Hot History - The Admiral: Artemisia I

Episode Date: July 23, 2026

Here we are at the end of our Ancient Greek series and today we're ditching the dudes and talking about the Greek Queen dubbed 'more man than men'. I can't wait for you all to meet Artemisia of Caria, one of my favourite women in antiquity!As promised, ⁠the Hot History Substack⁠ is also now live! If you'd like to support us there, you'd be very welcome!Shout out to our incredible researcher Grace McCamish for helping to pull this together, and if you're wanting more Hot History you can follow along on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and of course, right here!Til next week, Ainslie x

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At Participate in McDonald's Restaurants in Canada, product availability varies by restaurant. Hello, my deans, I am coming to you before we dig into this last episode on the ancient Greek world to remind you that our substack has launched. You can go and subscribe there for free or for a paid subscription as part of the free offering every single Monday. I am going to drop into your inbox in the morning before you've even woken up before a single, bothersome work email has come, a newsletter on what happened this week in history. Okay, from Monday to Sunday, we are going to look at one specific event that happened on each day throughout the week.

So if you guys have got a Pilates class, right, or a whip or a dinner date that night, you can spare a thought for Marilyn, right, who got a big break on that day or Audrey Hepburn, who, you know, decided she wasn't going to be a ballerina. You guys can just get it straight into your email every single Monday morning if you subscribe. There is also then a fortnightly kind of think piece for our paid subscribers. plus you can access the pod and other kind of community notes and things there. So if you would like to head over and subscribe on Substack, I will leave a link at the show notes.

Otherwise, just head over to Substack and look up Hot History Club. Thanks, guys. Let's get into it. Hi guys and welcome back to Hot History, your corner of the internet, where we cover all the things in history that you probably should know but don't. I'm Manely Harvey, your Hot Historian, ready to chat today. We're going to keep it going, all right, with Ancient Greece. I said I was going to be doing it for all of July, but I'm tapping out a week early. This is going to be our last episode on ancient Greece.

Because, to be fair, I'm over it, guys. I've had enough. I've stayed in one place for too long. But unlike the last few weeks, we are ditching the men, okay? Odysseus, Agamemnon, Menelaus, goodbye. Instead, we are talking about possibly one of the most fascinating women in antiquity. All right, she is so incredible, so much so that she's described by the OG historian himself, Herodotus as Andrea, which literally translates to manliness for her bravery, strength and determination

over other men. Yep, obsessed. This is the story of Artemisia of Haliccanassus. She's a queen. She's a naval commander. She's an expert strategist and deceiver. And she is, like I said, incredible, so I cannot wait for you all to meet her. Let's get into it by rewinding it all the way back to 520 BCE to the city of Halakanassas, situated on the southwestern coast of Anatolia, which is now modern-day Bodrum in Turkey. FYI, if you're watching on video, and you haven't met him. This is governor, my little doggie. If not, then you guys have seen pitch soon before.

Anyway, let me tell you divas about Halakanasas. It is a beautiful city, okay? There's a port town, so you're right near the sea. There's a bustling city with trade and commerce. The weather is gorgeous. really is quite advanced for its age. So, like this gorgeous place to grow up in, right? Which is exactly what Artemisia, daughter of King, Lycdamus of Carrier and an unknown cretan mother did. Here, among the port and the palace, young Artemisia thrived, living a very different life than her aristocratic

counterparts throughout Greece, and really, if we're being honest, throughout history. She was incredibly well-educated, training in disciplines from administrative and diplomatic arts to medicine, and battle strategy. And amongst all of that, found time for fun. Hanging out along the merchant docks where she extensively spoke with sailors and traders alike, learning how to sail and crew a ship. So again, very different in this regard. She's like quite an active, like a free range outdoor girlie, you know, something which was really important. And it was kind of central to who she goes on to be because it shows her really early on the importance of trust, teamwork, and also the relationship between politics and commerce, as she engaged, like I said, with these traders and merchants,

which was really important because at this point, guys, Carrier, right? Like the kind of wider nation, isn't a bit of a precarious state geopolitically. You see, 20 years before Artemisia is born, so around 540 BCE, Carrier was conquered by Persian Empress Cyrus. the great, making the region a satrapy, aka province, of the wider Persian Empire, which basically means that Carriar and Artemisia as its heir had to submit to the Persians, while still fighting for increased independence and, you know, like, carrion cultural values. So it's really a sticky position, which became all the more precarious around 480 BCE, when one of the most ambitious military expeditions the ancient world had ever seen kick.

Dintagir. Led by Persian Emperor Xerxes the first, his new and improved Persian army was the largest force ever seen on the Greek peninsula to date, guys, absolutely huge, with ancient scholars estimating there were millions of Persian land army soldiers, although that is likely exaggerated with modern estimates saying it was around 200,000. But like either way, guys, a huge, huge force, and one which Artemisia soon had to contend with. For after her father, death in mid-48BCE, so like this same kind of time, she became Carrier's sole ruler, and most importantly, the one who had to deal with Xerxes. Prime presents perfect pairings.

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Concern about your gambling or that of someone close to you. Call 1866-531-2600 or visit conxonario.ca. Now, for those of my divasers who are well versed in your movie and history knowledge, you will know Xerxes as the guy who defeated King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans at the Battle of the Mopoli. If you don't, don't you sweat it. for a single moment, guys. Zero shame here, but I will say, a quick little tidbit, all right? If you are into, even remotely, sweaty, sexy men with swords and sandals, then you should go and put 300 into your search bar at your own risk. Okay, guys, lots of sexy,

sexy men with very defined abs and, like, little leather sandal things on. You could take me later. And to be fair, we will actually talk about 300 and its sequel, a bit here. But we will get back to Xerxes in the meantime, right? So as we said, he was an empire builder, right? And he wanted to control all of Greece, not just a few of the states. He wanted it all, the very heartland. And as such, he decided to wage full-blown war against the various city states, one of which was Sparta. Now, knowing that the Persians were about to attack, a council of Greek states was hell. And while the Peloponnesians, a regional people of Greece, generally wanted their army to fall back, Leonidas, King of Sparta, stood firm on his wish to remain as

Greece's primary defence, and as such took 7,000 troops, including 300 of his finest men, to meet the invading Persians of the Greek coast at the Mopoli. Okay, so we have Xerxes gearing up for a huge invasion, right? Most of the Greeks, not wanting to meet him head on, and the Spartans gearing up as the frontline defence. So where does our girl, Artemisia, slot in the world? to all of this. Well, even though Artemisia was culturally Greek and her priority above all else, of course, was Ticaria and her people, she was firmly on the Persian side, understanding above all

else, and remember I said she's so smart, right? Understanding above all else how very fragile the balance of power could be. So when Xerxes comes knocking at the doors of Haliccanus for troops to fight in this invasion, she answered, but not with infantrymen, but a navy. Yes, you see, as a port city, Halicinacus was full of skilled sailors and traders whose whole lives revolved around the sea. Something which Artemisia fostered even further for when she became the ruler,

she pushed for this kind of greater trade program that strengthened Helicanasus' position as the major maritime power at the time, alongside really becoming involved in the everyday lives of her people. She became a patron of the arts, she funded widespread education, and she basically turned Halakana Sess into Halakana, yes. Yes, I have been waiting for all episode to make that joke, Devis, you are welcome.

It's giving like that episode of Queer Eye. They all came to Australia and went to Yas. InSpo. Her true triumph, however, as we said, was in diplomacy. And so she offered up carrion ships and naval officers to the Persian efforts alongside herself. That's right. You see, there is one teeny tight little detail. that I've left out about our girl.

For all her diplomacy, intellect and commercial skills, Artemisia was, above all else, a fearsome warrior, with her name actually derived from the goddess Artemis, who we spoke to a little while ago, right, patron deity of hunters. So she is incredibly skilled in hand-to-hand combat and naval skills from an early age. So when the Persian war call sounded, she responded not only with her fleet,

but with herself as their leader, which I want to make very clear here, guys, while Caria, like, absolutely had to send troops, Artemisia as its queen did not have to lead then. This was really extraordinary for the time and definitely speaks to, like, the leader and the level of skill that this woman had. You know, she was never going to ask anybody to do anything that she herself would not. So, as I said, right, she's a proper badass here and someone who really earned the affection of her crew, co-commanders, and Herodotus, who wrote, quote,

I pass over all the other officers of the Persians because there is no need for me to mention them, except for Artemisia, because I find it particularly remarkable that a woman should have taken part in the expedition against Greece, which, you know, for the time was a fair statement. This wasn't common for kings, let alone queens. And so, the carrier navy set off to link up with the Persians for their big offensive against the Greeks, which is when we come back to Leonidas and his 300 on the Greek shoreline at the Mopoli. Now, as we already said, right, the whole point of this battle was that the Greeks tried to halt the Persian's progress at Themopoli, which they ultimately needed to get through in order

to access the rest of Greece, including Athens, okay, the very heartland of Greek culture and history. So like, this is a super duper, high stakes, important mission here. So how on earth are Leonidas and his 7,000 men going to face off against this huge Persian force here? Like, surely this is just, you know, at this point. a suicide mission, and you are not wrong. In many ways it was.

But the Mopoli was advantageous and peaked specifically for its geographically strategic position, as it had this really big mountainous wall, basically, which allowed the Greeks to form a line, which blocked the entry. So when Xerxes got to the pass of the Mopoli, he found it really difficult to pass, even sending in his immortals. a 10,000 man elite corps who were all butchered by the Spartans. Again, if you watch 300, you know what I'm talking about. The Spartans were deeply militaristic, like, incredible.

So this is insane, right? Like on any other day, this would have looked like a total disaster for the Greeks, but they defended themselves for two whole days using a tightly packed phalanx formation and huge bronze shields to both defend while also faking retreats and using their superior attack training to absolutely batter the huge Persian army while suffering barely any losses themselves. Again, this is 300 men versus an estimate of like 200,000. So this is insane. But they could not hold out forever, especially my divas when there is a snitch about of

course there is a nasty little dibedobber in the mix. Where isn't there, right? And his name was Afilates, a local Greek trader who told Xerxes about a path that went around Thermopylae, which basically rendered the Greeks' line useless and ultimately resulted in the deaths of Leonidas and his 300 last remaining Spartans, opening a pathway for Xerxes and the Persians to head right into southern Greece. Now, you may be thinking, well, okay, but kind of snooze, like we're not here for the men, right? We're here for our hottie naval commander, but do not worry, because she is cracking on with a fight at sea against several Greek vessels. And let me tell you, here she really shows just how smart she is.

So seeing the Greek ship's approach, she basically tells her men, like, put down your arrows, right? put down the flamethrowers, just hold on to whatever you can, because instead of going on the offence here, she just basically starts, like, ramming into several Greek vessels to make way for the larger Persian fleet behind her. So basically the equivalent of, like, a big old body slam, but, you know, obviously it's sea the ships. Now, as we said already, the battle against the Spartans was over in three days, after which the triumphant Persians at Artemisia traveled to Athens to reconvene. So the Persians are in Greece, right? The Spartans have been defeated. Artemisia has kind of shown her acumen and this is really a moment of great triumph.

But when Artemisia arrives at Athens, she comes face to face with the city of ancient thought and culture, but instead finds a burning heap of rubble. Raised by Xerxes' commander Mardonius, the Persians hunted down any remaining Athenians before setting fire to the Acropolis, Temple of Athena and the Parthenon. To Artemisia, who valued art, culture, and history, this was a great loss that significantly lowered her opinion of Mardonius, which kind of explains what happened next, guys, absolute ancient tea. Are we ready? So, having demonstrated such success and bravery in battle, Artemisia earned herself a seat in Xerxes' war council, again, very uncommon for any woman at the time,

which she ultimately used to her greatest advantage by showing Mardonius as the full he is, which, you know, of course, I'm a huge fan of, right? So what does she do? Well, it all started when Xerxes asked his commanders and generals what their next point of attack should be, after all. You know, they'd kind of steamed through southern Greece and had now reached Athens, so what's to do next? You know, where do we pillage now? Well, Mardonius, to the surprise of no one here, recommended a huge forward assault on the Greek Navy, crushing what remained of the Greek defence in one foul swoop. Several of the other men present agreed, however, Artemisia had a different point of view which Herodotus is

kind enough to recount for us, saying, quote, the unanimous view was that Xerxes should engage the enemy at sea, with only a singular dissenter, Artemisia, who stood up in defiance of all at the table and said, Master, it is only right that I should tell you what is, in my honest opinion, the best course of action for you. So here is my advice. Do not commit the fleet to battle. The Greeks do not have the resources to hold out against you for any length of time. You will scatter them and they will retreat to their various towns and cities.

The result after this was silence. With her defiance of their plans and the influence of her, a woman, speaking at all in such company, enraging the other generals, including, of course, Mardonius, who, expected Xerxes to give her a big old bloody nose for the offence. However, not a drop of the carrion queen's blood was spilled. In fact, Xerxes was delighted by this, guys. He loves it. And Herodotus tells us he had already, quote, rated her highly before, but she went up even further in his estimation after. So this is a big old middle finger to Mardonius and his barbarian friends. And if this were made into a period drama war epic kind of thing today, this would be the scene clipped up

and re-shared across TikTok a million times, guys, but, you know, it isn't. Although I did say we would talk about the sequel to 300, so it is 300 Rise of an Empire, and it does actually feature Artemisia very loosely. It was played by Eva Green. So again, if you guys are like into the sweaty hot men and women, then go ahead and watch that, although fair warning here, it's pretty gory. So if that's not for you, then you can just watch this pot on spot. You know, and you can see the pictures on the screen, like this. Hot. But anyway, back to Xerxes' war council, right?

So Artemisia's had her say. But what now? How will Xerxes proceed? Well, because he is a man and more than that, because he is an egotistical ancient emperor, restraint and patience was never an option here. So blood and battle it would be. With the fleet and army making their way to Salamis, where they would face off against the remaining Greek.

force in a head-on naval assault. Now, I want to be clear here about Artemisia, okay? Because despite her desire to besiege versus go to battle, she had no intention of taking a backseat role here, all right? She goes into this showing no sign of fear, no sign of weakness, and really prepared herself and her crew for the ongoing onslaught. But she did so in a particularly savvy way. Again, remember, she's a smart and brutal queen here.

So, unlike the men in her company, she fights with what's between her ears, not between her legs. So what's the strategy then? Well, Artemisia saw the value in, how should we say it, a certain brand, or kind of deception, maybe? You know, she's nifty. She's not lying. She's just recycling. For when she rammed those earlier Greek ships off the Mopoli, Artemisia again never one to let a good thing go to waste kind of spot some Greek flags floating around in the sea.

You know, she's going vintage. You know, let me hold on to them for safekeeping, which is important in what's about to happen next. So the Persians show up to Salamis to face off against the hilariously outnumbered and outgunned Greek navy. and everyone's like, you know, it's going to be easy. But guess what, divas? It was, in fact, not easy. For the Greeks, obviously aware of the terrain here like this is their home, drive the Persians into the notorious straits.

Now, it is impossibly narrow here, guys. It's dangerously shallow and all in all impossible to maneuver unless you're Jack Sparrow in that Fifth Pirates of the Caribbean movie with like Haviyarbaldem, you know, when he does a big turn thing, right? But none of these people are. So the straits trap the larger Persian vessels who go in full steam ahead with all this sorts of armor and supplies on board. So it's really heavy their ships are, while the lighter Greek ships are able to kind of, you know, hop, skip and bounce around to launch their assault against the Persians.

So the Persians fell for some easy, low-hanging rage bait here. But guess who is not falling for this? Of course, our gal, Artemisia, she's not going on unnecessary ocean voyages and instead holds her crew back from entering the strait completely, watching the onslaught before her from the mouth of the strait, which is when she pulls out, right? Her vintage, recycled Greek flag, which she rises up the mast, fooling the Greeks with an abracadabra for the ages. basically she's using this like friendly disguise to again go back to her OG tactic ramming right so she's not fighting she's just like coming at you and she's ramming these Greek ships which tried to come out of the strait inflicting maximum casualties on her enemies while her crew remained relatively unharmed so she's kind of like the cap on this bottle right she's like anyone trying to

come up i don't think so now this was super effective from afar but unfortunately the ruse not be maintained up close. And when it became apparent that the Greeks were closing in and defeat was all but certain for the Persians, she knew the only thing to do was cut and run. With Xerxes, watching the disaster unfold from the high shores above, Artemisia raised the Greek flag even higher, turned her ship towards the sea, and rammed her way free, sending both Greek and Persian ships splintering to their doom. It was a genius. albeit treacherous act that achieved three key things here. All right?

First, it allowed for her and the carrion crew to escape the doomed battles, so the Persian still had at least one seafaring vessel. Like, these guys were really fucked at this point. Second, it deceived the Greeks into thinking she was one of their own, which ensured she wasn't followed so she could kind of, you know, actually go out to sea. And third, it proved to Xerxes that she was made of both brawn and brains. himself saying, quote, my men have become women and my women men. If only he'd actually listen to that woman from the get-go, but he didn't.

And so the battle was lost, and Xerxes is now left in a rather precarious situation here, guys. You see, he is, typical man here, so confident of an easy victory in Greece that he'd bought his most precious treasures on earth along for the trip. his two sons. And now, here he was, staring down at the majority of his hamata, sinking and fizzing beneath the waves. And there was a real possibility at this point of his and his heirs' deaths. So in undoubtedly the greatest sign of respect and trust he tasked Artemisia with their protection back to Caria for safekeeping.

Not Mardonius or any other general who wanted to, you know, run head first into the straight, but Artemisia, making her the most trusted person in the Persian world. So, she sets off, right, having avoided the Greek onslaught and after several weeks at sea, with one of the most skilled crews in the Mediterranean, Artemisia, the boys and her men, all arrived safely back in Haliccanars, where they were showered with ceremony from the city's adoring citizens who genuinely did love their queen, guys. Like, she was a really great woman, like a true woman of the people. people here. But the real price, however, came from Xerxes, several months later, who

showered Artemisia with treasures, gold, and something no other satrapy of the Persian Empire achieved under Xerxes. Extensive independence, which would not have been possible without their queen's intense bravery and skill. So, she's a queen, right? She's an admiral. She's a war hero and a stateswoman of the ages. And now, back in Haliccanarsus, she's kind of, you know, free to do as she pleases. So what does she do then? Well, as far as history is concerned, she pretty much did nothing. Yeah, that's right, guys. There is almost no mention of the great commander after she returned home to Haliccanarsus, with the sources we do have varying so greatly that it's almost impossible to meet a middle ground, which, it's, it's almost impossible. It's

literally is just testament to the, you know, state of women's history here. Like, this woman is so incredible and we know barely anything about her. It's insane. So what do the sources say then? Well, some of the later Carrier sources believe that she died sometime around 460 BCE, while others say she died shortly after the war. But, to be honest, it doesn't really matter when it comes to looking at the historiography, because the one thing that everyone gets hot and heavy over here is her method of death.

Thanks to the poet Sappher. So who is this person? Well, she was actually a woman and an incredibly fascinating one at that, living around the 6th to 7th centuries BC, on the Greek island of Lesbos. Now, she definitely, guys, deserves her own deep dive one day, so I'll add her to my ever-growing list of subject matter, which, FYI, thank you guys so much for sending through suggestions and ideas.

It does really help me when putting these episodes together. But back to Zappo. So, amongst being one of the most famous Greek poets of all time, she is most well known in pop culture today because of her connection to the queer community. Writing her love poetry to women, the origins of the word lesbian, are derived from the Greek island of Lesbos, where she lived, and Sapphic itself referring to women were attracted to other women, obviously, you know, inspired by her name.

So she's a proper diva here, right? But the historical record has not been kind to her, with legend suggesting that Sappho killed herself by jumping off the Lacadian cliffs after a ferryman named Fayon didn't return her affection. Which, I gotta say, ding-ding on my BS radar big time, guys, seriously? You want me to believe that this queen, this queer queen, right? According to many historians and literary interpretations, everybody believes that she was queer, killed herself for some random boatman.

I don't think so, divas. This sounds to me like some good old-fashioned sexist historical bias, which is exactly what happens with Artemisia. Honestly, like, I can't even say it with a straight face. It's so ridiculous when I even think about it, but we're going to get through it, all right? A male Byzantine scholar named Vatius claims that after Artemisia,

the great naval commander in the Stateswoman, right? Returns to Carrier. She threw herself off a cliff to try to get the attention of a man. Yeah. That same woman. Seriously? You want me to actually believe that the woman who faced war and death killed herself over a man. A scene which, like almost detail for detail, is the exact same thing that happened to Sappho,

which, again, there is no historical evidence. in either of these cases, especially because Vataius, who was writing in the ninth century, is like hundreds of years after Artemis' year's dead. Right? No, guys, you see, this is yet another example of how male history writers viewed women at the time. If they weren't sinking ships or reforming nations, they were little more than hopeless romantics who killed themselves if rejected. Ugh, yuck, vomit. Like, it's just such a fucking joke. And honestly, it is so transparent and generally just such a deep misjustice, with the rejection of these two

feminist icons to pitiful, desperate women whose lives only had value in the context of a man, just absolutely being one incorrect and too diabolical. Right? So what actually happened? Well, like I said, there is no historical evidence of Artemisia's life after Xerxes retrieved his sons. For someone to be this influential have had such an impact in both Persian and Greek history to just disappear is insane. So I'm going to do something controversial, guys. I hope that you'll follow me on the journey, right? I'm just going to make it up. I mean, after all, if, you know, if Thais can do it, then why not us? I know it's very non-historically, like,

legitimate, but if he's doing it, so am I. Yeah? So after negotiating. ongoing independence for Carrier, which allowed it to flourish, Artemisia focused on raising her son, Pisan Delas, who succeeded her as ruler. Again, facty. This freed up the Queen's plate, and so she retired, spending her days advising, learning and doing basically whatever the hell she wanted. We know she was an admirer of art and culture, again, fact. So, perhaps she upped her patronage, or even experimented herself.

But she lived her final years in the city she loved, fact. Then, around 460 BCE, she died. No pomp. No ceremony, no Greek enemies, no man, she just died. Passing into time and legend as the hero of Halicanasus, something which would inspire her grandson, who took Artemisia's love of history and culture and erected the famed mausoleum of Halakanasus.

Yeah, that's right, my devas, if you've been thinking this whole episode, Halakanasas, where have I heard that before? Well, there is a chance that you've heard of the seven ancient wonders of which the mausoleum at Haliccanarsus erected by Artemisia's grandson in reference to the warrior queen is one. Again, guys, all truth here. My version is stacking up, right? You can even see Ayakamina bars that King Xerxes gifted to Artemisia in the British Museum today after it was uncovered from Halakanasus. So, you know, I'm liking my version. It feels like more historically accurate than photography.

highest. Like, we're both just making shit up at this point, except mine is awesome and his is fucked. But before we wrap this all up around Artemisia, right, I do want to spend a minute on the mausoleum because I love me in ancient wonder. And to be honest, this is going to be a really short episode because we don't have that much to talk about when it comes to Artemisia, because we don't know anything. So, let's spend a minute here before we part for another week. So, as we said, this was constructed by Artemisia's grandson, Mosulis in the 4th century BCE and he didn't skimp guys, spending eye-watering amounts of money on the expansion of the new capital city at Halakanassas, which included everything from defensive

walls to theatres and temples, plus his own great tomb, which his own wife, Artemisia the second, took over construction of when Mozalus died, bringing in some of the most talented great artists to help bring the vision to life. But time was the enemy here, and the tomb was unfinished when Artemisia herself died only two years later. But don't worry, it was eventually finished. And my word, what a sight. Now, the best description of the mausoleum we have around the period of Haliccanarces' height comes from Pliny the Elder, dating to the first century AD, and according to him, the mausoleum had a high rectangular base on which there was an inner courtyard surrounded by a colonnade, formed by 36 columns and supporting a 24-step pyramid,

which modern historians today estimate to be about 43 meters high. At the top of this pyramid set a sculpture of a four-horse chariot, which was driven by Mazzulus and Artemisia, which was again, like, stunningly decorated, right? There was sculptures, there's bar of reliefs, though most of these have not survived, but we kind of know from these earlier accounts what it looked like at its heyday. So why is this then an ancient wonder? Well, aside from the fact it's, of course, beautiful and technologically advanced, it really does come down to what the mausoleum survived.

Having stuck around through both Alexander the Great in 334 BC and the pirate attacks of 62 and 58 BCE, the mausoleum then became a tourist attraction in the later part of the second century AD and was still spick and span come the 11th century, according to the commentary of Eustardius of Thessalonica. But sometime in the 15th century it fell into obscurity, with historians believing based on accounts and the actual archaeology, that it slowly fell to decay rather than being kind of slashed apart by bandits or destroyed in an earthquake or something, which means it had. Remains! We love this, right? A bit of archaeological site to actually go and get some proper info in, if only there was something like this for Artemisia. We love it, but there's another group of people who also love it, and that is the British. Yeah, so much so.

They took the major surviving bits out of Turkey and placed them in the British Museum where they remain today, which then obviously led to a big drama, one of which was back in 2012 where the Turkish were trying to appeal to international human rights laws to get the kind of remains of the Mosulaheim back.

But guess where they still are? Yeah, room 21 of the British Museum, as does Artemisier's vase I spoke about before. Which does, guys, bring us to the end of another episode of hot history, I kind of feel like this is a bit of a true crime one where it's like solved or unsolved. I wish I could give you like a definitive answer about what happened to Artemisia, but we do not know. I am glad that I was kind of able to introduce you to her and I hope I've been able to, you know, give this woman who was more

man than men, you know, back into the historical record as a warrior and a queen and a mother and a state's woman, someone more than a kind of sad, damns. who threw herself over a cliff because of a man like fucking snooze. No. No, no, no. I do hope I've given you enough this July to kind of wet the whistle in the ancient Greek world, but I am keen to move on. I'm tired of this, grandpa.

That's literally how I felt putting these back-to-back episodes together. Next week, we are coming well forward. We are going back to the world of the Romanova's because we are talking about the Faberge X. As always, guys, if you are looking for some more history, before then you can follow us on Instagram at Hot History Club and on TikTok at hot. Dot history plus our substack, guys, Hot History there. It has been a pleasure getting down and dirty in time with you as always and I will speak to you all shortly.

Thanks guys. Love you. Bye.