Apr 23, 2019
The Vexed Woman
Being refused, Phaedra returned to her husband, Theseus, and told him that Hippolytus had proposed lying with her! With this, Theseus summoned Hippolytus to question him, as he doubted his wife’s accusations.
When Phaedra learnt of the questioning, she feared the result, and so hung herself.
When Hippolytus heard the accusation, he was driving a chariot and was so distraught that the horses escaped his control and ran away with him. The chariot was smashed to bits and Hippolytus was tangled in the leather thongs and so was dragged by the horses until he died.
(Diod 4.62.3)