Inside Book Jacket Since ancient times, irrepressible women have broken all kinds of barriers. They ruled. They invented. They cured people. They killed people. They ran cities and businesses. They won races, athletic and political. They explored. They bankrolled explorers. They even bankrolled religions. Almost every organized religion, from Christianity to Buddhism to Quakerism, has gotten off the ground thanks to the hard work and cold cash of women! Most traditional histories-written by men-ignore, obscure, or erase the role of women, especially those who challenge the status quo. But the evidence of their achievements exists everywhere: in writings, coins, artifacts, graffiti, music, portraits, legal transcripts, love note, and hate mail. For more than twenty years, Vicki Leon has been examining this evidence, chasing clues however faint and unconventional, and reporting her findings in numerous books, including the delightful four-volume Uppity Women series. 4,000 Years of Uppity Women features the best of that series, chosen by Leon herself. It focuses not on legendary goddesses or literary characters but on real women (though many of them did become the subjects of poems, plays, and stories). You'll find a few familiar names, Joan of Arc, Cleopatra, and Elizabeth I among them. But most of them are lesser known but no less audacious in their efforts and outstanding in their accomplishments. You'll meet French publishers, Pompeian loan sharks, New Orleans voodoo queens, Egyptian alchemists, Hittite psychologists, Sumerian beer brewers, Pitcairn Island mutineers, and early American doctors who got paid in tobacco. Highfalutin poets and philosophers mix it up with early porn artists and big-hearted philanthropists. ut although they come from different cultures, eras, and social classes, they all share a common bond: they didn't buy into what others said women could and couldn't do. With irreverent wit and exceptional insight, illustrated by striking period artwork, Leon restores these courageous and innovative-and yes, often outrageous-women to their proper place in history.