Lady Eboshi is the great ruler of Iron Town (Tatara Ba in the original) that doesn't fears neither men or gods.

In the movie her past is not discussed, but it's said that she was kidnapped still young by pirates and forced to marry their chef. Then, some night she caught her husband asleep and killed him, taking over the ship. After that she sold everything  and contracted some skirmishers (or Jigo provided her with them, because later he will expect a return from her. I'm not really sure).

At that time Iron Town was a minor town with lots of problems with the forest gods but someday Lady Eboshi arrived with her men and took down Lord Nago, the boar god, and after she that never stopped fighting against the forest. Under the sovereignty of it's ruler the town prospered and outcast people found there a place where they could work equally.

The Lady, that didn't minded who people were since they behaved and worked, started buying the contract of each prostitute she found and setting them free to work on the foot bellows of her town. As for the lepers, she gave them a place to live and a chance to be useful as blacksmiths.

Lady Eboshi is a practical women whose skills in combat are amazing (her agility during the scene of the fight with San is great!), having learned them with the pirates. She's also very different from the other aristocratic women from that time, wearing pants and other clothes that only men did wear, as well as ruling, of course.

With the help of her blacksmith lepers, this woman designed a new type of hand canons, the anterior ones being too heavy for the other women, the ones she believed would be the best in using them.

At the end, and with less an arm, she seems to became a little less fierce and a little more disposed to give nature a chance.

Note: Her name can be other than the one she's known for. Actually eboshi is the Japanese name for that type of red hat she uses.

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