> Candace was the Latinized spelling of Kandake, the Kushite term for “queen.”

Surely both are versions of the name in the latin alphabet. Seems like Kandake is a later rendition, after C:s stopped being hard.

The kushites used hieroglyphics.

I'm unclear on the "underestimated" part. It sounds more like she was an excellent strategist rather than her success being due to Roman incompetence. Who mentioned anything like "we thought it would be easy because she is a woman but our asses got handed to us because we didn't take her seriously"? I could believe it, but that wasn't my takeaway. It's not like other queens hadn't waged war in history.

The Roman Empire has suffered plenty of defeats from Europe to Central Asia to Africa, not sure why this one is anything special.

Great story, I had never heard of her before. Here's hoping they can decode those scripts!