#kallipateira

[ukdamo]

Kallipateira

Lorentsos Mavilis, translated by Timothy Ades

“O high–born Rhodian lady, how came you to our door? For women are debarred from here by usages of yore.”

“My nephew’s name is Eukles; my father and my son, and my three brothers, all of these Olympic glory won.

“Judges of Greece, their merits bespeak my right to pass, proud of their splendid bodies, these that clinch for crowns of Herakles, sprigs of wild olive: spirits manly and marvellous.

“I am no common woman. My brave men shine in story: they earned what cannot fade. Writ gold on sparkling marble their golden hymn of glory, that deathless Pindar made.”

[no-barbarians-here]

Kallipateira had come to Olympia disguised as a man, because the rules forbade married women to be present; when her boy gained victory, however, she vaulted over the fence behind which all the trainers were kept, and in doing so revealed her female identity.

-Nigel Spivey, The Ancient Olympics: A History, 2004.