Silent Revenge: Women Fighting Back in Ovid’s “Tereus, Procne, and Philomela” Anonymous College

Metamorphoses, a collection of poems composed by the Ancient Roman poet Ovid documents hundreds of myths in an encyclopedic manner. It is a collection that is hugely influential in the Western canon and many of the myths surround the brutish treatment of women. The myth of “Tereus, Procne, and Philomela” is the grim account of the princess Philomela’s savage rape and imprisonment by her brother-in-law King Tereus, and her subsequent revenge. The trope of the tragic heroine is challenged as Philomela asserts her agency by actively opposing her oppressor. Though forcibly silenced, Philomela along with her sister Procne threatens a male dominated culture through their revenge. This inversion of power defies the patriarchy and Philomela’s transformation into the nightingale, though ambiguous in the text, restores her voice back into a largely masculine narrative.

The rape of women and the violent manner in which they are often treated is a frequently occurring element in Greek mythology. Philomela is treated in a similar manner when she falls prey to the gaze of King Tereus: “The brute could hardly wait to seize his joys / And never turned his eyes away from her” (Ovid 137). His dominance over the women is emphasized throughout the...