A Woman's Place?

"Now I see that some of you fear to go forward to fight for our king. If it were in the brave days of Osei Tutu, Okomfo Anokye, and Opoku Ware, chiefs would not sit down to see their king to be taken away without firing a shot. No European could have dared speak to chiefs of Asante in the way the governor spoke to you this morning. Is it true that the bravery of Asante is no more? I cannot believe it. It cannot be! I must say this: if you, the men of Asante, will not go forward, then we will. We, the women, will. I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight till the last of us falls in the battlefields." (Yaa Asantewaa, Queen Mother of the Ashanti)

"A woman's place is in the revolution."

"It is not as a woman descended from noble ancestry,

but as one of the people that I am avenging lost freedom,

my scourged body, the outraged chastity of my

daughters. Roman lust has gone so far that not our very

persons, nor even age or virginity, are left unpolluted.

But heaven is on the side of a righteous vengeance.

A legion which dared to fight has perished; the rest are

hiding themselves in their camp, or are thinking anxiously

of flight. ey will not sustain even the din and

the shout of so many thousands, much less our charge

and our blows.

If you weigh well the strength of the armies, and

the causes of the war, you will see that in this battle you

must conquer or die. is is a woman’s resolve; as for

men, they may live and be slaves." (Boudica, Queen of the Icemi tribe of Britions)