Avenge the Celts: Queen Boudicca (30 to 61 AD)
The Iceni Celtic people had actually decided to submit to the Romans.
Then, on his deathbed, client king Prasutagus declared his daughters, along with Nero, as his successors.
Rome's mercenaries occupied Iceni territory, raped Prasutagus' daughters and whipped his wife: Boudicca.
Their revenge terrified Rome in 60/61.
She gathered rebellious Celtic peoples to drive the Romans out of the area and went into battle in chariots.
The Celtic queen and her squad attacked Roman settlements and burned Londinium - ancient London.
Up to 70,000 Romans died.
Boudicca's uprising only lasted a short time, but the British now regard her as a freedom fighter for the island people.
Initiated Georgia's "Golden Age": Queen Tamar (1160 to 1230)
As a teenager, Tamar became co-regent of her father George III.
of Georgia, after his death she took over the government herself in 1184.
Her reign is considered the country's "Golden Age."
The poet Shota Rustaveli, who according to legend is in love with the queen, raves about her deeds in his verses.
He wasn't the only one fighting for her favor: Frederick Barbarossa offered her one of his sons as her husband, but Tamar married the Russian prince Yuri.
Under her rule, the country's economy, art and culture flourished, the importance of which she underlined through expansion;
Georgia was almost twice as large in the 12th century as it is today.
Tamar promoted science and the Christian religion in her country and is now revered as a saint in the Georgian Orthodox Church.
Made Spain great: Isabella of Castile (1451 to 1504)
Before her secret wedding to the Spanish heir to the throne, Ferdinand of Aragon, Isabella of Castile obliged her groom to recognize her claim to power by means of a marriage contract in 1469.
Five years later she ascended the throne and from then on set the tone.
Aragon and Castile were now ruled as a unit and the Islamic powers were pushed out of the Iberian Peninsula: the liberation of Granada in 1492 is considered the end of the “Reconquista”.
Muslims and Jews had to be baptized or flee;
Spain should be thoroughly Catholic.
That same year, Christopher Columbus set sail and discovered America.
Isabella of Castile laid the foundation for the Spanish empire during her 30-year rule.
Unintentionally helped in the conquest of the Aztec Empire: Malinche (around 1500 to 1529)
The indigenous people were enslaved by the Maya before being given as a gift to the Spanish conqueror Hernán Cortés.
Baptized with the name “Doña Marina,” she interpreted for him during the conquest of the Aztec Empire.
Although she probably did not choose this role voluntarily, she was long viewed by the Mexican people as a traitor who was partly to blame for the downfall of indigenous advanced culture.
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Malinche (drawing around 1585) bore Cortés a son, the first half-indigenous, half-Spanish “mestizo”.
Today, descendants of whites and indigenous people make up around 60 percent of the Mexican population - Malinche is their foremother.
Reached the top without scruples: Empress Cixi (1835 to 1908)
Cixi rose from concubine to become the most powerful woman in the Chinese Qing Dynasty.
After the death of Emperor Xianfeng in 1861, she seized power with allies and imposed economic and military reforms on the empire before switching to a reactionary course.
Cixi tried to steer the country through an era of change - but could not stop the decline of the empire.
Signed Israel's Declaration of Independence with: Golda Meir (1898 to 1978)
The convinced Zionist Golda Meir, who was born in Kiev and grew up in the USA, took on political positions in Israel from the 1940s onwards, co-signed the Declaration of Independence, served as Minister of Labor and Foreign Affairs and, unexpectedly, became Israel's Prime Minister in 1969.
She appeared strong-willed, but hoped for a solution to the conflict with her Arab neighbors.
The Yom Kippur War, which she had not foreseen, forced her resignation in 1973.
Attempted to renew Afghanistan: Soraya Tarzi (1899 to 1968)
The Afghan royal couple pursued a course of renewal in Afghanistan in the 1920s.
Syrian-born Tarzi had married Amanullah Khan in 1913 and became queen when he ascended the throne in 1926.
The fact that he dissolved the harem and the royal couple lived in a monogamous marriage was a first break with tradition.
The Queen founded the country's first girls' school and women's magazine, as well as a hospital for women.
In 1928 the king announced the end of the compulsory veiling, and Soraya Tarzi then publicly removed her veil.
Tarzi was the first Afghan queen to travel with her husband on state visits;
The photo shows the two of them on a visit to Berlin in 1928. Conservatives in the country opposed the reform course: Amanullah Khan had to abdicate in 1929.
The royal couple was forced into exile.
Committed to India's independence: Indira Gandhi (1917 to 1984)
Indira Gandhi fought for India's independence as a young woman, became secretary to her father Jawaharlal Nehru - the first prime minister of independent India - and rose to the highest office herself in 1966.
Gandhi struggled to feed a rapidly growing population but strengthened her country through the expulsion of Pakistani troops and gestures of power such as the 1974 nuclear weapons test.
She stumbled over corruption allegations, made a comeback as prime minister in 1980, but fell victim to an attack in 1984.
Became a folk heroine: Eva Perón, “Evita” (1919 to 1952)
All of Argentina mourned when Eva Perón died of cervical cancer in 1952 at the age of 33.
This ended a legendary rise from illegitimate child to presidential wife and almost vice president.
Eva Duarte was working as a model, radio host and actress when she met Juan Perón in 1944.
Her media fame made him shine too.
In 1946 he became President of Argentina, and the “Primera Dama” supported his politics with speeches and appearances.
The fact that Evita visited the fascist Spanish dictator Francisco Franco in 1947 is almost forgotten today.
What remains in the collective memory is her commitment to the country's poorest people and the fact that her body was kidnapped after Perón's death and remained missing for almost two decades.
Dismantled the welfare state: Margaret Thatcher (1925 to 2013)
"I want my money back," said the British head of government angrily at the EU summit in 1979, the famous beginning of the island nation's difficult relationship with Europe.
Unlike the Brexiteers decades later, this didn't necessarily make her popular domestically - Margaret Thatcher turned her people against her with her tough capitalism and the dismantling of the welfare state.
Even the victory over Argentina in the Falklands War in 1982 only saved them briefly.
After eleven years in government, her political allies abandoned her and in 1990 the “Iron Lady” was forced to resign.
Their influence on British politics continues to this day.
Was the first female Prime Minister to be directly elected: Vigdís Finnbogadóttir (*1930)
Non-party, divorced, single mother of an adopted daughter: This is how Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, until then director of the Reykjavík City Theater, ran for the post of Prime Minister of Iceland in 1980.
And won.
Although other women, Golda Meir and Indira Gandhi, were already at the head of states at that time, Finnbogadóttir was the first to be elected to this position by the people and not by a party.
She attested to her compatriots' courage for her choice, and she didn't doubt herself: She wanted to prove: "A woman can do it," she said in an interview in 2007.
She did this for 16 years.
In 1996 Finnbogadóttir decided not to run for another term.
Aware of her role model role, she founded the “Council of Women World Leaders” in 1996, which brings together current and former heads of government and state.
Became a symbol of hope for the Philippines: Corazon Aquino (1935 to 2009)
Their path to reconciliation began with tragedy: Aquino's husband Benigno became involved in opposition to the corrupt President Ferdinand Marcos;
In 1983 he was shot dead at the Manila airport.
His widow Corazon had previously been a housewife, but now she took the lead in the "People's Power" movement, which wanted to drive Marcos from office.
This succeeded in 1986: a bloodless popular uprising and the backing of the Catholic Church brought Corazon Aquino to power.
“Aunt Cory,” as she was nicknamed, became a symbol of hope for democracy.
The people confirmed a newly drafted constitution in 1987, and Aquino opened the country to the Eastern Bloc in terms of foreign policy.
It struggled with attempted coups and delayed reforms.
She lost her office after six years, but remained politically active.
Tens of thousands said goodbye to her after her death from cancer in 2009.
Won the Nobel Peace Prize: Wangari Maathai (1940 to 2011)
The Kenyan environmentalist Wangari Maathai was the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004.
Maathai is still considered the “mother of trees” today: the qualified biologist and first female professor at the University of Nairobi started the largest reforestation project in Africa in 1977.
Their "Green Belt Movement", which is still active today, sensitized their fellow citizens to environmental protection and encouraged them to raise their voices against environmental crimes and abuse of power - Maathai's movement was therefore essentially democracy-building.
She was repeatedly targeted by the autocratic ruling Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi and was imprisoned.
After Moi's replacement, she became part of the government herself: from 2003 to 2005 she served as Environment Minister.
Wrapped up the GDR: Sabine Bergmann-Pohl (*1946)
After the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, Lothar de Maizière, as the last Prime Minister of the GDR, and Sabine Bergmann-Pohl, as its last head of state, took over the dissolution of the "workers' and farmers' state."
Instead of the “blooming landscapes” promised by Chancellor Helmut Kohl, the new beginning produced economic wastelands in many places.
The frustration of this also affected de Maizière and Bergmann-Pohl - even though they were doing a job from which it was impossible to emerge as a winner.
Was the first woman to head an Islamic state: Benazir Bhutto (1953 to 2007)
Her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was Pakistan's first democratically elected prime minister and was overthrown and assassinated by the military in 1979.
After her education at Harvard and Oxford, the daughter did everything she could to save her father's honor.
In 1988, Benazir Bhutto became the first woman to head an Islamic state.
Soon there were allegations of corruption against her and her husband, and she was accused of lust for power.
Bhutto was forced to flee into exile in Dubai for eight years in 1999.
Just two months after returning to Pakistan to run for prime minister again, she was killed in an assassination attempt.
The texts compiled here first appeared in SPIEGEL Edition Geschichte 1/23, on April 17, 2023.