Telesilla

Telesilla was an ancient Greek lyric poet from Argos, active in the fifth century BC. She is known for her supposed role in the defence of Argos in 494 BC, which is doubted by modern scholars. Only a few fragments of her poetry survive, several of which reference the gods Apollo and Artemis. She was apparently famous in antiquity, included by Antipater of Thessalonica in his canon of women poets; in the twentieth century she inspired a poem by the imagist poet H.D.

Life

Little is known of Telesilla's life. She was from the Peloponnesian city of Argos. A tradition reported by both Plutarch and Pausanias associates Telesilla with the defence of the city after the Battle of Sepeia in 494 BC; according to Eusebius her floruit was around 450 BC. If both these dates are correct, she would have lived a relatively long life – though Maria Elisabetta Colonna has proposed instead that she was born . Plutarch says that Telesilla was from an aristocratic family. He also reports that she was sickly; on the instructions of an oracle she became a poet, and was cured.

According to both Plutarch and Pausanias, when Cleomenes I of Sparta attacked Argos in 494 BC and defeated the Argive army at Sepeia, Telesilla organised the old men, slaves, and women of the city to defend it until the Spartans withdrew. According to Plutarch, Telesilla's victory was celebrated by the festival of Hybristica. The battle is described by Herodotus, who does not mention Telesilla's defence of the city, and the story was probably not true. The story of the defense of Argos was probably invented to explain a Delphic oracle which referred to the female driving out the male; the inclusion of Telesilla in the legend was perhaps inspired by something in her poetry.

Poetry

Nine fragments of Telesilla's poetry survive in quotation or paraphrase, with only one being longer than a single word. What little survives suggests that, like Corinna, Telesilla concentrated on local legends. Both Pausanias and Plutarch state that she was well regarded by women in particular, and her surviving fragments suggest that she was interested in women's lives. Five fragments of her poetry relate to the gods Artemis and Apollo, and one apparently comes from a poem about the wedding of Zeus and Hera. According to Maximus of Tyre, Telesilla's poetry inspired the Argives. Umbertina Lisi suggested that this referred to war poetry, though Telesilla's surviving fragments are religious rather than martial.

A glyconic meter, the Telesillan, was named for her. The longest surviving fragment of Telesilla is two lines quoted by the grammarian Hephaestion to illustrate this meter, about the myth of Alpheus. It is addressed to "maidens" (κοραι), and was possibly a choral poem written for performance at a local festivals.

Telesilla's poetry was apparently admired in antiquity. According to Eusebius she was as famous as Bacchylides, and Antipater of Thessalonica included her in his canon of nine women poets. According to Pausanias, there was a stele to Telesilla in front of the temple of Aphrodite in Argos, and Tatian reports that Niceratus sculpted her.

In the modern world, Telesilla inspired H.D.'s poem "Telesila", and she is included in Judy Chicago's '' Heritage Floor'', accompanying the place setting for Aspasia in ''The Dinner Party''.

References

Works cited

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External links

Project Continua: Biography of Telesilla
Project Continua is a web-based multimedia resource dedicated to the creation and preservation of women's intellectual history from the earliest surviving evidence into the 21st Century.

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Women in ancient Greek warfare
Ancient Greek lyric poets
Ancient Argives
5th-century BC poets
5th-century BC Greek women
5th-century BC women writers
5th-century BC writers
Ancient Greek women poets