Pausanias, Graeciae Descriptio 3.17.6: the victory of Euryleonis of Sparta

Pausanias, Graeciae Descriptio 3.17.6: the victory of Euryleonis of Sparta

mid 2nd century CE

Travel writing

Literary source

The date of Euryleonis' victory is uncertain. Moretti 1957, no. 418, dates it to 368 BCE without explanation. Since Pausanias does not comment on the date of her victory, all we know for certain is that it must have been sometime between 400 BCE and the second century AD. Considering that most women won at the races in the Hellenistic period, it is not unreasonable to assume that Euryleonis' victory also falls into this period.

On the right of the Lady of the Bronze House has been set up an image of Zeus Most High, the oldest image that is made of bronze. It is not wrought in one piece. Each of the limbs has been hammered separately; these are fitted together, being prevented from coming apart by nails. They say that the artist was Clearchus of Rhegium, who is said by some to have been a pupil of Dipoenus1 and Scyllis, by others of Daedalus himself. By what is called the Scenoma （Tent） there is a statue of a woman, whom the Lacedaemonians say is Euryleonis. She won a victory at Olympia with a two-horse chariot.

William H. S. Jones/Henry A. Ormerod, Pausanias, Description of Greece, vol. 2, Books 3-5 (= Loeb Classical Library; 188), London 1926.

τῆς Χαλκιοίκου δὲ ἐν δεξιᾷ Διὸς ἄγαλμα Ὑπάτου
πεποίηται, παλαιότατον πάντων ὁπόσα ἐστὶ χαλκοῦ: δι᾽ ὅλου γὰρ οὐκ ἔστιν εἰργασμένον, ἐληλασμένου δὲ ἰδίᾳ τῶν μερῶν καθ᾽ αὑτὸ ἑκάστου συνήρμοσταί τε πρὸς ἄλληλα καὶ ἧλοι συνέχουσιν αὐτὰ μὴ διαλυθῆναι. καὶ Κλέαρχον δὲ ἄνδρα Ῥηγῖνον τὸ ἄγαλμα ποιῆσαι λέγουσιν, ὃν Διποίνου καὶ Σκύλλιδος, οἱ δὲ αὐτοῦ Δαιδάλου φασὶν εἶναι μαθητήν. πρὸς δὲ τῷ Σκηνώματι ὀνομαζομένῳ γυναικός ἐστιν εἰκών, Λακεδαιμόνιοι δὲ Εὐρυλεωνίδα λέγουσιν εἶναι: νίκην δὲ ἵππων συνωρίδι ἀνείλετο Ὀλυμπικήν.

Frederick Spiro (ed.), Pausaniae Graeciae Descriptio, vol. 2, Leipzig 1903.