PHAEDRA (wife of Theseus)

Theseus married Phaedra after the death of Antiope, a union forged as part of an alliance with Crete.^12,13 From this marriage, she bore two sons, Acamas and Demophon.^14,12 Accounts differ on the nature of their marriage, with some noting that she considered Theseus a foeman, while others describe her as a devoted wife who vowed never to be unfaithful to him.^15,14,16 She was the sister of several Cretan figures, including Ariadne, Deucalion, Catreus, and Glaucus, linking her deeply to the royal bloodline of the island.^15,12,1,17

The turning point of her life arrived in Troezen, where she first saw Hippolytus, the son of Theseus, during his initiation in the land of Pandion.^18,4 Aphrodite seized her heart with wild desire for the youth, whose physical beauty had already captivated her when she watched him practice his exercises.^4,19,12,20 Driven by this unruly passion, she compared her heart to a ship drifting with the tide against waves, feeling the sovereignty of love rule over her completely.^21,22,23

When her desire was rejected, Phaedra devised a plot to cause the death of Hippolytus, falsely accusing him of proposing to lie with her.^18,14,12 She cleft open the doors of her bed-chamber and rented her garments to display the supposed assault, her hair disheveled and torn to support her lie.^14,24 Fearing the outcome of Theseus's investigation, she hanged herself, refusing to face her husband to save her life and vowing not to bring shame to her Cretan home.^25,12,5 She hanged herself, choosing immediate death as the only cure for her suffering and believing her calamity offered no escape from fate.^25,26,27,11

She also offered two wooden figures of Eileithyia to the Athenians, leaving a mark on the religious landscape of the city.²⁸ Though she claimed that a chaste wife fears her husband most, her final act was one of desperate self-preservation against a fate she believed would bring her renown through death.^29,16,10