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Amazon (AMAZONE from a without)

or AMAZONE (from a= without, and mazos the breast, from the story that the Amazons cut off their right breast to prevent its interfering with the use of the bow), a nation on the river Thermodon, the modern Termeh in Pontus, in Asia Minor, said to consist entirely of women renowned for their love of manly sports, and as warriors. Men were excluded from their territory, and commerce was held only with strangers, while all male children born among them were killed. They are mentioned by Homer.

Also the females of an Indian tribe on the banks of the great river Maranon, in South America, who assisted their husbands when fighting against the Spaniards, and caused the Maranon to receive the new name of the Amazon, and any female soldiers, such as the band of female warriors kept by the King of Dahomey in Africa.

In entomology, Huber's name for the neuters of a red ant (polyergus), which are accustomed to sally forth in large numbers from their nests, in military array, and, proceeding to some neighboring anthill belonging to another species, plunder it of the larvæ of its neuters. These, when hatched, become a kind of pariah caste in the habitation of the Amazons.

AMBALA or UMBALLA, a city of India, the capital of the district of the same name in the Punjab. It is a well built town and contains a handsome Gothic church, several hospitals and asylums. It is also an important military station. Pop. about 90,000.