Bilistiche
Bilistiche (
Name
It is generally accepted that the name Bilistiche is a
Origin
According to Pausanias, Bilistiche was a woman from the coast of Macedonia;[3] according to Athenaeus, she was an Argive (said to descend from the line of Atreus);[4] according to Plutarch, a foreign slave bought from the marketplace.[5] If one were to accept Plutarch's information, one might suppose that, as a (former) slave of such origin she was given Macedonian citizenship for her services, although this is considered unlikely.[2]
Olivier Masson dismissed Plutarch's information as fiction concluding that Plutarch had drawn her from the existing entourage of the Macedonian nobility,[6] as does Daniel Ogden, who notes that Plutarch's information probably originated from Sotades' work On Bilistiche whose contents are unknown, but may have been a polemic against her.[2]
Biography
Bilistiche was born around 280 BC. Her father was named Philon (cf. Athenian architect
Death
Her date of death is unknown. After her death, it is known that Ptolemy II deified her as Aphrodite Bilistiche.
References
- ^ Belistiche in Pausanias; Belestiche in Plutarch; Blistichis in Clement (Protrepticus 4.42); Philistaikhus in Eusebius (Chronikon); Bilistiche in pCairZen 2.59289.
- ^ ISBN 978-90-04-17089-6.
- ^ a b Pausanias. Description of Greece, 5.8.11. "Later they added a pair of foals and a ridden foal: they say Belistiche, a woman from the coast of Macedonia, won with the pair, and Tlepolemos the Lykian was proclaimed for the ridden foal, Tlepolemos at the hundred and thirty-first Olympics and Belistiche two games before."
- ^ Athenaeus. Deipnosophists, 13.596e.
- ^ Plutarch. Moralia, 753e.
- ISSN 2814-855X.
- ^ Ptolemy Andromachou by Chris Bennett
- ^ Pomeroy 1990, pp. 53–55; Golden 2008, pp. 18–19.
- ^ The Hibeh Papyri II 261-262
- ^ Clement of Alexandria. Protrepticus, 4.48.2-3.
Sources
- Golden, Mark (2008). Greek Sport and Social Status. Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-71869-2.
- Pomeroy, Sarah B. (1990). Women in Hellenistic Egypt: From Alexander to Cleopatra. Detroit, Michigan: Wayne State University Press. ISBN 0-8143-2230-1.
External links
- Chris Bennett - Bilistiche
- Kosmetatou, Elizabeth. "Bilistiche and the Quasi-Institutional Status of Ptolemaic Royal Mistress". Archiv für Papyrusforschung und verwandte Gebiete. Volume 50, Issue 1, Pages 18–36, ISSN (Online) 1867-1551, ISSN (Print) 0066-6459, 2004.