Kuniska

Σπάρτας μὲν [βασιλῆες ἐμοὶ] πατέρες καὶ ἀδελφοί,
ἅ[ρματι δ’ ὠκυπόδων ἵππων] νικῶσα Κυνίσκα
εἰκόνα τάνδ’ ἔστασε. μόν[αν] δ’ ἐμέ φαμι γυναικῶν
Ἑλλάδος ἐκ πάσας τό[ν-]δε λαβν στέφανον.
Ἀπελλέας Καλλικλέος ἐπόησε.
(IG V.1.1564a)

[Kings] of Sparta were [my] fathers and brothers.
Having been victorious with a c[hariot of swift-footed horses,] I,
Cynisca, set up this statue. I declare that alone amongst the women
of all Greece, I took this crown.
Apelles the son of Callicles made this.
(tr. Sarah Brown Ferrario)

Ἀρχιδάμου δὲ ὡς ἐτελεύτα, καταλιπόντος παῖδας, Ἆγίς τε πρεσβύτερος ἦν ἡλικίᾳ, καὶ παρέλαβεν ἀντὶ Ἀγησιλάου τὴν ἀρχήν. ἐγένετο δὲ Ἀρχιδάμῳ καὶ θυγάτηρ, ὄνομα μὲν Κυνίσκα, φιλοτιμότατα δὲ ἐς τὸν ἀγῶνα ἔσχε τὸν Ὀλυμπικὸν, καὶ πρώτη τε ἱπποτρόφησε γυναικῶν, καὶ νίκην ἀνείλετο Ὀλυμπικὴν πρώτη. Κυνίσκας δὲ ὕστερον γυναιξὶ καὶ ἄλλαις, καὶ μάλιστα ταῖς ἐκ Μακεδονίας, γεγόνασιν Ὀλυμπικαὶ νῖκαι, ὧν ἡ ἐπιφανεστέρα ἐς τὰς νίκας ἐστὶν αὐτῆς. δοκοῦσι δὲ οἱ Σπαρτιᾶταί μοι ποίησιν καὶ ἔπαινον τὸν ἀπ’ αὐτῆς ἥκιστα ἀνθρώπων θαυμάσαι. ὅτι γὰρ μὴ τῇ Κυνίσκᾳ τὸ ἐπίγραμμα ἐποίησεν ὅστις δή, καὶ ἔτι πρότερον Παυσανίᾳ τὸ ἐπὶ τῷ τρίποδι Σιμωνίδης τῷ ἀνατεθέντι ἐς Δελφούς, ἄλλο δή γε παρὰ ἀνδρὸς ποιητοῦ Λακεδαιμονίων τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν οὐδέν ἐστιν ἐς μνήμην.
(Pausanias 3.8.1-2)

Archidamus left sons when he died, of whom Agis was the elder and inherited the throne instead of Agesilaus. Archidamus had also a daughter, whose name was Cynisca; she was exceedingly ambitious to succeed at the Olympic games, and was the first woman to breed horses and the first to win an Olympic victory. After Cynisca other women, especially women of Lacedaemon, have won Olympic victories, but none of them was more distinguished for their victories than she. The Spartans seem to me to be of all men the least moved by poetry and the praise of poets. For with the exception of the epigram upon Cynisca, of uncertain authorship, and the still earlier one upon Pausanias that Simonides wrote on the tripod dedicated at Delphi, there is no poetic composition to commemorate the doings of the royal houses of the Lacedaemonians. (tr. Henry Arderne Ormerod)