Who are the Dahomey Amazons and why are they so famous?

Their training included jumping off walls covered with thorny acacia branches, and living without supplies in the forest for 10 days. They were only allowed to carry machetes with them. The bravest were rewarded with a belt made of acacia thorns and proudly carried it.

Some enlisted voluntarily, while others were accused of not being good wives because they did not submit to the pressures of their husbands, and were drafted into the army by their husbands themselves.

These warriors were armed with muskets and machetes in the 19th century. At the age of eight, she was drafted into the army and given weapons.

They did not leave the battlefield unless ordered to retreat by their king. They don't even accept defeat, they are often the last ones left on the battlefield.

They are the warriors who made the European colonists come to Sub-Saharan Africa tremble. They called themselves N'Nonmiton, though foreign observers called them the Amazons of Dahomey.

The N'Nonmiton women were not allowed to marry and have children during their tenure. For this, they also took an oath of virginity to the king. Even the king wouldn't dare to break their oath, especially if you weren't king it would mean your death.

In their language, this meant "our mothers". Fighting on the bloodiest fronts for their kings, these women eventually became an elite fighting force in the Kingdom of Dahomey (modern-day Republic of Benin).

The Black Panther movie, which is about the women of Dahomey, made in 2018, also featured an army of women.

The last surviving Dahomey Amazon died in 1979 at the age of 100. At their most effective, they comprised a third of the Dahomey army. This amounted to 6,000. It is also said that they are more effective and brave warriors than male soldiers.

These Amazons, who were chosen among the healthiest, strongest, and bravest women in their tribe, turned into killing machines that terrorized all of Africa over time.

A French delegation visiting Dahomey witnessed the training of a 16-year-old Amazon in 1880. Records say she completely ripped the head off the torso in three hits. Then she drank the blood from her sword. At that time, it was considered customary for warriors to return home by cutting off the head or genitals of their killed enemies.

In his 1891 memoir, Three Months a Slave at Dahomey, E Chaudoin spoke of them as follows: "Here are the 4,000 black maidens of Dahomey, the king's bodyguards, motionless in battle clothes, ready to leap forward at the behest of their masters. Whether they are young or old, beautiful or ugly, they are really nice to look at. They're as built and disciplined as male warriors, standing in line as if on a string.”

In 2015, French street artist YZ decided to show their admiration for these fearless female warriors of the 19th century by launching a campaign. The artist, who is descended from these women and named her work Amazone, works in Senegal. The aim of the artist, who prints the photos of these women she finds from local archives in large formats and pastes them on the walls of the houses, is to change the perspective of women in Africa.