Telesilla (fl. 6th or 5th c. bce)

Poet from Argos who defended her native city against the Spartan army. Name variations: Telessilla. Flourished in the 6th or 5th century bce.

Sources written long after Telesilla's time credit her with the following accomplishment (Herodotus, her near contemporary, does not). Cleomenes, a Spartan king, invaded Argos and won a major battle. Many Argives died defending their land, and others fled in disarray to a religious sanctuary where they sought asylum only to be incinerated when Cleomenes set a sacred grove on fire. The losses suffered by the Argive army having been severe, Cleomenes approached Argos itself expecting little resistance. Led by Telesilla, however, the women of Argos organized their city's defense. Calling up slaves, old men and boys, Telesilla and her cohorts ordered them all onto the city's walls where they were meant to impress their oppressors by their numbers. Then, after scrounging up what arms and armor she could muster, Telesilla arrayed in military dress those Argive women who were mature enough to be convincing. Thereafter, she deployed them where she expected the Spartan attack to take place.

Approaching the Argive women thus positioned, the surprised Spartans arrayed for battle and then bellowed their famous war-cry, intending to reduce the Argives to panic. Nonetheless, the Argive women held their line. Coming to realize that they were confronting women, and conscious of the rebuke they would receive among the Greeks at large if they dared to butcher the women facing them, the Spartans withdrew from Argos with their mission unaccomplished. For the courage it took to organize her defense, Telesilla had a statue erected in her honor before a temple of Aphrodite in Argos. Because the statue is historical, so, probably, is the incident which is said to have led to its erection. This statue portrayed Telesilla as a poet with her published works strewn about her feet, while she, distracted from her muse, was in the act of securing a helmet on her head in preparation for battle.

William Greenwalt , Associate Professor of Classical History, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California