Stheneboea- Greek FigureMortal"Queen of Tiryns"

Queen of Tiryns

Stheneboea was the daughter of King Iobates of Lycia. When Proetus fled Argos after losing a bitter struggle for the throne with his twin brother Acrisius — the two had fought even in the womb, Apollodorus says — Iobates sheltered him and gave him Stheneboea's hand. She became queen of Tiryns once Proetus returned to claim his portion of the Argolid. Homer calls her Anteia; the name Stheneboea comes from the tragic tradition, preserved most notably in the Euripides play that bears her name.

The Lie

The young Corinthian Bellerophon arrived at Proetus's court seeking purification for an accidental killing. Stheneboea desired him, but he refused her out of loyalty to his host. Rejected, she went to Proetus and swore that Bellerophon had tried to force himself on her.

Proetus could not kill a guest under his own roof without offending Zeus Xenios, protector of host and stranger alike. Instead he sent Bellerophon to Iobates in Lycia carrying a folded tablet inscribed with deadly signs — a message, in the bearer's own hands, requesting the bearer's death. Iobates set the young man against the Chimera, expecting the fire-breathing monster to finish him. When it didn't, he sent him against the Solymoi and the Amazons. When Bellerophon survived every trial, Iobates recognized divine favor and gave him his other daughter Philonoe in marriage.

Death

Bellerophon returned to Tiryns alive and triumphant. Stheneboea's lie stood exposed, and the cost came due. In most traditions she took her own life — by poison or by the rope.

Euripides told a harsher version. In his lost play Stheneboea, Bellerophon lured her onto the back of Pegasus with the promise of flight, then dropped her into the sea. The surviving fragments suggest he justified the killing as payment for her false accusation — a death without a grave and without mourning.