: 10-11.
630
See Jer. Ep. 54.15.
631
See Holderness 2004: 99-100.
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 with one side of her hair braided, the other not, bore witness to this noble and courageous
deed for a long time.632

When arriving at the revolt story in the biography the anecdote almost seems out of place as it contains
tangible features of Semiramis’ gender that have been omitted elsewhere in the narrative. As such, it is
argued by Dulac that the revolt story provides an opportunity to discuss her physique due to the remaining
female elements i.e. Semiramis’ braided hair.633 However, to fit in with Semiramis’ characterization as
a suitable, strong ruler for the foundation stone of the city, the hair anecdote is de-feminised. There are a
lack of maidens and her abilities in beautification are not commented on. Moreover, an oath is added to
the story where she swears by her power that her hair would not be finished until the rebellion was
quelled. By doing this, the role of Semiramis’ hair in de Pizan’s account is linked to political
connotations—that the city will be restored to a stable political state. This is different to Boccaccio’s
account in which Semiramis’ vanity and luxury are highlighted. Thus, the story is de-feminised as much
as possible without noticeably omitting any key elements of the story. In consequence, the courageous
Semiramis, who is promoted throughout de Pizan’s narrative, is maintained.

Similar to Semiramis in the revolt story, Christine de Pizan was an upholder of monarchy. This is
emphasised by de Pizan through the Queen’s courageous actions. According to de Pizan, Semiramis did
such a good job quashing the revolt that none of her other subjects ever rebelled again. As such, the revolt
story demonstrates that Semiramis, in fact, exceeded what she first set out to achieve. Carr has argued
that this was a slight to Semiramis’ character as emphasis is placed on the fear evoked in her subjects
that subsequently highlighted her ‘totalitarian tendencies’.634 However, this is contradicted by the
historical context of the text. In fact, the assertive Semiramis seems to be a prime exemplum of the type
of ruler that Christine desired with France on the brink of civil war issuing from King Charles VI’s
incapability to rule during his frequent bouts of madness.635 Like Semiramis, Isabeau of Bavaria (wife of
the mad king) acted as regent to her young son, Louis, during these times.636 This granted her exceptional
power for a queen. Despite this, Louis of Orléans and John of Burgundy vied for regency and power,
eventually descending into the Armagnac–Burgundian Civil War (1407-1435). As such, the
contemporary works of Christine de Pizan, such as The Book of the City of Ladies, acted as a “mirror”
for the Queen in this time of crisis.

632
De Piz. Le Livre. 1.15.1.
633
Dulac 1978: 324.
634
Carr 2017: 70-71.
635
Adams 2014: 1-6.
636
Adams and Rechtschaffen 2013: 119-120.
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As a “mirror”, the work contained exempla of female leadership and virtue relatable to the Queen’s
situation. The beginning of the work is littered with women who have ruled in their husband’s stead
including pertinent examples from France: Fredegunde, Blanche of Castile, Jeanne d’Evreux, Blanche
of Orleans, Bonne of Luxembourg (wife of Jean le Bon), Marie of Blois (Countess of Anjou), and
Catherine (Countess of La Marche and Vendôme). After this, similar women continue to be employed
as building blocks of the city: Semiramis, Zenobia, Artemisia, Lilia, Berenice, Dido, Opis, and Lavinia.
Accordingly, the inclusion of these figures that promoted female regency urged Isabeau to figuratively
take a page from the book and assert herself in the volatile political situation. Thus, it is fitting that in
1414 the illuminated collection of Christine’s works, concluding with The Book of the City of Ladies,
was presented to the queen when her chancellor, Robert le Maçon, was arguing in the royal council that
Isabeau should lead the government.637

Moreover, de Pizan herself was particularly aware of the dangers of rebellions which are echoed in the
biography of Semiramis. In France, radical depopulation and famine occurred due to the Black Death,
political tensions with England culminated in the Hundred Years War, and the ruling elite, especially
Charles VI, were seen to be self-indulgent to the detriment of the country’s economy.638 In consequence,
there were several nationwide revolutions concerning economic matters by the growing bourgeoisie
class—the Jacquerie uprising of 1358, Maillotin insurrection of 1382, the Tuchin revolt from 1383-1834,
and the Parisian Cabochien revolution of 1413 that was witnessed by de Pizan herself.639 Once
championed as the “proto-feminist” of this period, Christine was on the conservative side of this social
change favouring feudalism and monarchy.640 These challenges to the crown were seen as heretical by
de Pizan and dominance over the rebels necessary. Consequently, a figure like Semiramis who acted as
regent for her son after the death of her husband and not only quelled a rebellion but stopped rebellion
from ever occurring again was a fitting model of good governance in the eyes of Christine de Pizan.641

637
Broad and Green 2009: 29.
638
Harley MS 4431 in the British Library; Cardini 2012: 257-263.
639
Delany 1987:184-185.
640
De Piz. Paix. 2.1; Delany 1987: 187-194. These ideologies were a consequence of her beneficial relationship with the
French court and patronage from the Queen, especially after the death of her husband. For example, the Chateau de Mémorant
was given to Christine’s father by Charles V; her son was a companion to the Henry IV, the young English prince; and
Christine herself often retreated with the queen to her farm estate, Hostel des Bergeries. (Delany 1987: 195-196.) Moreover,
it seems that the Queen was grateful for de Pizan’s works (possibly including the City of the Ladies) as in October of 1404,
she was presented with a hennap, a chalice of gold, in return for a manuscript. (Adams 2010: 191.)
641
McLeod 1991: 124-125.
121
Figure 18. ‘Queen Semiramis with Attendants’. Tapestry. Flemish, Tournai c. 1480. Figure 195. A close-up of the details of
Wool, silk; tapestry weave. Honolulu Museum of Art. Semiramis’ face and hair.

During this time of political contention, the French royalty of the fourteenth-century, and in particular
the Burgundian dukes, had a predilection for opulent tapestries. King Charles V alone had acquired more
than two hundred tapestries before his death in 1380.642 A popular theme for these tapestries were the
preux and preuse. Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy and bother to Louis I, is recorded to have owned
two sets of these tapestries, the latter of which was sold for two-thousand francs.643 The collection of
Charles VI, husband to Isabeau of Bavaria with whom we are already acquainted, also included a wall
hanging of this kind, probably inherited from Jean de Berry, the bother of Louis I and Philip the Bold.644
There is one surviving tapestry of Semiramis that dates to the fifteenth-century and is thought to have
belonged to a set of Lady Worthies.645 This tapestry captures the moments before Semiramis hears and
subsequently reacts to the news of the rebellion and depicts the queen eschewing her femininity in favour

642
Brosens 2013: 298; O’Hear and O’Hear 2015: 33.
643
Lestocquoy 1978: 34, 37.
644
Cassagnes-Brouquet 2004: 169.
645
Comstock 1946: 179-180; Souchal 1974: 90-91; Cassagnes-Brouquet 2004: 169-171.
122
of virile militarism. Semiramis, dressed in a brocaded surcoat with an ornate breastplate and armour,
brushes her hair and turns from a mirror held by a handmaiden towards another baring news of rebellion
and a large spear. At the top of the scene is an Alexandrine verse which also alludes to the rebellion story;
‘I was Semiramis, Queen of Babylon. I conquered barbarian Indians and Syrians. I went up into the North
and set my throne there, and slew the king of the Ethiopians’. Tapestries, like this one of Semiramis,
were sought after in times of political instability, particularly during the civil war in France. In these
circumstances, imagery of the preux and preuse were adduced to endorse the legitimacy and capability
of the Burgundian contenders to rule in place of the mad king.646 Thus, the Worthies were also a form of
visual exempla to the monarchs not unlike Semiramis who was an exemplum for Queen Isabeau in
Christine de Pizan’s The Book of the City of the Ladies.

Conclusion

This case study has demonstrated that the rebellion story can be expressed in a number of ways through
a number of media. Either through prose, as seen with the anonymous work, Tractatus de mulieribus in
bello, through a description of an image like Philostratus’ Imagines, and through visual representations,
such as the woodcut accompanying Giovanni Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris and the fresco at the
Castello della Manta. Despite these differences, all these sources share one thing. They demonstrate the
liminality of the Queen. This comes to the fore in the revolt story which expresses many polarizing
dichotomies of the queen. These include; masculinity and femininity, militarism and Orientalism, good
political leadership and tyranny. She can embody all these attributes or only some of these attributes
simultaneously. As such, these dualities can be censored or promoted, approved or denigrated. It is due
to the Queen’s liminality that makes her especially adaptable and relevant, especially during times of
political contention. We see this time and time again with our sources from Valerius Maximus and
Polyaenus in Antiquity, to Petrarch and de Pizan in the Renaissance. Moreover, it is during this period
that we see a substantial increase in females in the political sphere and, in consequence, Semiramis
inducted as Lady Worthy.

646
See Cassagnes-Brouquet 2004: 175-177 for the use of the Worthies during the civil war in France.
123
 CONCLUSION
This thesis has examined representations of the Babylonian Queen Semiramis from Antiquity to the
fifteenth-century in both literary and visual sources. It has also explored the role of the East in the
Western imaginary, the function of female rulers in the discourse of rulership and kingship, and how
exemplary individuals contribute to moral discourse. Conclusions have been made which add to our
understanding of Semiramis.

Chapter One on sex established that there is a long tradition of the Western imaginary associating the
Oriental East with sexual promiscuity. While such a view may receive some support from the image of
Mesopotamian sexuality that emerges from our Near Eastern sourses, it owes far more to the projected
desires of later authors than it does to any ‘historical’ reality. This is an important theme in the
representation of Semiramis and we should handle it with nuance and critical distance. Scholars have
been ready to accept and perpetuate—particularly through the citation of Irene Samuel’s outdated work—
that a sexualised Semiramis originated from the Late Antique and Medieval periods, and was the
conception of the Queen. However, this thesis has shown that we actually see her sexual excess
manifesting in early Greco-Roman traditions tied to her persona as an Oriental despot. This can be found
in one of our earliest sources on Semiramis, Diodorus Siculus’ reworking of Ctesias in his Bibliotheca
Historica. We should also observe the type of intellectual work that this representation does. A good
example is provided by the story of Semiramis’ incest with her son, Ninyas.

Whilst the story of incest stems from Justin in his Epitome of Pompeius Trogus’ Philippic Histories, it
has been argued that the sexual allegation was used to demonstrate Semiramis’ lust for power rather than
a monstrous lust for her son. This shifts with later, especially Christian sources where the story is
combined with elements of cruelty and immorality to help elucidate theological aspects relating to
operation of sin and carnal desire. This is seen in the famous discussions of the story by St Augustine,
Orosius, Dante, Boccaccio, and Chaucer.

Chapter Two demonstrates that Semiramis was consistently renowned for her feats of monumental
construction. In our sources, in particular Diodorus Siculus’ Bibliotheca Historica and Herodotus’
Histories, they are described as hubristic, excessively large, extravagant, costly, largely self-serving and
superfluous. These descriptions are a gross exaggeration of reality. To build many of these constructions,
the Babylonian queen often transgressed boundaries of nature, the tell-tale faux pas of a Herodotean

124
despotes. We also see the trope of the corrupting nature of Semiramis’ luxury that originates from her
building programme being promoted in our sources. This disconnection from reality and use of tropes
highlights how the antique world viewed Eastern culture through an Oriental lens, casting Semiramis as
the despotes figure. For all their revulsion, authors nevertheless took a continued interest in Semiramis
as a monumental builder, especially the Walls of Babylon that were categorised as one of the Seven
Wonders of the World by Antipater of Sidon. Semiramis continues to be associated with the Walls in
later sources such as Ammianus Marcellinus, Paulus Silentarius, and the Armenian tradition of the
Alexander Romance. In the Medieval period we see a drastic change in the receptions of these deeds in
Giovanni Boccaccio’s De Mulieribus Claris and Christine de Pizan’s Book of the City of Ladies. In these
works, the deeds are no longer seen as the actions of an Oriental despot but rather as a positive element
of her sovereignty that reflected the changing socio-political climate during this period which saw
females increasingly being involved in traditionally masculine spheres of society.

The case study on the tomb story elaborates on how monumental constructions pertain to the trope of
Persian denigration of morals. What is interesting about this narrative is that it only manifests in
Herodotus’ Histories and Plutarch’s Moralia. After this, the story disappears from Greco-Roman, Late
Antique and Medieval texts. It is explained that the lack of longevity of this narrative is due to the
ancillary nature of Semiramis/Nitokris within the tale. In both the sources examined, the primary purpose
of the strong, Oriental women was to demonstrate the weakness of Persian men. In this way, Nitokris and
Semiramis were seen to conform to a trope within Greek literature of women whose purpose was to
illustrate the flaws and failures of Persian rulers. As such, these women were not the focus of this anecdote,
and are interchangeable. This explains the shift we see from Nitokris in Herodotus to Semiramis in
Plutarch.

Chapter Three of this thesis examined Semiramis’ military representations. The ways in which
Semiramis is represented in this theme is highly variable. When mentioned in relation to Alexander the
Great she is often a triumphant expansionist, someone that the Macedonian king strives to emulate and
surpass. Whilst other sources, such as Diodorus Siculus, use it as evidence of her despotism, her overly
ambitious and hubristic nature leading to her defeat in India. In Late Antique and Medieval sources these
themes were exacerbated by Paulus Orosius who depicts the Queen as a bloodthirsty woman. Again, in
the later sources of Giovanni Boccaccio and Christine de Pizan that engage with the querelle des femmes,
we see these ideologies shifting in a more positive direction, and it becomes a characteristic of masculine

125
strength and good sovereignty. This is particularly evident in the rebellion story that is examined as the
case study for this chapter.

The rebellion story was a particularly popular narrative associated with Semiramis. It is apparent from
the vast number of differing sources throughout our timespan that it could be adapted and manipulated
to appeal to a number of audiences and situations. This is because the story demonstrated a number of
dichotomies: masculinity and femininity, militarism and Orientalism, good political leadership and
tyranny. Certain traits could either be censored or promoted in order to approve or denigrate her actions.
We see the story being especially relevant during times of political contention, so Valerius Maximus and
Polyaenus recount it in Antiquity, as well as Petrarch and de Pizan in the Renaissance. In these sources
Semiramis is a positive exemplum, someone that rulers should emulate. In this sense, this facet of her
representation is quite different to others, as it is an overwhelming positive reflection of the Queen’s
political and military prowess. We see this story being embraced for females who were becoming more
frequent in the Medieval period and is clearly reflected in Semiramis induction as Lady Worthy, and in
the use of this motif throughout the Medieval period.

By examining sources on Semiramis from Antiquity to the fifteenth-century, this thesis has brought to
light a variety of refracted representations of the Queen. By looking at Semiramis as more than a sexual
figure we see other complex versions of the Queen emerging from the shadows. Most prominently, we
see Oriental discourse deeply imbedded throughout these many refractions—as a monumental builder, a
military commander, and a sexual being. Whilst these associations most often reflect badly on the Queen,
we also see positive representations in our sources. In the tomb story and the rebellion story in particular,
we see Semiramis functioning as an exemplum of moralistic virtue that is completely detached from these
discourses. Here, her nationality and gender are not of prime importance. These representations of
Semiramis not only reflect the changes in the debates on woman, power, and female sexuality, but also
academic Zeitgeist.

126
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