Editing Thalestris (section)

==Historicity==
The story is rejected by modern scholars as legendary. Perhaps behind the legend lies the offering by a [[Scythian]] king of his daughter as a wife for Alexander, as the latter himself wrote in a letter to [[Antipater]].<ref>Plutarch, ''Alexander'' 46.3</ref>

Another possibility is the story was inspired by the contingent of 100 women warriors sent by [[Atropates]] to Alexander in 324 BCE. They were called Amazons, arriving on horse and carrying light [[battle axe]]s and [[Peltast|pelta]] shields. The king sent them back, fearing their presence might incite his male troops to molest them, but he gave them the message he would visit their queen to beget children by her, referencing the popular Amazon custom. These women have been interpreted as product of the [[Achaemenid]] custom to train female bodyguards,<ref name=Amaz>{{cite book|title=Postcolonial Amazons: Female Masculinity and Courage in Ancient Greek and Sanskrit Literature|last=Penrose, Jr.|first=Walter Duvall|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2016|page=124-125}}</ref> mere [[prostitutes]] playing roles,<ref>Elizabeth Baynham, ''Alexander and the Amazons'', The Classical Quarterly, New Series, Vol. 51, No. 1. (2001), pp. 115-126.</ref><ref>Adrienne Mayor, ''When Alexander Met Thalestris''. 2015. History today 65(1):10-27</ref> or true members of Eurasian tribes where women were trained for war, like Scythians themselves,<ref name=Amaz/> It has been interpreted that Alexander sent her back not because they might be threatened, as his army was accustomed to travel with concubines, but because of the cultural clash of fighting along women.<ref name=Amaz/>