Artemisia of Halicarnassus: Herodotus' Excellent Counsel

Numerous ancient sources attest that Artemisia of Halicarnassus, a 5th C. BCE tyrant whose polis came under Persian rule in 524 BCE, figures prominently in Xerxes’ naval campaign against Greece. At least since Pompeius Trogus’ 1st C. BCE Philippic History, interpretations of Artemisia have juxtaposed her “virile courage” (uirilem audaciam) with Xerxes’ “womanish fear” (muliebrem timorem) primarily as a means of belittling the effeminate non-Greeks. My paper argues that although Herodotus is aware of such interpretations of Artemisia, he depicts her primarily as an excellent counsel, a woman who is not only brave in battle, but who is a wonder primarily because of her intellectual excellences in deliberative rhetoric and “geo-political” strategy in the Greco-Persian world