Posidippus, AB 88: king Ptolemy II boasts about the hippic victory of his mother Berenice I at the Olympic games

Posidippus, AB 88: king Ptolemy II boasts about the hippic victory of his mother Berenice I at the Olympic games

3rd century BCE

Victory epigram

Literary source

Ptolemy II refers to the victories of his parents, stressing especially his mother’s triumph. Like in Posidippus, AB 87, the Ptolemies’ Macedonian origin is emphasized, since Ptolemy I originated from Eordaia (cf. Arrian, Anabasis 6.28.4).

First and only, three of us won as kings
the chariot at Olympia, both my parents and I.
One I am, bearing the same name, Ptolemy, Berenice’s
son, of Eordaian origin, two are my parents.
To father’s glory I add my own; but for my mother
to win the chariot race as a woman, that is great.

translation by Christoph Begass for the Cynisca project

πρῶτο[ι] τρεῖϲ βαϲι̣λῆ̣εϲ Ὀλύμπια καὶ μόνοι ἁμὲϲ
    ἅρμαϲι νικῶμεϲ̣ κ̣α̣ὶ γονέεϲ καὶ ἐγώ·
ε̣ἷϲ μ̣ὲν ἐγὼ̣ [Π]τολεμαίου ὁμώνυμοϲ, ἐ‹κ› Βερενίκαϲ
    υ̣ἱ̣[όϲ], Ἐορδαία γέννα, δύω δὲ γονεῖϲ·
†π̣ρ̣ο̣υ μέγα πατρὸϲ εμου† τίθεμαι κλέοϲ, ἀλλ’ ὅτι μάτηρ
    εἷλε γυνὰ νίκαν ἅρματ‹ι›, τοῦτο μέγα.

Kainz, L. (2016), “We are the best, we are one, and we are Greeks!” Reflections on the Ptolemies’ participation in the Agones, in: C. Mann – S. Remijsen – S. Scharff (eds.), Athletics in the Hellenistic World. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 331–53.

Mann, C. (2018), Könige, Poleis und Athleten in hellenistischer Zeit, Klio 100, 447–79.

Meaker, M. (2024), Women at the Races: Female Victors at Greek hippikoi agones, in: C. Frank – G. Gilles – C. Plastow – L. Webb (eds.), Female Agency in the Ancient Mediterranean, Liverpool, 49–82.

Remijsen, S. – S. Scharff (2015), The Expression of Identities in Hellenistic Victor Epigrams, in: T. F. Scanlon (ed.), Greek Sport and Poetry (Classics@ 13), online.

Thompson, D.J. (2005), Posidippus, Poet of the Ptolemies, in: K.J. Gutzwiller (ed.), The New Posidippus: A Hellenistic Poetry Book, Oxford, 269–283.