As archaeologists, we’ve spent over thirty years studying warrior women from a variety of cultures around the world, and, we have to tell you, shieldmaidens pose a problem.
Stories of Viking warrior women are found in a number of historical documents, but several come from factually unreliable heroic sagas, fornaldarsogur. A good example is Hervor’s and Heidrek’s Saga. After the hero, Angantyr, falls in battle his daughter Hervor takes her father’s sword and uses it to avenge his death by killing his enemies. There are similar stories of Brynhilde and Freydis, in Sigurd’s Saga and the Saga of the Greenlanders. But in each case the story is more about myth-making than fact. As well, these are tales of individual women who are highly skilled with swords and fight in battles, but give no evidence for a ‘community’ of women warriors, which the shieldmaidens are supposed to have been.
There are, however, more reliable historical resources. In the 1070s, for example, Adam of Bremen (chronicling the Hamburg-Bremen archdiocese) wrote that a northern region of Sweden near lake Malaren was inhabited by war-like women. But he doesn’t say how many women, nor does he clarify what “war-like” means. Were these women just zealously patriotic, bad-tempered, aggressive, or maybe even too independent for his Medieval Christian tastes? It’s hard to say.
Then we have the splendid references to ‘communities’ of shieldmaidens found in the works of 12th century Danish historian, Saxo Grammaticus, whose writing is sure to make every modern woman livid. Keep in mind, Saxo was likely the secretary of the Archbishop of Lund, and had specific Christian notions about appropriate female behavior. He wrote:
“There were once women in Denmark who dressed themselves to look like men and spent almost every minute cultivating soldiers’ skills. …They courted military celebrity so earnestly that you would have guessed they had unsexed themselves. Those especially who had forceful personalities or were tall and elegant embarked on this way of life. As if they were forgetful of their true selves they put toughness before allure, aimed at conflicts instead of kisses, tasted blood, not lips, sought the clash of arms rather than the arm’s embrace, fitted to weapons hands which should have been weaving, desired not the couch but the kill…” (Fisher 1979, p. 212).
Okay. Saxo says there were ‘communities’ of shieldmaidens. Apparently, he means more than one community. How many? Ten? Fifty? Five thousand? In his The Danish History, Books I-IX, he names Alfhild, Sela, and Rusila as shieldmaidens, and also names three she-captains, Wigibiorg, who fell on the field at Bravalla, Hetha, who became queen of Zealand, and Wisna, whose hand was cut off by Starcad at Bravalla. He also writes about Lathgertha and Stikla. So…eight women? They might make up one community, but ‘communities?’
Historical problems like these have caused many scholars conclude that shieldmaidens were little more than a literary motif, perhaps devised to counter the influences of invading Christians and their notions of proper submissive female behavior. There are good arguments for this position (Lewis-Simpson, 2000, pp. 295-304). However, historically most cultures had women warriors, and where there were more than a few women warriors, they formed communities. If the shieldmaidens existed, we should find the evidence in the archaeological record.
For example, do we see them represented in Viking material culture, like artwork? Oh, yes. There are a number of iconographic representations of what may be female warriors. Women carrying spears, swords, shields, and wearing helmets, are found on textiles and brooches, and depicted as metallic figurines, to name a few. One of the most intriguing recent finds is a silver figurine discovered in Harby, Denmark, in 2012. The figurine appears to be a woman holding an upright sword in her right hand and a shield in her left. Now, here’s the problem: These female warrior images may actually be depictions of valkyries, ‘choosers of the slain.’ Norse literature says that the war god, Odin, sent armed valkyries into battle to select the warriors worthy of entering the Hall of the Slain, Valhalla. Therefore, these images might represent real warrior women, but they could also be mythic warrior women.
And where are the burials of Viking warrior women? Are there any?
This is tricky. What would the burial of a shieldmaiden look like? How would archaeologists know if they found one? Well, archaeologists recognize the burials of warriors in two primary ways:
1) Bioarchaeology. If you spend your days swinging a sword with your right hand, the bones in that arm are larger, and you probably have arthritis in your shoulder, elbow and wrist. In other words, you have bone pathologies from repetitive stress injuries. At this point in time, we are aware of no Viking female burials that unequivocally document warrior pathologies. But here’s the problem: If a Viking woman spent every morning using an axe to chop wood for her breakfast fire or swinging a scythe to cut her hay field—and we know Viking women did both—the bone pathologies would be very similar to swinging a sword or practicing with her war axe. Are archaeologists simply misidentifying warrior women pathologies? Are we attributing them to household activities because, well, they’re women. Surely they weren’t swinging a war axe. See? The psychological legacy of living in a male dominated culture can have subtle effects, though archaeologists work very hard not to fall prey to such prejudices.
2) Artifacts. Sometimes warriors wear uniforms, or are buried with the severed heads of their enemies, but they almost always have weapons: swords, shields, bows, arrows, stilettos, spears, helmets, or mail-coats. A good example is the Kaupang burial.
There are many Viking “female weapons burials,” as archaeologists call them. Let us give you just a few examples. At the Gerdrup site in Denmark the woman was buried with a spear at her feet. This is a really interesting site for another reason: The woman’s grave contains three large boulders, two that rest directly on top of her body, which was an ancient method of keeping souls in graves—but that’s a discussion for another article. In Sweden, three graves of women (at Nennesmo and Klinta) contained arrowheads. The most common weapon included in female weapons burials are axes, like those in the burials at the BB site from Bogovej in Langeland (Denmark), and the cemetery at Marem (Norway). The Kaupang female weapons burials also contained axeheads, as well as spears, and in two instances the burial contained a shield boss.
There are many other examples of female weapons burials. For those interested in the details please take a look at the Analecta Archaeologica Ressoviensia, Vol. 8, pages 273-340.
So did the shieldmaidens exist? When taken as a whole, the literary, historical, and archaeological evidence suggests that there were individual Viking women who cultivated warriors’ skills and, if the sagas can be believed, some achieved great renown in battle. Were there communities of Viking women warriors, as Saxo claims? There may have been, but there just isn’t enough proof to definitively say so…yet.
However, Lagertha, you personally are still on solid ground. You go, girl.
This article was originally published on the Tor/Forge blog on May 19, 2015.
Kathleen O’Neal Gear & W. Michael Gear are Anthropologists and award winning authors who have authored and co-authored over 40 books. Their next book, People of the Songtrail, releases on May 26th. Follow the Gears on Twitter at @GearBooks, on Facebook, or visit them online.
Excellent write-up. My take is that there were certainly some number of women who took up arms in the medieval period, not just the Norse but other regions as well. However, I don’t support the “community of warriors” idea, primarily because even if we call much of the sagas “factually unreliable” (they were), the sagas are still the best (and generally only) source for the culture as a whole. Had there been entire communities, the skalds would certainly have sang of them and saga writers would have written of them. But what we see in the sagas is singular warrior women, who mostly were warrior women because they had circumstances forced upon them. Shieldmaidens like Lagertha are fictional constructs for the most part, created for the modern viewer.
It is an interesting Idea and am glad that someone pointed it out. Would those left behind in a raiding Culture, ( vikings were definitely known for leaving home to raid) have taken up arms as a sort of defunct militia? Would it only be able bodied males , or any one willing. With the winter in Scandinavia, would that leave a longer time for training when the fields were frozen over, making a warrior culture more pronounced? Part of the issue is that you have second hand accounts ( like the one listed above). Much of the Scandinavian culture was oratory. Much like the Iliad, many of the tales were told for generations before finally being written down. So there are little to no written documents from the culture itself to say so.
I personally like to think that based on their myths and legends, that it was not nearly as frowned upon as one might believe. I am not sure how accurate this is, but i have heard that women could inherit land, so it would stand to reason they would want to protect it. As for common place? well that depends on your definition of common place.
Always relevant
I’d be a lot more convinced by this “warrior women” thing if anthropologists came across them in the world today. As it is, I am suspicious about these people in an age of muscle powered weaponry.
The best example I can think of is the African coastal kingdom of Dahomey, where the guards of the Kings harem were said to be women, according to European visitors at the time.
Well, there are certainly plenty of well-documented historical ‘warrior’ women from Medieval records, although generally speaking these were wives who took over feudal duties when their husbands died. Some would have been more in a command and rally position with a troop of their feudal-bound men, whereas some actually did plunge in and fight (it appears).
Women Warlords: An Illustrated Military History of Female Warriors by Tim Newark is a pretty good starting point if you’re curious, although how well researched it is from an academic point of view I couldn’t say.
There’s a lot of variation in human physical size after all, and a large woman will certainly be a potential match in a fight for any average sized man. Once you take into account that some of the women in question might have come from noble houses and have been better fed than common troops, it starts to look plausible at least in a spotty and sporadic sort of way.
Comparing among cultures is tricky as well. Much as the original writer noted, anthropologists do have examples of individual warrior women from all manner of cultures, but they tend to be unusual in a culture. That Finnoscandian, Germanic or Celtic peoples might have been more permissive of women fighting than most other iron age or steel age cultures is plausible, though extraordinarily difficult to ever be sure of.
Anyway, it seems plausible, and I don’t really buy into arguments against from a basic biology stand. We’re not dealing with all women fighting here, but presumably a small number who were physically built with enough strength and mass to be able to hold their own in a melee.
Chris
But the whole deal about Ragnar Lodbrok is that he sits on the cusp of myth and history. There’s no evidence he ever existed, and stories about him are largely myth or borrowed from other people, but there sure is evidence his sons, Ivar the Boneless, Sigurd Snake in the Eye, and Bjorn Ironside existed. Look up “the Great Heathen Army.”
That’s why I kind of like Vikings’ semi mystical aspects. It is fitting for a guy who is 90% myth. He deserves a Lagertha leading the charge, whether she really existed or not.
I think it partly depends on what we mean by ‘communities of warrior women.’ If you mean entire communities where most of the women were warriors, or where most warriors were women, then this seems to be not too likely. After all, physiologically, males tend to be stronger on average than females, so pragmatically, it makes sense to use your strongest as warriors. Thus, I would imagine that in communities with women warriors, they would have likely fought alongside males.
On the other hand, if we simply mean ‘a community where women were allowed to become warriors,’ then I think we have very strong evidence that the Norse were always open to allowing women to become warriors, particularly those who were ‘tall’ with ‘forceful personalities. In other words it seems like the evidence points to the Norse being an ‘anyone who can hold their own with the other warriors is welcome to fight, regardless of gender’ philosophy. As such, I’d expect the majority of viking warriors might have been male, but there were probably a number of females too.
Which may also have been the practice of the Celts. Historically it is unreliable, but the story of Cu Chulainn involves the hero being taught by a warrior woman. If the ancient Irish had something against women being warriors, it is highly doubtful they would have made one of their greatest mythic heroes be the student of a female warrior.
As is typical in academia, the authors of this article completely misrepresent the “Christian” attitude about “properly submissive” women. History is filled with people that refuse to read the relevant scripture in its entirety and, thus, misunderstand the whole concept of what it means for a wife to submit to her husband. I don’t want to go into great detail here, but take the time to read Ephesians 5:21-33 (and try not to grind your teeth and seethe over verses 22-24, but take the entire passage into account). The whole gist of this is to promote teamwork in the conduct of a Christian household, where husband and wife are working together under the guidance of the husband as counseled by the wife. Together, they are a unified front, loving each other and working toward a common goal.
http://www.tor.com/2014/09/02/female-viking-warriors-proof-swords/
This is is an earlier article posted at Tor, which discusses the issue as well. Although it seems to focus on the biology of skeletal remains at grave sites.
Sorry, Bearcat89, but in this case it is you, as a 21st century Christian, who is wilfully misunderstanding the way in which Church authorities in previous centuries themselves interpreted the meaning of “Christian wifely submissiveness”.
I would direct your attention to the fact that the authors didn’t TELL us how Church leaders interpreted this in the 11th to 16th centuries; instead they QUOTED one… and let us draw our own conclusions.
And they didn’t even quote things like the laws that allowed a husband to “discipline” his wife — provided that he did it with a stick no thicker than his thumb…
I am a Christian myself… but that doesn’t mean I feel the need to try to explain away the more obnoxious attitudes of my spiritual ancestors. They were what they were and form part of the legitimate history of those periods — “warts and all”.
The truth is, from our perspective, in many ways medieval Christians were total cretins. And their views on the proper place of women in society (basically as chattels of men and often as chattels of dubious worth at that) are just one example of that.
There have been many cases where graves have been found indicating that there were many women who were shield maidens – prior to this article being written. A little more research may have unearthed this fact.
I am not christian but was raised christian. I am heathen. The Christian Church twisted information to fit their agenda. The edda’s and sagas we written after christianisation – by those with a christian influence however they may have had pagan tendencies. For us to dismiss the possibility that women weren’t ‘tough enough’ to fight with their men is as preposterous as assuming that women now would not fight with their men. Ah wait, it’s men who say they can’t!
Lagertha – Shield Maiden
https://teespring.com/es/lagertha-shield-maiden
Just because the sagas were often fictional and over-the-top, should not automatically discount their content. Popular literature of any type is popular because it taps into what people believe and what they hold dear. It has some anchor in reality. Take the overwhelming popularity of Star Trek as an example. We’d laugh at the idea of a future historian studing ST:TNG and claiming it was proof that intelligent androids, warp technology, and Klingons actually existed. And yet, many technologies that were wildly “science fiction” thirty years ago are now a reality. We hold these things dear. We desire them. These are some of our heroes and naturally there are many people who try to be like/live up to their heroes. It may be physically difficult to become a Klingon, but far less so for a Viking-era woman to take up weapons and learn to be skilled with them. And to those who argue women are universally the weaker sex and incapable of being warriors in real life, I’d pay good money to see you in a ring with Ronda Rousey for 5 minutes. Even the greatest of the saga heroes would have respect for her. And that is exactly my point.
If shield maidens could exist, and by extension specialized communities of them, how could these communities be identified if we found them? Would we be looking for a grouping of only women of a certain age, with no evidence of children, men, adornments, trappings of domesticity, set completely apart from any other villages, perhaps with only barracks type buildings? This kind of silly expectation of women warriors only happens in bad fantasy literature. Just like their male counterparts, these women probably had lovers, bore children, often married (no one wants to be a middle aged shield maiden), and were no doubt expected to do the kinds of daily chores that non warriors did. Just imagine how some far future archaeologist will look at our society and try to identify those who were police or firefighters or football coaches and wonder where the proof is that women took on these jobs. Short of having a nice identifying tattoo–“I was a pretty successful shield maiden”–how easy is it to nail down the complexities of a person’s life from a set of old bones, a moldering purse with the remains of a Twinkie, and some strange lump of plastic with the picture of a partially eaten apple on it. The amount of evidence archaeology has uncovered so far, of women with weapons, while far from definitive, is certainly pretty amazing.
But ultimately, it has to come down to common sense. Certain professions are biologically universal because the need for them is universal. Life is struggle. If you believe DNA successfully programs an entire sex to wring their hands and demand to be coddled by the other, I have to wonder what Internet fantasy (and parental basement) you’re living in. The reality I and my ancestors were raised on is that women wear many hats throughout their lives and often do more than men do: because a thing is there and must be done and nobody else wearing pants is volunteering.
I note more than one comment that questions whether there are any cultures where the idea of warrior women exists, and no one has pointed to the USA. Several women were just tested and proven worthy to become Army Rangers. Air Force General Lori Robinson, Commander of Pacific Air Forces, has been nominated to be the first woman to lead a combatant unit. There are numerous women in all branches of the Armed Forces, and it is only because of the dictates of old men that they are only now breaking the glass ceiling to become full combatants. Are these not modern shieldmaidens?
@@@@@#14 barbara ruhmann – Actually a better example is WW2 Russia. For example, it had an all-female night fighter squadron that the German pilots nicknamed “the Night Witches”. More directly on point to ground combat, It fielded 2,000 female snipers, 75% of whom were killed in combat. So not just “photo op” soldiers. One of the best known, Lyudmila Pavlichenko had 309 confirmed kills, including 36 enemy snipers, before she was taken out of action — by a mortar. After she recovered, she toured the US and then was a sniper instructor for the rest of the War. (btw she was reportedly dumbfounded by the banality of the questions she was asked by the American press — ignoring her combat record to focus on the length of her uniform skirt and whether she thought it flattered her figure, for example.)
What I will like to know is if there are any records from the countries that were raided by the Vikings where Viking women were observed fighting? Are there any such British or French records for examples?
They’re represented in art, women are found with weapons buried with them, and they’re documented in Anglo-Saxon accounts of the vikings. Nah, doesn’t look like they existed at all! Lmfao!
The idea of warrior women being at all common in the pre-industrial age is preposterous. They simply do not have the physical capacity to compete with male warriors. I mean this in a logistical sense. No commander/leader is going to spend the time, effort and money to train and equip women when they are demonstrably inferior warriors.
The average woman has the upper body strength of a fourteen year old boy. In a recent study integrating just 20% female soldiers slowed down units by 50%. Yes, it halved their speed. On top of that the women were injured considerably more often (just from load-bearing movement). The top 25% of women equated to the bottom 25% of men in many tests; this ratio was even worse in other tests. The results are incontrovertible.
In an ancient world of precarious survival, with a demand for the absolute efficient use of resources and man-power, the idea of female warriors being more than an incredibly rare oddity is utterly ludicrous.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2394531-marine-corps-force-integration-plan-summary.html
In 1867 a Viking Age grave containing a single skeleton with oval brooches (characteristic of a woman’s grave) and a “sword like item” was discovered in Santon Downham, Norfolk, England.
(source “Women in the Viking Age”) An excavation at Gerdrup in Denmark found a skeleton buried with a needlecase (characteristic of a woman’s grave) and a spear. (source “Women in the Viking Age” – Judith Jesch) Axes and arrowheads were found in women’s graves at Kaupang. (source “Women in the Viking Age” – Judith Jesch
Also<
Invasion of the Viking women: Wives joined warriors when they came to Britain
Almost half of all bodies in burial grounds researchers examined were those of women
Some were carrying swords and shields
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2017251/Family-affair-Viking-warriors-joined-wives-invaded-Britain.html
I do believe in shieldmaidens. This word is difficult to spell. There is enough evidence to convince me of their historical significance. Go battling women!
As I am just starting to study vikings. I don’t know much.
But Scottish women. Where taught to defend the home as the last line of defense. Was she strong enough to take an a full grown man no. But she was taught to not just give up.
Could the viking women have been the same way? Possible.
I think it is very likely there were women warriors among the Vikings. If you look at Rome for example there are examples of female gladiators who fought in the area. Even some high ranking noble women were known to have taken up the profession. If what we would consider a normally peaceful state such as Rome to have bred women whom desired battle, i don’t think that we should have any problem allowing women from the Viking culture as having the desire to fight. Also if you look at the spiritual side of things, how else would a woman be able to reach Valhalla?
There is no evidence women fought in ANY viking raids or battles (outside of instances where everyone had to fight because of being over run).
We have got to get past what Christian’s thought. Rome conquered a nation & made a new religion. There are plenty of women religions in the past. Women are different just like men are different. Some of us have earth running through us and some have fire. To think a woman with a bow can’t take down an enemy, is as ridiculous as saying that just men were made for fighting.
I have read the article above and all the comments on the matter. Why would it be so hard to believe there were shield maidens? History has many documented “female” warriors that took up arms when they had to fight. Bodica(sp) comes to my mind first. Just using her as my example. Her husband killed, she and her daughters raped and disgraced. She took the power and led an army. A successful army I might add. She had a brilliant mind for strategy and defeated the Romans in several battles before she was defeated. Doesn’t anyone think that other women throughout time have taken up arms? Comments said that women were found with needle case and a spear. Makes sense to me. As far as toughness, I was pretty tough but our lives were nothing like theirs. They were physically strong just from the work they did to survive. They had to be mentally strong just to survive in those times. The common woman was not coddled, they worked, they bore children, they did what they had to in order to protect their homes. So picking up arms to me, would seem a fairly normal part of life. Who protected them when the men were away on raiding parties when they would be most vulnerable to attacks from clans wanting to take over their group? Those are just some of my thoughts. I may not be as learned as some of you on here, but using common sense and thinking “if I were a woman in that time era what would I do to survive, protect my children and my clan”? I can tell you. I would fight.
Joan of Arc? Silly boys, oh wait it was robed priests that defeated her.
There is evidence of women fighting in wars throughout history – many times disguised as men because they wouldn’t otherwise be accepted. Women fought in America’s Civil War in the 1800s on both sides. Some fought as warriors, and others fought with their brains and others skills. Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy by Karen Abbott is a well researched book on this. So if Civil War-era has proof of female fighters, why not further back?
We can say with certainty that the concept of women warriors was part of Nordic culture and that there were women who made that concept a reality and were more or less accepted socially. It may be mistake however to see this as a permanent life choice. Shield maidens may have given up arms when they stopped being ‘maidens’. It could have been mainly a choice made by adventurous young girls who eventually settled down to a more conventional life.
I’ve been reading “Sigurd of the Volsungs” to my daughter these past few days, and we are just through Sigurd’s encounter with a figure in armor who turns out to be a shieldmaiden. (How does one describe this job description to an eight-year-old?)
After riding through the flames and discovering Brynhild, young Sigurd stays with her for a considerable time. Brynhild teaches him the wisdom of runes—thought runes and speech runes and healing runes—and many of the other useful things that proper shieldmaidens should know, until, basically, the two fall in love. Sigurd could be no hero if he would not respect her commitment, but Brynhild doesn’t cleary reject Sigurd’s love: she merely postpones their fulfillment as a couple. The clear implication of the passages I have read to my daughter so far is that Brynhild knows she can’t stay a shieldmaiden forever: when her warlike skills aren’t useful and urgently needed anymore, there is the hope for a life after shieldmaidenhood.
Sigurd could be no hero if he would not respect her commitment, but Brynhild doesn’t cleary reject Sigurd’s love forever: she merely postpones their fulfillment as a couple. The clear implication of the passages I have read to my daughter so far is that Brynhild knows she can’t stay a shieldmaiden forever: when her warlike skills aren’t urgently needed anymore, there is the hope for a life after shieldmaidenhood. Sigurd gives Brynhild a gold ring and swears to stay single for her until the day comes when they can reunite.
We all know what happens instead: Queen Grimhild slips Sigurd a philter or love potion that makes the tragic ending inevitable. (A little bit like in “Tristram and Iseult” in the last story I read my girl.)
I won’t spoil the story for you, but the storyline of “Sigurd” seems to require a generally expected skill set for shieldmaidens, and a generally expected career path for shieldmaidens that does not necessarily require a lifetime commitment on the shieldmaiden’s part, and most importantly, a generally expected ethos and set of character traits for shieldmaidens that make the tragedy of “Sigurd” all the more poignant when it is finally played out (in the final chapter: “Together in Death.”)
I had forgotten just how violent these old stories can be…
(White, Anne Terry. The Golden Treasury of Myths and Legends. NY, Golden Press, © 1959)
This is a reply to Lwyd’s post and all the other nay-sayers, as I couldn’t find a reply button. I must say I disagree strongly on your arguments. They could pick up a weapon for themselves, for gods sake! I’m a 14-year old girl myself, and we had this kind of competition (all physical) where the girls won 7 to 3 in things like running, arm wrestling, smashing each other to the ground (boy, that was fun) kicking a ball, endurance… things like that. When fourteen year old girls absolutely destroy boys at the same age, I don’t see how the average woman can have the upper body strength of an average teenage boy. Just to clarify, we have eight boys who do soccer, two who does hockey, five football players, and a gymnast with 3rd place country wide in his age group.
Of our girls we have me, the only Soccer-girl in my class, three kickboxers, one gymnast (not as good as the guys’ one, but still), and six handball players.
When the men went raiding, who defended their elders and children? Certainly, like today women can learn to to protect and survive, if anyone raided their homes and land. Who better to teach them from a young age then a Viking Warrior? Why is that so difficult to believe as it is highly likely they made sure they could protect the home front. Maybe many women excelled at it and wanted to go on a raid. Again, believable and probably true!
The saying is , hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. It should also take into account those whose children are liable to be killed or enslaved, or whose home and safety is about to be taken from her. Your comments that men are stronger is true if you take the average man and the average woman. But individuals differ from the norm, and a strong woman with knife sword spear or bow would be as scary to the unarmed as any man would be. So my view is, in turbulent times, lots of women would know how to use weapons, and would when attacked. And some would like the feeling of power, and take the battle back to the (perceived) enemy. Not in the same sort of numbers as men, and mostly not as single warrior standing alone.
Knowing which end of sword to hold and being able to give a reasonable account of oneself in fight is not the same thing as being a professional warrior. Not at all. Women had good reason to want to learn the basics of self defense and their men had good reasons for teaching them but a woman choosing to go a-viking is in a whole different class. The Shieldmaiden class. There are certainly literary accounts of such women and it’s reasonable to assume that there were a few real life examples but it wasn’t a common career choice by any means.