14 October 2022 - We are happy to announce that Maria-Àngels Roque Alonso, part of the Executive Committee of our Foundation, has recently published her book "Amazonas y serranas: Guardianas del territorio materno" ("Amazons and Serranas: Guardians of maternal territory") ! On 13 October, the book was joyfully presented to a full house at the Llibreria Nollegiu Poblenou in Barcelona, Spain.

Published by the Valladolid publishing house Páramo, Roque analyses the matrilocal model, in which it is the men who move to their wives’ village when the marriage takes place and not the other way round. The main purpose of this work, the result of exhaustive research by the author, is to "synthesise" all these processes and practices, but focusing especially on the role of women. Maria-Àngels Roque offers "a less patriarchal vision", a feminist and above all realistic view of the subject that is presented in this publication. A vision that does not want to be comparative but explanatory, breaking myths, both about the Amazons described by Greco-Latin authors and about the women of the Sierra de la Demanda and Urbión.

It focuses on areas of great anthropological interest where women lived alone for a large part of the year and were able to protect or maintain the good governance of their territories. These divisions have, in Roque’s opinion, fostered myths created about single women, of which the myth of the Amazons in particular is taken to extremes. In the Hispanic novels, the Serrana is a woman with weapons and even in fantasy she is a dangerous woman, such as the serrana de la Vera, a "powerful being without male control".

If your interest has been sparked by this insightful book with a feminist perspective, please visit https://bit.ly/3gaAl8J.