Tomyris

thumb|Tomyris and the Head of Cyrus, [[Frankenthal porcelain, c. 1773]]

thumb|Queen Tomyris learns that her son [[Spargapises has been taken alive by Cyrus, by Jan Moy (1535–1550).]]

upright=1.3|thumb|Tomyris Plunges the Head of the Dead Cyrus Into a Vessel of Blood by [[Rubens]]

Tomyris (; Saka: ; ;

History

Background

Tomyris was the widow of the king of the Massagetae, whom she succeeded as the queen of the tribe after he died.

War with Persia

When the founder of the Persian Achaemenid Empire, Cyrus, asked for the hand of Tomyris with the intent of acquiring her kingdom through the marriage, she understood Cyrus's aims and rejected his proposal. On the advice of the Lydian Croesus, Cyrus responded to Tomyris's rejection by deciding to invade the Massagetae.

Aftermath

According to another version of the death of Cyrus recorded by Ctesias, Cyrus died in battle against the Derbices, who were either identical with the Massagetae or a Massagetaean sub-tribe: according to this version, he was mortally wounded by the Derbices and their Indian allies, after which Cyrus's ally, the king Amorges of the Amyrgians, intervened with his own army and helped the Persian soldiers defeat the Derbices, following which Cyrus endured for three days, during which he organised his empire and appointed Spitaces son of Sisamas as satrap over the Derbices, before finally dying.

Little is further known about Tomyris after the war with Cyrus. By around 520 BC and possibly earlier, her tribe was ruled by a king named Skuⁿxa, who rebelled against the Persian Empire until one of the successors of Cyrus, the Achaemenid king Darius I, carried out a campaign against the Sakas from 520 to 518 BC during which he conquered the Massagetae, captured Skuⁿxa, and replaced him with a ruler who was loyal to Achaemenid power.

Legacy

thumb|Mattia Preti, Tomyris Receiving the Head of Cyrus, 1670–72

thumb|Queen Tomyris and the head of Cyrus, by [[Mattia Preti.]]

The history of Tomyris has been incorporated into the tradition of Western art; Rubens,

Shakespeare's reference to Tomyris as 'Queen of the Scythians', rather than the usual Greek designation 'Queen of the Massagetae', points to two possible likely sources, Marcus Junianus Justinus' "Abridged Trogus Pompeius" in Latin, or Arthur Golding's translation (1564).

In 1707 the opera Thomyris, Queen of Scythia was first staged in London.

The name "Tomyris" also has been adopted into zoological taxonomy, for the Tomyris species group of Central American moths and the Tamyris genus of skipper butterflies.

590 Tomyris is the name given to one of the minor planets.

Kazakhstan has adopted Tomyris as its national heroine and issues coins in her honour.

In popular culture

Toʻmarisning Koʻzlari (The Eyes of Tomyris) is a 1984 book of poems and stories by Uzbek author Khurshid Davron.
Toʻmarisning Aytgani (The Sayings of Tomyris) is a 1996 book of poetry by Uzbek poet Halima Xudoyberdiyeva.
The Kazakhstani film studio "Kazakhfilm" released the film Томирис (Tomyris) in late 2019. She is portrayed by Almira Tursyn.
Tomyris leads the Scythian civilization in the 2016 4X video game Civilization VI developed by Firaxis Games.
Washington D.C.–based, female-fronted, heavy metal band A Sound of Thunder, features a song titled "Tomyris," based on the historical figure, on their sixth full-length album It Was Metal released in 2018.

Footnotes

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