, to revenge his death, of which, though innocently, she had
been the cause. Pausanias, who says that this was the general
opinion, avers, on what ground it is difficult to conceive, that
Homer designedly omitted this fact, because it was so dishonourable
to the Greeks; and in his description of the paintings at Delphi,
by Polygnotus, of the destruction of Troy, he says that Polyxena was
there represented as being led out to the tomb of Achilles, where
she was sacrificed by the Greeks. He also says, that he had seen her
story painted in the same manner at Pergamus, Athens, and other
places. Many of the poets, and Virgil in the number, affirm that
Polyxena was sacrificed in Phrygia, near Troy, on the tomb of
Achilles, he having desired it at his death; while Euripides says
that it was in the Thracian Chersonesus, on a cenotaph, which was
erected there in honour of Achilles: and that his ghost appearing,
Calchas was consulted, who answered, that it was necessary to
sacrifice Polyxena, which was accordingly done by Pyrrhus.

The ancient writers are divided as to the descent of Hecuba. Homer,
who has been followed by his Scholiast, and by Ovid and Suidas, says
that she was the daughter of Dymas, King of Phrygia. Euripides says
that she was the daughter of Cisscus, and with him Virgil and
Servius agree. Apollodorus, again, makes her to be descended from
Sangar and Merope. In the distribution of spoil after the siege of
Troy, Hecuba fell to the share of Ulysses, and became his slave; but
died soon after, in Thrace. Plautus and Servius allege that the
Greeks themselves circulated the story of her transformation into a
bitch, because she was perpetually railing at them, to provoke them
to put her to death, rather than condemn her to pass her life as a
slave. According to Strabo and Pomponius Mela, in their time, the
place of her burial was still to be seen in Thrace. Euripides, in
his Hecuba, has not followed this tradition, but represents her as
complaining that the Greeks had chained her to the door of Agamemnon
like a dog. Perhaps she became the slave of Agamemnon after Ulysses
had left the army, on his return to Ithaca; and it is possible that
the story of her transformation may have been solely founded on this
tradition. She bore to Priam ten sons and seven daughters, and
survived them all except Helenus; most of her sons having fallen by
the hand of A