Queens & Mothers: African Women Who Ruled, Built, and Mothered Empires Volumes I, II & III - Feelnubia Legacy Series: From Pharaohs to Kingdoms, From Antiquity Through the 17th Century to Present Day Africa's history is, in no small part, a history of queens, and they were certainly more than mere ornaments or afterthoughts. These queens commanded armies, negotiated with empires, buried enemies beneath temple walls, and just as often quietly held a kingdom together while history credited someone else. Queens & Mothers brings together twenty of them across two volumes, compiled and lightly re-edited from the SAGE and DISCOVER archives of feelnubia.org for e-book distribution, several chapters published here as previews ahead of their scheduled release on the site. Volume I: Antiquity to the 17th Century]Spanning roughly 1850 BCE to the mid-1600s across Egypt, the Horn of Africa, the Kingdom of Kush, the Yoruba city-states and Oyo Empire, Kanem-Bornu, the Anlo-Ewe territory, and the kingdoms of Ndongo and Matamba. Meet a princess known mostly through the jewelry buried with her, a pharaoh who ruled Egypt as king in all but body, two generations of Kushite Kandakes (one who fought Rome to a standstill, one who built temples in the peace that followed) a Yoruba bride who traded her freedom and later her son for her people's survival, a woman who talked her way past a throne built to exclude her, and an Angolan queen who outlasted the Portuguese Empire for four decades. Featuring: Khenemetneferhedjet III, Hatshepsut, Makeda (the Queen of Sheba), Amanirenas, Amanitore, Moremi Ajasoro, Magajiya Delo, Iy'Oba Idia, Orompoto, and Njinga. Volume II: Resistance, Reform, and Living LegacyPicking up the thread in the 18th century and carrying it to the present, across C?te d'Ivoire, South Africa, Benin, Nigeria, Madagascar, Senegal, Ghana, Rwanda, and Uganda; an era defined by colonial encroachment and the women who met it head-on. A queen who gave up her only son at a river crossing to save her people. A kingmaker who twice decided who sat on the Zulu throne. An all-female regiment so feared by European observers they borrowed a name from Greek myth to describe it. A scholar-poet whose network of traveling teachers reshaped literacy across a caliphate. A queen who kept an island nation independent for over three decades, at devastating human cost. A Queen Mother who led an army rather than surrender her kingdom's sacred stool. And, closing the collection, a modern Nigerian Queen Mother whose service continues the same lineage today. Featuring: Pokou, Mkabayi kaJama, Nandi, the Warrior Queens of Dahomey, Nana Asmau, Ranavalona I, Ndat? Yalla Mbodj, Yaa Asantewaa, Muhumuza, and Eyelua Modupe Oshin. Volume III: Queens Who Met Colonial Powers With ResistanceHard cover print edition includes bonus Volume III featuring queens and mothers who resisted colonial powers and slowed the advancement of the invaders. Featuring: Dahia al-Kahina, Nehanda Nyakasikana, Mekatilili wa Menza, and Empress Taytu Betul. Why Read ItSome of these women live on in inscriptions and court records; others survive mainly through oral tradition, retold for generations before anyone wrote them down. *Queens & Mothers* holds both truths at once, telling each story with the drama and reverence it deserves, while staying honest about where the record thins into legend or where a legacy is genuinely contested. Feelnubia Legacy Series is compiled by FeelNubia Educational Resources Perfect for readers of African history, students of women's leadership, and anyone who wants the stories textbooks left out.
