Psaumis of Camarina

Psaumis of Camarina (Greek: Ψαύμις Καμαριναίος) was the tyrant and re-founder of Camarina and a charioteer who won the Olympic four-horse chariot race (tethrippon) in the 82nd Olympiad (452 BC). He probably had already won the two-mule chariot race in the previous edition of the 81st Olympiad and he also competed unsuccessfully in the mounted-horse race. He was the son of Akron (Greek: Ἂκρων), according to one of the odes written about him.[1]

A pair of odes attributed to Pindar (Olympian 4 & 5) celebrate his victory, but these may actually be the work of a Sicilian imitator of Pindar.[2]

The fourth ode provides the most biographical information

To you he has dedicated rich renown by his victory, and he had his father Acron and his new-founded home proclaimed by the herald. Coming from the lovely homes of Oenomaus and of Pelops, he sings of your sacred grove, Pallas protector of the city, and of the river Oanis, and the local lake, and the sacred canals with which Hipparis waters its people, and swiftly builds a tall-standing grove of steadfast dwellings, bringing this host of citizens out of helplessness into the light.

— Odes Pindar (5.7-12), trans. Diane Arnson Svarlien, 1990[3]

Camarina was destroyed and re-founded several times in antiquity. Its third re-foundation with Psaumis as oecist must have been around the same time as his Olympic victory, as one of the odes refers to it as "his new-found abode" and alludes to rapid growth occurring there as the city re-built. According to Thucydides, the settlers came from nearby Gela.[4]

References
  1. Hugo Förster, Die Sieger in den Olympischen Spielen, Zwickau, 1891, p. 17, (e-book)
  2. Λεξικόν της ελληνικής γλώσσης / συνταχθέν υπό Σκαρλάτου Δ. του Βυζαντίου και πλουτισθέν διαφόροις πίναξι χρονομετρικοίς νομισματολογικοίς κτλ. κατά το εν Ελλάδι νενομοθετημένον μετρικόν σύστημα οις προσετέθη εν τέλει και λεξικόν επίτομον των εν τοις ελληνικοίς συγγράμμασιν απαντώντων κυρίων ονομάτων,«Παύμις» (Anestes Konstantinidos, Athens:1895). vol. 3, p. 1053
  3. available at:
  4. William Smith, LLD, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, "Camarina" (G. E. Marindin, London:1854)
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