From Our Heritage:
The aim of studying the biographies of our famous men and women is not to stop at the crowns of laurel and glory they wove upon their heads, for that exercise harms us more than it profits us: it teaches us to boast of our ancestors, to sing their glories, and
to stand with folded hands, having neither strength nor power.
But if these biographies and lives are a spur to us in our own lives, so that we trace their subjects' footsteps and follow their example, and outstrip them on the fields of struggle and weave new wreaths of glory and eminence — then welcome to these biographies, and blessed be these lives.
It is in the light of this truth that we must look at this corner in The Woman's Voice.
This is what has now moved us to write a word about Zenobia, queen of Palmyra,
the greatest, most beautiful, and richest city of the East in the third century A.D.
This great queen was cultivated in the sciences, with a command of Latin, Greek, Coptic, and Syriac, besides Arabic. She was kind to men of learning and letters, encouraging them and taking them under her care.
It is commonly related that she used to accompany her husband Odaenathus, king of Palmyra, on his raids and wars, and that his success in fighting
the Persians was due in the first degree to her wisdom and skill.
When her husband died in the year 267 A.D. she ascended the throne and took the helm of government, and the title of 'Queen of the East' was bestowed upon her.
She was ambitious, aiming to enlarge her realm and make of Palmyra an empire. She overcame Syria, Egypt, and the north of the Arabian Peninsula, and her armies reached north as far as Ankara in Turkey. But fortune turned the back of its shield upon her, for Aurelian, that seasoned soldier, declared a fierce war against her. After winning the battles of Antioch and Emesa he besieged her in Palmyra. She defended herself and her country with rare heroism and courage; and when she learned that the city must surrender, she left the capital of her kingdom heading east, but she was seized while attempting
to cross the Euphrates in a boat, and was taken prisoner in the year 272 A.D. The Roman emperor did not kill her, but took her to Rome, where she remained at the mercy of the Romans, suffering the bitterness of captivity in all its shapes and colors.
From Zenobia we learn love of knowledge and learning, and their diffusion and patronage; skill, wisdom, ambition, and work — all of them virtues in which women shine as men do. And lastly, patience under adversity — and that, perhaps, is the chief of these virtues.