The Voiage and Travayle of Sir John Maundeville Knight / Which treateth of the way towards Hierusalem and of marvayles of Inde with other ilands and countreys

by Sir John Mandeville

This lande marcheth to the lande of Caldee that is a great land, & there is full faire folke & well apparaited & they go richly araied with cloth of gold & with perls & other precious stones. But the women are righte foule & evill clad & go bare fote & bare an ill cote, large, wide, & short, unto theyr knees, & haue long sleves down to the fote, & they haue great black here long hanging about theyr shoulders & they are right foule for to loke upon that I dare not tell it all bicause that I am worthy for to haue a great reward for my praising of them. In this land of Caldee aforesayde is a citie that men call Hur & in y^t citie was Abraham y^e patriark born.

[1:] Susiana.

[2:] Want of anything.

CAP. L.

Of the Kingedome of Amazony whereas dwelleth none but women.

AFTER the lande of Caldee is the lande of Amazony that is a land where there is no man but all women as men say, for they wil suffer no men to lyve among them nor to haue lordeshippe over them. For sometyme was a kinge in that lande and men were dwelling there as did in other countreys, and had wives, & it befell that the kynge had great warre with them of Sychy, he was called Colopius and hee was slaine in bataill and all the good bloude of his lande. And this queene when she herd that, & other ladies of that land, that the king and the lordes were slaine, they gathered them togither and killed all the men that were lefte in their lande among them, and sithen that time dwelled no man among them.

And when they will have any man they sende for them in a countrey that is nere theyr lande, and the men come and are ther viii dayes or as the woman lyketh, & then go they againe, and if they have men children they send them to theyr fathers when they can eate & go, and if they have maide chyldren they kepe them, and if they bee of gentill bloud they brene[¹] the left pappe[²] away for bearing of a shelde, and if they be of little bloud they brene the ryght pappe away for shoting. For those women of that countrey are good warriours and are often in soudy[³] with other lordes, and the queene of that lande governeth well that lande, this lande is all environed with water. Beside Amazony is the lande of Termagute that is a good lande, King Alexander did make a citie ther that men call Alexandry.

[1:] Burn.

[2:] Breast.

[3:] War.