Figure di “donne duellanti” nei poemi epico-romanzeschi persiani dei secoli XI-XIV e nella Gerusalemme Liberata

Starting from the myth of the Amazons, revisited in the Book of the Kings of Ferdowsi (XI sec.) and in the Alexander book of Nezami (XII-XIII), the author attempts a comparison between some figures of dueling women in Persian literature and Italian literature. In particular, some episodes of Tasso’s Gerusalemme liberata have been read and analyzed, especially with regard to the motives of disguise and unmasking of the beautiful pagan warrior Clorinda, and to similar episodes of the “Book of Kings” by Ferdowsi and Homay and Homayun by Khwaju of Kerman, where we see in action similar figures of dueling women disguised as warriors and unmasked by their masculine opponents at the climax of the duel.