'My pen has been taken up in the cause, and for the benefit of my own sex. For their improvement, and to their entertainment, my labours have been devoted ... I have at heart the happiness of my sex, and their advancement in the grand scale of rational and social existence.' - From the Preface by Mary Hays

Published in 1803 by Mary Hays, famous for her relationship with Mary Wollestonecraft, this collection of female biographies is now considered as the very first major reference of women, for women, and by a woman. The collection includes approximately 290 women from the classical period up to the seventeenth century, a third of which are British.