Why does the ancient Greek word for bravery come from the word for man, and what did bronze spears have to do with it?
How does one of the coldest decades in 2,000 years end with around 100,000 women on trial for meddling with the weather?
And, what links a woman blamed for a hailstorm in the 1590s to ten young protesters superglued to an oil company's headquarters in London?
Afua Hirsch reads Peter Frankopan's The Earth Transformed for the women in it, from Bronze Age weapons to the police station where she once defended those ten protesters.
Part one of Her Story and the Natural World. Hunter-gatherer women with the bone strength of Olympic athletes, Akan market women who still run the trade, and the scapegoat logic that turns a bad harvest into a witch trial. Plus the women written out of the civil rights story, and why everyone who dreams of being a Spartan pictures themselves next to Leonidas, never as the cook at the back with no teeth.
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[0:00] Weapons, magic spells and superglue: what do they have in common?
[1:07] Why the word "herstory" still rattles people
[7:49] The Bronze Age losers, and how bravery became a man's word
[12:38] Tradwives, Spartans and the history nobody actually wants to live
[16:20] Curses, churches and witchcraft in West Africa
[21:53] A freezing decade, 100,000 trials and the women blamed for the storms
[27:41] Coretta Scott King, Amy Ashwood Garvey and the women written out
[31:32] Afua's first case: ten women glued to a building
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Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas:
Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com
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