TOWARDS A CULTURAL VICTIMOLOGY OF ATTIC TRAGEDY: EPITHETS OF MISERY IN EURIPIDES’ HECUBA

Abstract

In recent scholarship, characters in Attic tragedies are often described as victims. Modern audiences may be familiar with the word ‘victim’, but victimological studies have shown that the notion of victimhood, the recognition of a person as a victim, is culturally and historically contingent. As a step towards a cultural victimology of Attic tragedy, this article posits that epithets of misery are markers of the undeserved and unjust suffering which often serves as a foundation for the development of victimhood. In order to illustrate how an analysis of epithets of misery can contribute to a victimological reading of an ancient text, the article discusses the use of these epithets in Euripides’ Hecuba, the extant Attic tragedy with the highest number of occurrences of such epithets.

Keywords

• cultural victimology
• euripides’ hecuba