Bravery of Persian Women

Bravery of Persian Women

Around 24 centuries ago, the Persian army was fighting a war against the Greeks in which they were defeated. The hopeless and injured soldiers returned home. But they didn’t receive a warm welcome.

Persian women, who heard that the soldiers were returning home after a defeat, were afraid that the Greek army would follow them and invade the city. What would happen then? At that time, when an army conquered a city, they were allowed to do whatever they wanted as a reward.

Most of the time, those soldiers didn’t do noble things. Instead, they used to do horrible things like looting and killing. The Persian women were aware that all these things would happen to them and their children if they didn’t take any action.

But what on earth could they do? They couldn’t go to war because they didn’t know how to use a sword, and there wasn’t enough time for practice. But they could persuade their men to return to war.

They decided to show their disappointment and scorn toward those soldiers. They chose a very unique way to do so: the crowd of women lifted their garments, exposing themselves to shame their men.

This gesture was indirectly calling them cowards and expressing disdain for their failures. The men of war found this too much to digest. The shamed men returned to the war and even won it. The result would have been different if the women hadn’t come forward to remind their men that they should try harder to save their people.

The source of this story is "Moralia" written by the famous Greek historian Plutarch. 

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