After this, Hecabe finally succumbed to her misery she threw herself into the sea to drown.Ģ. Whilst there, she killed Polymestor’s sons and then blinded the king in a fit of vengeful rage. Hecabe greeted him and his two sons and convinced them to come into a tent to collect Troy’s last remaining treasure. The traitorous Polymestor came to visit the fallen city before the Greek troops set sail for home after the Trojan War. Despite slavery, Hecabe was afforded one chance for revenge. Hecabe herself became a slave for Odysseus of Ithaca. Her last surviving daughter, Polyxena was taken after the war to be a human sacrifice.

Hecabe lost everything due to the Trojan War: all her sons were all killed, her daughters were either killed or forced into slavery, her husband was murdered, and her illustrious city was burnt to the ground. “There is no end to my sickness, no term. When news of Troy’s fall reached the king’s ears, he killed the boy and took the treasure for his own. Attempting to save her youngest, Polydorus, she sent him to a trusted ally named King Polymestor. She had nineteen children with King Priam including the most famous: Hector, Paris, Cassandra, and Polyxena.ĭuring the Trojan War, Hecabe was forced to watch as each one of her sons was killed, one after the other, sending her into a well of grief. Her story begins with riches and ends with rags… Hecabe married King Priam and together they built one of the most formidable kingdoms on the eastern coast of the Aegean Sea. The women told stories about bygone eras so as to preserve them in people’s memory.Īs Queen of Troy, Hecabe was a woman who had a lot to lose. Greek women were a huge part of the oral tradition as their traditional role in the home meant that they were involved in the education of young children. Ancient Greek culture kept its history alive in the retelling of its history through myth. There were myths, poetry, and plays composed detailing the experiences of Greek women and men alike. Storytelling was often the domain of Greek women.

The oral tradition - a way of telling stories from generation to generation by word of mouth - was a method used to immortalize such conflicts. Meanwhile, the women of Troy were similarly bereft of their men, who fought to defend their homes. This cataclysmic event uprooted thousands of men from their homes and left thousands of Greek women at home to run households and kingdoms. In the name of revenge for his brother, Menelaus, Agamemnon drafted the entire Greek nation under his power to bring their weapons and lay siege to Troy. When young Prince Paris of Troy came to Sparta and kidnapped (or seduced) Queen Helen, Agamemnon’s sister-in-law, Agamemnon took the opportunity to wage war on Troy. Agamemnon had set his sights on the neighboring kingdom of Troy, an affluent city under the power of King Priam and Queen Hecabe. According to myth, at this time King Agamemnon of Mycenae successively brought each kingdom under his power, with himself as King of Kings. What was the Trojan War? In circa 1200 BCE, the ancient Greek world was populated with many different kingdoms. Greek Women, Trojan Women, and the Trojan War Relief showing Penelope, Eurykleia and two other women, drawing aquired 1814, via th British Museum

Trojan war story lost to time