Hecuba and Polyxena (Met. 13.399-575)

Hecuba, the former queen of Troy but now a slave, suffers the deaths of her two youngest children, Polydorus and Polyxena. She avenges the death of the former, and is transformed into a dog.

Model play.

The Hecuba of Euripides.

Areas to explore.

Where do Ovid and Euripides overlap? How does this episode make intratextual connections with the Iphigenia episode of book 12?

Bibliography.

• N. Loraux, Tragic Ways of Killing a Woman.
• B. Otis, Ovid as an Epic Poet.
• W. Thalmann, "Euripides and Aeschylus: The Case of the Hekabe."