Ancient Greek women poets

thumb|right|Kalpis painting of Sappho by the [[Sappho Painter ( 510BC)|alt=Vase painting of a woman holding a lyre.]]

thumb|alt=Reproduction of a painting of a woman with a lyre and a crown of leaves|Corinna of Tanagra, , by Frederic Leighton

thumb|Fanciful portrait of Erinna from Finden's Gallery of Graces (1834) Erinna (; ) was an ancient Greek poet. She is best known for her long poem The Distaff, a 300-line hexameter lament for her childhood friend Baucis, who had died shortly after her marriage. A large fragment of this poem was discovered in 1928 at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt. Along with The Distaff, three epigrams ascribed to Erinna are known, preserved in the Greek Anthology. Biographical details about Erinna's life are uncertain. She is generally thought to have lived in the first half of the fourth century BC, though some ancie

thumb|right|Illustration of Anyte by Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer, for [[Renée Vivien's Les Kitharèdes]] Anyte of Tegea (; ) was a Hellenistic poet from Tegea in Arcadia. Little is known of her life, but twenty-four epigrams attributed to her are preserved in the Greek Anthology, and one is quoted by Julius Pollux; nineteen of these are generally accepted as authentic. She introduced rural themes to the genre, which became a standard theme in Hellenistic epigrams. She is one of the nine outstanding ancient women poets listed by Antipater of Thessalonica in the Palatine Anthology. Her pastoral poetry ma

thumb|upright|Marble sculpture of a dancing female figure, sometimes identified as Lysippus' sculpture of Praxilla. Praxilla (), was a Greek lyric poet of the 5th century BC from Sicyon on the Gulf of Corinth. Five quotations attributed to Praxilla and three paraphrases from her poems survive. The surviving fragments attributed to her come from both religious choral lyric and drinking songs (skolia); the three paraphrases are all versions of myths. Various social contexts have been suggested for Praxilla based on this range of surviving works. These include that Praxilla was a hetaira (courtes

thumb|right|Marble bust of Nossis by Francesco Jerace

thumb|right|Illustration of Telesilla by Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer, from Les Kitharèdes by [[Renée Vivien]] Telesilla () was an ancient Greek lyric poet from Argos, active in the fifth century BC. She is known for her supposed role in the defence of Argos in 494 BC, which is doubted by modern scholars. Only a few fragments of her poetry survive, several of which reference the gods Apollo and Artemis. The longest surviving fragment, only two lines, is quoted by the grammarian Hephaestion to illustrate the Telesillan metre, named after her. She was apparently famous in antiquity, included by Antipater

ancient Greek poet

thumb|right|Lucien Lévy-Dhurmer's portrait of Moero for Les Kitharèdes by [[Renée Vivien]] Moero (, fl. ) or Myro () was a woman poet of the Hellenistic period from the city of Byzantium. Little of her poetry survives: ten lines of her epic poem Mnemosyne are quoted by Athenaeus, and two of her epigrams are preserved in the Greek Anthology; two other poems are known only through mentions in other sources.

Cleobulina (, 6th century BC) or Eumetis (Εὔμητις) was an ancient Greek poet. She was known for writing riddles, and three riddles attributed to her survive.

Elephantis () (fl. late 1st century BC) was a Greek poet and physician renowned in the classical world as the author of a notorious sex manual. Due to the popularity of courtesans taking animal names in classical times, it is likely Elephantis is two or more persons of the same name. None of her works have survived, though they are referenced in other ancient texts.

Hedyle (, Hḗdylē; fl. 4th century BC) was an ancient Greek poet. She is known only through a mention in Athenaeus' Deipnosophistae. According to Athenaeus, Hedyle was the daughter of an Attic poet, Moschine, who is otherwise unknown, and the mother of Hedylus, another poet. Hedyle was probably Athenian, like her mother.

Melinno () was a Greek lyric poet. She is known from a single surviving poem, known as the "Ode to Rome". The poem survives in a quotation by the fifth century AD author Stobaeus, who included it in a compilation of poems on manliness. It was apparently included in this collection by mistake, as Stobaeus misinterpreted the word ρώμα () in the first line as meaning "strength", rather than being the Greek name for the city of Rome.

Spartan poet praised by Alcman

Charixene, or Charixena (5th-century BC), was an Ancient Greek musician, poet and composer. She was a professional fluteplayer. She was active as a poet and achieved some fame, and Eustathios lists her among Sappho and Korinna as a woman poet worthy of praise. She also wrote erotic songs, and composed tunes for wind instruments. She was respected as an artist, but as a person, many comic poets of the time referred to her as stupid and naive, and her name became an expression of stupidity.

Ionian poet

Cleitagora or Clitagora or Kleitagora () was a lyric poet mentioned by Aristophanes in his Wasps and his lost play the Danaïdes; a fragment of Cratinus also mentions her. A drinking song named "Cleitagora" is mentioned in Aristophanes' Lysistrata.