Finally finished the other rayon boucle scarf this afternoon. I didn’t have the fiesta shoulder scarf pattern I was basing it on so I sort of made it up - casting on about 75 stitches and increasing on both sides every other row. I was also knowingly working with about half the yarn the pattern called for. But I wanted to make two scarves from that skein so it’s a fairly small shoulder scarf - but it makes a nice head scarf too.

Rayon Boucle Tequila Sunrise shoulder (left) and blouse (right) scarves

My sister’s birthday was on the 18th so I’ve been working on a bias stole for her. It’s going to take me a while but isn’t that La Boheme yarn beautiful?

La Boheme Adirondack biased stole (in progress)

There are more images in the photo journal for which I’ve set up some syndication feeds in case anyone wants to know when I’ve uploaded photos because I don’t always post about them in the main weblog.

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Wu Chao (as she was originally named) was born into a rich and noble Chinese family in 625. She was taught to play music, write, and read the Chinese classics. The Tang dynasty (618-906 AD) was a time of relative freedom for women. They did not bind their feet nor lead submissive lives. It was a time in which a number of exceptional women contributed in the areas of culture and politics. By thirteen years of age Wu was known for her wit, intelligence, and beauty, and was recruited to the court of Emperor Tai Tsung. She soon became his favorite concubine. But she also had eyes for his son, Kao Tsung.

When the emperor died and Kao Tsung took over, Wu was now twenty seven years old. In time she became a favorite concubine of the new emperor, giving birth to the sons he wanted. As mother of the future emperor of China, she grew in power. She managed to eliminate Kao Tsung’s wife, Empress Wang, by accusing her of killing Wu’s newborn daughter. Kao Tsung believed Wu, and replaced Empress Wang to marry the up and coming Wu Zetian.

Within five years of their marriage, Emperor Kao Tsung suffered a crippling stroke. The Empress Wu took over the administrative duties of the court, a position equal to the emperor. She created a secret police force to spy on her opposition, and cruelly jailed or killed anyone who stood in her way, including the unfortunate Empress Wang. With the death of Emperor Kao Tsung, Wu managed to outflank her eldest sons and moved her youngest, and much weaker son, into power. She in effect ruled, telling him what to do.

In order to challenge Confucian beliefs against rule by women, Wu began a campaign to elevate the position of women. She had scholars write biographies of famous women, and raised the position of her mother’s clan by giving her relatives high political posts. She moved her court away from the seat of traditional male power and tried to establish a new dynasty. She said that the ideal ruler was one who ruled like a mother does over her children.

In 690, Wu’s youngest son removed himself from office, and Wu Zetian was declared emperor of China. In spite of her ruthless climb to power, her rule proved to be benign. She found the best people she could to run the government, and treated those she trusted fairly. She reduced the army’s size and stopped the influence of aristocratic military men on government by replacing them with scholars. Everyone had to compete for government positions by taking exams, thus setting the practice of government run by scholars. Wu also was fair to peasants, lowering oppressive taxes, raising agricultural production, and strengthening public works.

During her reign, Empress Wu placed Buddhism over Daoism as the favored state religion. She invited the most gifted scholars to China and built Buddhist temples and cave sculptures. Chinese Buddhism achieved its highest development under the reign of Wu Zetian.

As she grew older, Empress Wu lessened the power of her secret police. But she become increasingly superstitious and fearful. Sorcerers and corrupt court favorites flattered her. Finally, in 705, she was pressured to give up the throne in favor of her third son, who was waiting all these years in the wings. Wu Zetian died peacefully at age eighty the same year.

To some she was an autocrat, ruthless in her desire to gain and keep power. To others she, as a woman doing a “man’s job,” merely did what she had to do, and acted no differently than most male emperors of her day. They also note that she managed to effectively rule China during one of its more peaceful and culturally diverse periods.

Amina was born around 1533 in a province of Nigeria now known as Zaria during the reign of Sarkin (king) Zazzau Nohir. She was probably his granddaughter. Zazzua was one of a number of Hausa city-states which dominated the trans-Saharan trade after the collapse of the Songhai empire to the west. Its wealth was due to trade of mainly leather goods, cloth, kola, salt, horses and imported metals.

At the age of sixteen, Amina became the heir apparent (Magajiya) to her mother, Bakwa of Turunku, the ruling queen of Zazzua. With the title came the responsibility for a ward in the city and daily councils with other officials. Although her mother’s reign was known for peace and prosperity, Amina also chose to learn military skills from the warriors.

Queen Bakwa died around 1566 and the reign of Zazzua passed to her younger brother Karama. At this time Amina emerged as the leading warrior of Zazzua cavalry. Her military achievements brought her great wealth and power. When Karama died after a ten-year rule, Amina became queen of Zazzua.

She set off on her first military expedition three months after coming to power and continued fighting until her death. In her thirty-four year reign, she expanded the domain of Zazzua to its largest size ever, as far as Bauchi in the east, extending as far south as the Niger River and as far north as the Katsina River. Her main focus, however, was not on annexation of neighboring lands, but on forcing local rulers to accept vassal status and permit Hausa traders safe passage, enriching Zaria’s economy with gold, slaves (yep), and new crops as the center of the North-South Saharan trade and the East-West Sudan trade

She never married or had children but, according to some accounts, wherever she went and conquered, she took a temporary husband but had him killed the following morning so that he did not live to tell of his experiences with the queen.

She is credited with popularizing the earthen city wall fortifications, which became characteristic of Hausa city-states since then. She ordered building of a defensive wall around each military camp that she established. Later, towns grew within these protective walls, many of which are still in existence. They’re known as “ganuwar Amina”, or Amina’s walls.

She is mostly remembered as Amina, Yar Bakwa ta san rana, meaning “Amina, daughter of Nikatau, a woman as capable as a man.”

Another female-led rebellion against an occupying army from the same period of time. Great follow-up to Boudicca!

The Trung sisters, Trung Trac and Trung Nhi, were born around 20 AD to a powerful lord in Chinese-occupied Vietnam, as it had been since 111 BCE. Vietnamese people did not actively oppose the Chinese rule until the year 39 AD when they began to feel oppressed, however, the sisters had grown up watching the occupying army’s cruelties to their countrymen and spent their childhoods mastering the art of warfare and weaponry. They lived in a time when Vietnamese women enjoyed freedoms forbidden them in later centuries. Such as the ability to inherit property through their mothers’ lineages and become political leaders, judges, traders, and warriors; while in China women had already lost their privileges due to the popular teachings of Confucius requiring women’s subservience.

The older sister, Trung Trac, was married to Thi Sach, another powerful lord. Chinese records note that Trac had a “brave and fearless disposition.” In 40 AD, to frighten the Vietnamese and bring them to submission, a Chinese commander killed Thi Sach and raped Trung Trac. In retaliation, the Trung sisters organized civil war. With the support of nearby tribal lords, they formed an army of 80,000. Thirty six of the generals were women, including their mother. According to legend, the Trung sisters committed acts of bravery, such as killing a fearful people-eating tiger - and used the tiger’s skin as paper to write a proclamation urging the people to follow them against the Chinese, to garner confidence in their abilities. Within months the sisters had retaken 65 cities. They won back the territory extending from Hue into southern China and they were proclaimed co-queens.

After their victory they established royal court in Me-linh, an ancient political center in the Hong River plain and abolished the hated tribute taxes which had been imposed by the Chinese. They also attempted to restore a simpler form of government more in line with traditional Vietnamese values.

For the next three years the Trung sisters engaged in constant battles with the Chinese government in Vietnam. Out armed, their troops were badly defeated in 43 A.D. Rather than accept defeat, both Trung sisters committed suicide. Some stories say they drowned themselves in a river; others claim they disappeared into the clouds. One close comrade of the Trung sisters, a woman named Phung Thi Chinh, led one of the armies of resistance. She apparently fulfilled her mission despite being pregnant at the time. She delivered her baby at the front, hoisted the baby onto her back and continued fighting. When informed of the sisters’ suicide, she either slit her own throat and that of her baby or jumped into the river with the baby in her arms rather than face defeat and cruel governmental rule.

The Trung sisters became symbols of the first Vietnamese resistance to the Chinese occupation of their land. Temples were later built in their honor and the people of Vietnam celebrate their memory every year with a national holiday: Hai-Ba-Trung Day which, coincidently, usually takes place in March.

Boudicca (also called Boadicea) was most likely to have been born into the Royal house of a powerful Celtic Iron age tribe around 30 AD. Through marriage she became queen of the Iceni, an indigenous Celtic tribe that inhabited Great Britain at the time of the Roman invasion in 43 A.D.

According to the Greek historian Dio Cassius (who wrote one of only two accounts of these battles), “She was huge of frame, terrifying of aspect, and with a harsh voice. A great mass of bright red hair fell to her knees: she wore a twisted torc, and a tunic of many colours, over which was a thick mantle, fastened by a brooch. Now she grasped a spear, to strike fear into all who watched her.”

Their territory covered a large part of East Anglia near what is today the modern town of Colchester, and the Iceni watched with concern as the emperor Claudius waged a campaign that threatened their independence. In an attempt to avoid any bloody conflict, Boudicca’s husband, King Prasutagus, bargained with Roman officials and agreed to submit to terms that would insure that his tribe and their culture remain untouched. The Romans were happy enough with the arrangement so long as they could collect taxes from the Iceni, but that didn’t change the fact that they had always held a dismal view of the Celts, viewing them as barbarians who treated their women as equals.

Life for Celtic women was one of comparative prestige and power. Women were allowed to own land, choose their own mates, and even divorce if they made the wrong choice. So when Prasutagus died he left his kingdom to Boudicca and their two daughters after bequeathing a full half of it to the new Roman Emperor, Nero. By including Nero in his will Prasutagus thought he was buying the future tranquility of his kingdom. But under Roman law royal inheritance could not be passed to daughters and co-ownership of a kingdom with a woman was downright ridiculous. Nero sent his men to take care of the situation, which meant the public flogging of Boudicca and the rape of her daughters.

While the Roman governor, Gaius Suetonius Paulinus, was leading a campaign against the druids on the island of Anglesey in north Wales, the Iceni rebelled, along with their neighbours the Trinovantes, under Boudicca’s leadership. Their first target was Camulodunum (Colchester), the former Trinovantian capital, which had been settled with Roman veterans and where a temple to the former emperor Claudius had been erected at local expense. The city was poorly defended and the rebels destroyed it, beseiging the last defenders in the temple for two days before it fell.

Boudicca’s retaliation was merciless: she took no prisoners. Throats were cut, people hanged or crucified, and entire villages were burned to the ground. Her tactics included a particularly cruel assault upon Roman women: “their breasts were cut off and stuffed in their mouths, so that they seemed to be eating them, then their bodies were skewered lengthwise on sharp stakes.”

When news of the rebellion reached him, Suetonius hurried to Londinium (London), an important mercantile settlement, but concluded he did not have the numbers to defend it. “Let us show them that they are hares and foxes trying to rule over dogs and wolves!” cried Boudicca, addressing her troops as they stormed the town. Londinium was abandoned to the rebels, who burnt it down (archaeology shows extensive destruction by fire at this time), slaughtering anyone who had not evacuated with Suetonius. Verulamium (St Albans) was next to be destroyed.

Suetonius regrouped his troops and took a stand at an unidentified location, probably in the West Midlands somewhere along Watling Street, in a defile with a wood behind him. They were greatly outnumbered by the British rebels (who were 230,000 strong by now according to Dio Cassius) but superior Roman tactics and training won the day at the Battle of Watling Street. The Britons were prevented from fleeing by their own families, who they had stationed in a ring of wagons at the edge of the battlefield, and were slaughtered. (The German king Ariovistus is reported to have made the same mistake in Julius Caesar’s Gallic Wars.) Tacitus reports that “According to one report almost eighty thousand Britons fell” compared with only four hundred Romans. Boudicca, according to Tacitus, poisoned herself; Dio Cassius says she fell sick and died, and was given a lavish burial.

Before the inevitable fall of her army, Boudicca outlined her cause (in this account by the Roman historian, Tacitus):

The site of Boudicca’s defeat is unknown. According to London legend it was at Kings Cross in London (a nearby street is named Battle Bridge Road), and that Boudicca herself is buried under one of the platforms at Kings Cross Station (different sources list platforms eight, nine or ten as her supposed resting place) but this is unlikely. Manduessedum near the modern day town of Atherstone in Warwickshire has been suggested as the most likely place of burial.

A large bronze statue depicting Boudicca and her daughers driving a (Persian-style) chariot was commissioned by Prince Albert in 1850 and still stands next to Westminster Bridge and the Houses of Parliament.

I could’ve spent the whole month just profiling women artists in history but I’ve been really trying to cover almost all professions. Now I feel like I haven’t done nearly enough artists.

Maria Bashkirtseff was born in Gavrontsi, Pultowa, Russia, on the 11th of November, 1858, to a family of nobility. Her father was marshal of the nobility at Pultowa. When Marie was seven years old, her parents separated and she left Russia with her mother to spend the winters in Nice and Italy, and the summers in Germany. She had a significantly better education than most girls. Through private tutors she was able to read Plato and Virgil in Greek as well as read and write four other languages. A naturally gifted musician, she had hoped to be a singer, and studied in Italy but her voice was not strong enough to continue in a professional capacity.

When she lost her voice she devoted herself to painting, and in 1877 settled in Paris, where she studied at the Académie Julian in Paris where she was taught by Jules Lepage and Tony Robert-Fleurys. She traveled all over Europe and exhibited in several salons. She was considered a promising painter and sculptor, mainly of portraits, but she painted several works that really captured scenes of her observed life in Paris, most notably, In The Studio and The Meeting.

Her health had always been always delicate and with the chaos from her hard work and success it quickly weakened. She died of tuberculosis on October 31, 1884.

While her paintings are notable she’s most well known for the personal journals she kept from the age of thirteen. Her personal account of the struggles of women artists is documented, as well as descriptions of her interaction and correspondence with famous painters and notable personalities of the time. It was published shortly after her death and is still in print today.

Most of her artwork would end up in the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, many pieces would be destroyed during the Second World War.

Another Quiz Saturday.

You are Farmer Ted (from Sixteen Candles),
everyone’s favorite freshman geek! You’re the
life of the party, although perhaps not in the
way you intend. Still, somehow things turn out
for you in the end.

Which John Hughes Character Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

snagged this from House of Snark

You Are 15% Redneck

I’ll slap you so hard, your clothes will be outta style. You ain’t no redneck - you’re all Yankee!

Well, have to admit I do kind of make assumptions about people with Yankee accents sometimes :p

Since today is Purim I thought I’d profile the woman behind the holiday. She has her own book in the Old Testament - and it’s the only one where the word God doesn’t appear. It is also the only book of the Hebrew canon not represented among the Dead Sea Scrolls. There’s been some debate as to whether or not she really existed but that could be said about a lot of people in ancient history. In any case the story about Esther has had a huge amount of influence on the concept of womanhood in Judaism but not enough coverage elsewhere for my taste. I find that most of the common Bible stories vilify women (Eve, Bathsheba, etc.) and this story to be a rare exception to that rule.

Esther was born in roughly 500 BC with the name Hadassah but was later renamed when she became Queen of the Persian Empire after marrying Ahasuerus (historically referred to as Xerxes). Interestingly, she was called some form of Ishtar or Astarte, but in Hebrew and Aramaic it was pronounced Ester.

This was right after the Babylonian Exile of the Jews when a national identity was being forged, the first Synagogue was being built, and the transition from an oral to a written tradition was taking place. It was also right before the first attempt to eradicate the Jewish people as a race.

During a wild drunken banquet for various emissaries King Ahasuerus asked his wife, Vashi, to expose herself which she promptly refused to do, for which she was exiled, giving the King a convenient excuse to do a little wife-shopping. Orphaned at a young age, Esther was a notoriously beautiful but extremely modest woman who had been raised by her cousin Mordechai in Persia. At the time of Vashi’s exile, Esther had been residing in the “house of women” where she was picked for the year long purification process before being brought before the king for wifely considerations. The “keeper of women” wasn’t aware of Esther’s Jewish heritage.

The king selected Esther from the throng of beautiful virgins vying for the Mrs Persia spot. Since no one seemed to have noticed, Mordecai warned her not to reveal her Jewish heritage. Once after a visit with his niece he was lingering at the gates of the palace and overheard two guards planning to kill the king. He immediately told Esther who passed the word to the king.

Soon after the assassination scare, Assuerus appointed a man named Haman to be first minister. Mordecai was among the spectators at the palace during the celebratory procession but he refused to bow to the new minister. Haman was infuriated and plotted to kill not only Mordecai, but all the Jews in Persia.

Haman cast lots (purim) to decide in which month to murder the Jews, deciding to slay all Jews on the thirteenth day of the Hebrew month of Adar. He managed to convince the king that they were refusing to honor his laws and persuaded the king to pass an edict authorizing the wholesale massacre of the Jews and the confiscation of their property.

Mordecai promptly sent an urgent message to Esther asking her to intervene on their behalf. But She had been forbidden to approach the king uninvited, on pain of death. However, she made a brave decision that changes history. “I will go into the king … and if I perish, I perish.”

The king was pleased to see her so she quickly invited him and his minister to a banquet. At dinner she invited them for another meal the next day when she would make a request.

Emboldened by these favors, Haman had a gallows built to hang Mordecai. The morning after Esther’s first banquet, the king asked him how he should honor a loyal servant. Unknown to Haman, the king has spent a sleepless night going through records where he was reminded that Mordecai once saved his life, but was never rewarded. Thinking the king was planning to honor him, Haman suggested that the man be dressed in royal robes and paraded through the city, then was devastated when he is ordered to honor Mordecai in that fashion.

At Esther’s second dinner, she revealed her Jewish origin, accusing Haman of orchestrating her murder, and the murder of her people. “If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it please the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. For we are sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be slain, and to be annihilated.” The king left the banquet room to consider the situation, and Haman threw himself at the queen’s feet pleading her to have mercy on him. When the king returned, he thought that Haman was attacking his queen, and ordered his death immediately. Haman and his ten sons were hung from the gallows he had built for Mordecai.

On the exact day the original edict was appointed, the Jews were given permission to defend themselves and since many of them had been trained in the Persian army, were successful in defending themselves. Mordecai was appointed the king’s new minister. He declared the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the Hebrew month of Adar as days of rejoicing, as the feast of Purim. Esther was a beloved queen and has been regarded ever since as the savior of her people.

Haven’t participated in one of these random mp3 memes for a long time but I’m feeling somewhat posty today.

All this research for the women in history posts has taken a lot of my computer chair time. But I’m sort of on a day schedule at the moment. (And I’ve almost used up my Pirates attention span)

It’s a rainy day and we’ve already been to the grocery store (where we bought nominally healthy food) and on the way home I got a peppermint mocha coffee treat. Phunq has already had an escaping into the garage when we were bringing in groceries adventure, Zola’s sleeping on her belly with her head in a toilet paper tube as usual, and Winter is incredibly gassy…again. Melon and Kurry are pouting because we didn’t bring them anything.

Cody’s working tonight and unfortunately I won’t get to witness the hilarity of the rebellious cousin’s wedding down in Belen. I actually am bummed about missing out watching these small town republicans watch a handfasting with the groom in a kilt - at Belen High School (not in the grassy knoll I was hoping for). I’ve been trying to explain exactly what the SCA is (with mostly a straight face because while I think they’re kinda freaky I’d much rather go to one of their events than a monster truck rally or wrestling event) and that this guy really isn’t all that unusual but they all think I’m a big artsy freak that married their freaky smart-assed cousin (six years ago last Sunday actually, but we had a surprisingly traditional wedding - almost a rebellion in itself it was so unexpected) so my opinion only counts for so much. They were just scandalized that it’s taking place on good friday. DamndamnDAMN I wish I could go. Ah well. It’ll be so much more colorful to hear about it filtered through these nice but simple people’s eyes. I wonder if there’s going to be mead at the reception..

So here’s what I pulled up when I refreshed the itunes party shuffle sourcing my full library.

Right Here, Right Now - Fat Boy Slim
Seaweed - Fruit Bats
Love Me or Leave Me - Ruth Etting
Groove is in the Heart - Deelite
House on Fire - Assemblage 23
What Its Like - Everlast
Shut the Fuck Up - Cake
A Good Run of Bad Luck - Clint Black
Flesh for Fantasy - Billy Idol
Heart of the Sunrise - Yes
If I Loved You - Bernadette Peters