CASSANDRA:
CURSED PROPHETESS
by Laura Fitton

(Paper submitted to Images of Women in the Ancient World: Issues of Interpretation and Identity, Spring 1998)



cassandra on gold ring; courtesy of University of Haifa Library
Cassandra kneeling before the Palladion
gold ring, c. 400-380 BCE
courtesy of University of Haifa Library.
Cassandra, or Alexandra, was a daughter of Hecuba and King Priam, the rulers of Troy during the Trojan War according to Homer's Iliad. Cassandra was a beautiful young woman, blessed with the gift of prophecy by Apollo, who was infatuated with her. Unfortunately, she shunned Apollo at the last minute and he added a twist to her gift; Cassandra was doomed to tell the truth, but never to be believed. King Priam did not know what to do with her, so he tried to keep Cassandra locked up and out of the way of the warriors of Troy. When Troy finally fell to the Greek invaders, Cassandra was attacked and supposedly raped by the Greek warrior Ajax of Locris, but eventually avenged by Athena. When Cassandra accompanied the Greek hero Agamemnon as his mistress to his homeland, she was killed by his vengeful wife, Clytaemnestra.

Cassandra has always been misunderstood and misinterpreted as a madwoman or crazy doomsday prophetess. Shakespeare presented her as a madwoman ranting and raving along the walls of Troy in his play Troilus and Cressida. More importantly, her own people and family in Troy mistook her as a raving lunatic. She has always been shown in paintings with her long hair flying around her shoulders in what has been considered luntic fashion, scantily clad, and helpless on her knees in the face of her predicted doom. But there is so much more to Cassandra than her maddened predictions and pitiable treatment. Cassandra was a great, intelligent heroine who was cursed by the gods for not playing by their rules. She is a tragic figure, not a madwoman.

Her name, Cassandra, has two distinct meanings. Robert Graves translates it from Greek to mean "she who entangles men", which is ironic since, although she was stunningly beautiful, her 'madness' repelled most men and her prophesies foretold their ignorant deaths. Today, we call a "cassandra" someone whose true words are ignored, since Cassandra's doom was to predict what others refused to believe. (Graves p747, Powell p325)

The following pages catologue Cassandra's tragic life, from her initial encounter with Apollo, through her prophesies of the fall of Troy, to her untimely death at the hands of Clytaemnestra.