And that was
in that time that Ninus was king of Babylon, of Arabia and of
Egypt.
This Ninus made the city of Nineveh, the which that Noah
had begun before. And because that Ninus performed it, he cleped
it Nineveh after his own name. There lieth Tobit the prophet, of
whom Holy Writ speaketh of. And from that city of Ur Abraham
departed, by the commandment of God, from thence, after the death
of his father, and led with him Sarah his wife and Lot his
brother's son, because that he had no child. And they went to
dwell in the land of Canaan in a place that is clept Shechem. And
this Lot was he that was saved, when Sodom and Gomorrah and the
other cities were burnt and sunken down to hell, where that the
Dead Sea is now, as I have told you before. In that land of
Chaldea they have their proper languages and their proper letters,
such as ye may see hereafter.
Beside the land of Chaldea is the land of Amazonia, that is the
land of Feminye. And in that realm is all women and no man; not,
as some men say, that men may not live there, but for because that
the women will not suffer no men amongst them to be their
sovereigns.
For sometime there was a king in that country. And men married, as
in other countries. And so befell that the king had war with them
of Scythia, the which king hight Colopeus, that was slain in
battle, and all the good blood of his realm. And when the queen
and all the other noble ladies saw that they were all widows, and
that all the royal blood was lost, they armed them and, as
creatures out of wit, they slew all the men of the country that
were left; for they would that all the women were widows as the
queen and they were. And from that time hitherwards they never
would suffer man to dwell amongst them longer than seven days and
seven nights; ne that no child that were male should dwell amongst
them longer than he were nourished; and then sent to his father.
And when they will have any company of man then they draw them
towards the lands marching next to them. And then they have loves
that use them; and they dwell with them an eight days or ten, and
then go home again. And if they have any knave child they keep it
a certain time, and then send it to the father when he can go alone
and eat by himself; or else they slay it. And if it be a female
they do away that one pap with an hot iron. And if it be a woman
of great lineage they do away the left pap that they may the better
bear a shield. And if it be a woman on foot they do away the right
pap, for to shoot with bow turkeys:
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