each mother might give over to the father whatever male
child she had borne, but should herself keep and train for
warfare whatever children of the female sex were born.
Or else, as some maintain, they exposed the males, destroying
the life of the ill-fated child with a hate like
that of a stepmother. Among them childbearing was
detested, though everywhere else it is desired. The terror 57
of their cruelty was increased by common rumor; for
what hope, pray, would there be for a captive, when it
was considered wrong to spare even a son? Hercules,
they say, fought against them and overcame Menalippe,
yet more by guile than by valor. Theseus, moreover, took
Hippolyte captive, and of her he begat Hippolytus. And
in later times the Amazons had a queen named Penthesilea,
famed in the tales of the Trojan war. These women
are said to have kept their power even to the time of
Aleander the Great.

[Sidenote: REIGN OF TELEFUS AND EURYPYLUS]

IX But say not "Why does a story which deals with 58
the men of the Goths have so much to say of their women?"
Hear, then, the tale of the famous and glorious
valor of the men. Now Dio, the historian and diligent
investigator of ancient times, who gave to his work the
title "Getica" (and the Getae we have proved in a previous
passage to be Goths, on the testimony of Orosius
Paulus)--this Dio, I say, makes mention of a later king
of theirs named Telefus. Let no one say that this name
is quite foreign to the Gothic tongue, and let no one who