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.