of Pisistratus drove her to
the city, having sent heralds before to proclaim: 'O Athenians, welcome
back Pisistratus, whom Athena herself, honoring above all men, now
conducts back to her own citadel!' Thus the report was spread about that
the goddess Athena was bringing back Pisistratus; and the people,
believing it to be true, paid worship to the woman, and allowed
Pisistratus to return." The return was most happily effected, and, soon
after, the usurper celebrated the marriage of this "counterfeit
presentment" of the goddess to one of his sons.

Woman was to continue to play a fateful part in the history of the
usurped power of Pisistratus. The tyrant ill-treated his young wife, and
this threw her father, Megacles, again into the party of the opposition.
Pisistratus was once more driven from Athens, and this time from Attica
as well. But he returned a third time, and established his power so
firmly that at his death he bequeathed it to his sons unimpaired.
Hippias and Hipparchus ruled wisely at first, and carried on the many
public works in which Pisistratus had engaged; but their downfall
finally came through an insult to a highborn Athenian maiden, and the
story as told by Thucydides shows how highly a sister's honor was
cherished at Athens.

Harmodius, an aristocratic young Athenian, had rejected the friendship
of Hipparchus, preferring that of Aristogiton, a citizen of modest
station. The tyrant basely avenged himself. After summoning a sister of
Harmodius to come to take part in a certain procession as bearer of one
of the sacred vessels, Hippias and Hipparchus publicly rejected the
maiden when she presented herself in her festal dress, asserting that
they had not invited her to participate, as she was unworthy of the
honor.

Harmodius was very indignant at this insult, and with his friend, who
was equally incensed, formed a plot which led to the death of
Hipparchus, though Harmodius was also killed in the prosecution of the
plan. Aristogiton was put to the torture; and tradition relates that
Leaena, his mistress, was also tortured, and fearing lest in her agony
she might betray any of the conspirators bit off her tongue. After the
expulsion of the Pisistratidae, the Athenians honored her memory by a
bronze statue of a lioness without a tongue, which was set up on the
Acropolis. The Athenians by this act showed their delight in a play on
names, as _Leaena_ is the Greek word for "lioness."

The Athenian woma