Curated playlist
Princesses in Greek mythology
- MedeaMedea, daughter of King Aeetes of Colchis, first appears in Hesiod's Theogony around 700 BC. She carries a lineage that traces back to Helios, the sun god, making her the granddaughter of a deity and the niece of Circe, the enchantress.…
- IphigeniaIphigenia told the assembled Greek army: "In peace and in good heart I offer you my throat." Those words belong to Euripides, but the story they capture predates any surviving text. She was the eldest daughter of King Agamemnon of Mycenae…
- Leda (mythology)Leda, an Aetolian princess who became queen consort of Sparta, is one of Greek mythology's most haunting figures. She is remembered not for her own deeds but for what was done to her, and for the extraordinary children who came from a…
- Phaedra (mythology)In Greek mythology, Phaedra was a Cretan princess. Her name derives from the Greek word phaidros, which means bright. She stood as the daughter of King Minos and Queen Pasiphaë of Crete. This royal union produced eight children together.…
- AlcmeneAlcmene, whose name in Greek means "strong in wrath," is one of the most remarkable mortal women in all of Greek mythology. She was a great-granddaughter of Zeus himself, and yet Zeus would deceive her, sleep with her, and father the most…
- Helen of TroyHelen of Troy was said to be the most beautiful woman in the world. Around the year 1604, the playwright Christopher Marlowe gave her the line most people still know. In Doctor Faustus, a character asks whether this was the face that…
- ChlorisThe Greek word chlōrós describes a color that sits between green and yellow. It means pale, fresh, or even pallid to the ancient eye. A name like Chloris carries this weight of living grass or fading skin. The sound itself suggests…
- CassandraIn Aeschylus' Agamemnon, Cassandra cries out to Apollo: "God of all ways, but only Death's to me, once and again, O thou, Destroyer named, thou hast destroyed me, thou, my love of old!" She is standing outside a palace, brought there from…
- AtalantaAtalanta is a heroine from Greek mythology who was left on a mountain to die as a newborn, raised by a bear and hunters in the wild, fought monsters with her bow, sailed with the Argonauts, and still became the subject of a Greek tragedy…
- Europa (consort of Zeus)Europa was a Phoenician princess, and the man who wanted her was the king of the gods. In Greek mythology, Zeus turned himself into a tame white bull and slipped quietly into the herds of her father. She stroked his flanks, climbed onto…