About the work
Hecuba is a tragedy by Euripides, most likely first staged in Athens around 424 BC — a date inferred from metrical features and an allusion in Aristophanes, since no direct performance record survives. The play is set after the fall of Troy, in the camp of the victorious Greeks, and traces the former Trojan queen Hecuba's double loss.
Plot
The ghost of Achilles demands the sacrifice of Hecuba's daughter Polyxena, which the Greeks carry out despite Hecuba's pleading. Soon after, Hecuba discovers the body of her youngest son Polydorus, murdered for gold by the Thracian king Polymestor. Together with the captive Trojan women, Hecuba lures Polymestor into her tent, blinds him and kills his sons.
Cultural significance
In antiquity the play was among Euripides' most widely read works and remained part of the canon through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, though its unflinching violence pushed it out of favour for much of the 20th century before newer translations and productions revived interest. It stands as an early example of Euripides' psychologically precise treatment of revenge and the collapse of human dignity.