Claudia Metrodora was a Graeco-Roman public benefactor. A resident of the island of Kios, Metrodora was the daughter of Claudius Kalobrotos of Teos

Teos

Teos or Teo was a maritime city of Ionia, on a peninsula between Chytrium and Myonnesus, colonized by Orchomenian Minyans, Ionians, and Boeotians. The city is situated on a low hilly narrow strip of land connecting two larger areas of land . Teos ranked among twelve cities comprising the Ionian...

, and the adopted daughter of Skytheinos of Kios.

Details saved from a fragmentary inscription from Ephesus

Ephesus

Ephesus was an ancient Greek city, and later a major Roman city, on the west coast of Asia Minor, near present-day Selçuk, Izmir Province, Turkey. It was one of the twelve cities of the Ionian League during the Classical Greek era...

 reveal that Claudia Metrodora paid from her own finances to provide public meals, erected public baths, held the honorary rank of gymnasiarch

Gymnasiarch

Gymnasiarch [Latin gymnasiarchus, from Greek γυμνασίαρχος which derives from Greek γυμνασίον + ἀρχός ] was the name of an official of ancient Greece whose rank and duties varied widely in different places and at different times...

 on four separate occasions, provided supplies of live oil teice for public consumption, and was honoured as a basileia

Basileia

Basileia may refer to:*One of the daughters of Uranus*The royal palace, or citadel, of Atlantis, as described by the Greek philosopher Plato in the Critias...

of the Ionian League

Ionian League

The Ionian League , also called the Panionic League, was a confederation formed at the end of the Meliac War in the mid-7th century BC comprising twelve Ionian cities .These were listed by Herodotus as*Miletus, Myus, and...

.

Source

• R van Bremen, The Limits of Participation (1996)
• Kearsley, Roy, "Women in Public Life in the Roman East: Iunia Theodora, Claudia Metrodora and Phoebe, Benefactress of Paul," Tyndale Bulletin
  Tyndale Bulletin
  The Tyndale Bulletin is an academic journal published by Tyndale House in Cambridge....
  
  50/2 (1999), p. 189 - 211.