Among the early women of distinction must be named Homai, who has indeed been identified with "the Persian Semiramis." She was a princess of renown and daughter of Bahman, and to her has been given the credit of being the author of a collection of tales known as _Hezar Afsane_, which comprises about two hundred stories told upon a thousand nights. It is from this collection by the Princess Homai that many suppose the _Arabian Nights_ was constructed. How much of the material from the former went to make up the latter is not capable of present proof, but that the general idea and plan and some of the names, and the groundwork of many of the tales, were borrowed from the work of the Persian princess seems quite certain. Homai is mentioned in the Avesta, the sacred book of the Persians; and the Persian poet Firdausi makes her the daughter as well as wife of Artaxerxes Longimanus. Her mother is said to have been a Jewess, Shahrazaad, among the captives brought from Jerusalem to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar. She is reported as having delivered her nation from captivity, and has been identified with Esther of the Hebrew Scriptures, as well as with Shahrazaad the Jewess of the _Arabian Nights_. Professor Gottheil thinks that the case here is well made out by Kuenen and others. The period of Cyrus the Great brings us upon the borderland between legend and history. Very romantic is the story told by Herodotus concerning the mother of Cyrus. Astyages, the Medean king, had a daughter named Mandane. This young woman was given in marriage to Cambyses, son of Theispes. Shortly after this, King Astyages had a dream in which there appeared a vine springing from his daughter Mandane and spreading till it had overshadowed all Asia. Wishing to know the meaning of this unusual dream, Astyages received from the Magi the interpretation that a son of Mandane should some day reign in his place. Alarmed at this, the king called a trusted servant, Harpagus, and commanded that he make plans to put to death the infant to which Mandane was soon to give birth; and the wife of Cambyses was closely guarded. Harpagus, however, unwilling himself to be guilty of so bloody a crime, directed that a herdsman of the king expose the infant son on a desert mountain, where its death would be certain. The herdsman, however, instead of leaving the little one to perish, reared him himself instead of his own stillborn son. The child received the name of Agradates, but later that of Cyrus, who by his achievements won the cognomen "The Great." According to Ctesias, Cyrus, after defeating Astyages, married his daughter Amytis, who had been the wife of a Mede named Spitaces, whom Cyrus put to death. Herodotus, as we have seen, says that the mother of Cyrus was a daughter of Astyages. The two statements may be both correct, however, since an Oriental conqueror would not hesitate to marry his mother's sister if the procedure gave him greater power over a conquered territory.