The author looks at women who have led armies and empires. Boadicea, the Celtic chieftain who led a bloody uprising against Roman rule in the first century A.D. Cleopatra, who relied less on sexual guile than on political acumen. The grimly devout Isabella of Spain. The majestic and murderous Jinga Mbandi, who became the bane of Portuguese colonists in the seventeenth century Angola. Also are the modern iron ladies”: Margaret Thatcher