Posted on 03/08/2026 10:43:24 PM PDT by nickcarraway
There are many strong and powerful women, or femme fatales, who became known for their ruthlessness and cunning ways in Greek mythology, such as Circe, Clytemnestra, and Medea.
These women were powerful and often deadly forces despite the fact that Greek mythology is filled with references to strong men who conquered kingdoms, fought for their freedom, and did not hesitate to kill.
Clytemnestra, one of the most ruthless figures in Greek mythology deadliest women greek mythology femme fatales clytemnestra “Clytemnestra Hesitates Before Killing Agamemnon,” by Pierre-Narcisse Guerin. Clytemnestra is one of the most notorious femme fatales in Greek mythology. Credit: Public Domain Clytemnestra was every man’s worst nightmare. According to the legend, Clytemnestra was the wife of Agamemnon, the king of Mycenae. He sailed to Troy as commander of the Greek Army to help his brother Menelaus take back his wife Helen, who had been abducted by Paris of Troy.
Before leaving Greece, as the story goes, Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter, Iphigenia, to the goddess Artemis, to appease her after he accidentally killed one of the goddess’s sacred stags.
While Agamemnon was fighting the Trojan War, Clytemnestra, who was enraged at the murder of her daughter, began plotting his murder with her new lover, Aegisthus.
Grecian Delight supports Greece Upon the king’s return, the two lovers ambushed him and slit his throat. Choking on his own blood, the king called Clytemnestra a name that can only be translated as “bitch-face.”
Even though she has been portrayed as a villain in numerous ancient Greek tragedies, few could truly blame her for avenging her daughter’s death.
Artemisia of Caria women ancient greek mythology femme fatales The Battle of Salamis. Painting by Wilhelm on Kaulbach, 1868. Artemisia can be seen wearing white and wielding a bow-and-arrow near the middle of the work. Credit: Public Domain Artemisia, the Queen of Halicarnassus, was a real historical figure, but her legacy is legendary.
She fought in the Battle of Salamis for her Persian overlord Xerxes as one of his closest naval advisors.
Even though she was opposed to the attack, she fought bravely and refused to back down.
With her cunning tactics, she fought through the Greek ships fearlessly while the other Persian admirals dissolved into hysteria.
Although she may not have been on the right side of history, the Athenian fighters who sailed against her showed a lot of respect for Artemisia.
Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons in Greek mythology panthesileia The battle between Penthesilea and Achilles. Credit: Marie-Lan-Nguyen/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.5 Penthesilea was the queen of Amazons. She went almost suicidally mad after she caused the death of her sister during a hunting accident.
Driven by the demons haunting her, she decided to go on a suicide mission to fight in the Trojan War.
Eventually, she got her wish, but not before killing her way through the Greek troops and heroes.
She even held her own in a fight against Telamonian Ajax. She was eventually defeated by the Greek demigod Achilles, according to mythology.
Medea, the most notorious femme fatale of all Greek mythology medea “Medea,” by Frederick Sandys. Credit: Public Domain Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Medea was the wife of Jason who, like many ancient Greek husbands, was sleeping around.
He had many mistresses, but when he decided to marry one of them, he stepped over the line.
In order to get revenge, the heartbroken Medea, who was deeply in love with her husband, murdered the children that she and Jason had together.
Circe lured men to her island and turned them into hogs According to ancient Greek legends, Circe, a sorceress, was the most well-known femme fatale of that time. She would seduce men, luring them onto her island.
When the men, driven mad by their desire to touch her, visited the island, she would catch them off guard and use a spell to transform them into hogs, trapping them forever in their ignominious bodies.
The only man who was ever able to escape her magic was Odysseus, who had been forewarned by the ancient Greek god Hermes.
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Some day, dear Nick, you will learn how to use the “WIDTH=80%” tag when you post your images. And those of us with tablets instead of wide-screen TVs will sing your praises.
I used to, but I forgot. Do you remember the formula?
But that small bit of carping aside, thanks for posting this thread. A word of warning to all us males who go chasing after the wild ones.
Sure thing. Like this:
<IMG SRC="https://whatever.domain.com/image.jpg" WIDTH=80%>You can specify the width as a percentage of the viewer's screen width (I find that 80% is convenient), or as a certain number of pixels (e.g. WIDTH=500). Generally a percentage is best for large images because it adapts to whatever the viewer has. For smaller images a high percentage might expand them too much, and in that case specifying a pixel width is more pleasing.
That was 80%, THEN 40%.
I should have mentioned, although "WIDTH=" often suffices to manage size, you can alternatively use "HEIGHT=". It's not recommended to use both together, since that can cause distortion of the aspect ratio. Specifying only one lets the user's browser compute the other.
Thanks!
I thought there was one that used height and width, keeping the ratio.
I suppose that if you use both HEIGHT and WIDTH together, specifying the same percentage, it ought to keep the ratio correct. I don't know of a single tag that incorporates both, although there might be something like "SIZE=".
Where that practice gets in trouble is when you specify in pixels, because the browser will stretch/shrink the image as needed to meet the spec, and if the pixel numbers don't have the right ratio, the image will get distorted.
In the immortal words of Sheldon Cooper “Got yer back, Jack! Dem bltches be crazy”
Francine with the beehive hairdo and cats eyes glasses. By far the deadliest. If she corners you in the break room…her prattling stories about Darl the admin’s inappropriate blouses…aye aye aye.
Pfft. Those females of Greek mythology have nothing on the actual females of today, who can kick ass in straight up martial combat with 10 fit male martial arts experts at the same time.
You want to see some real life deadly women?
Arm the Iranian women - and let them choose which men get weapons to fight alongside them...
Hahahahahaha!
As Rudyard Kipling wrote, the female of the species is deadlier than the male. While female murderers are much rarer than males, when they do go over to the dark side they’re often even more sadistic and depraved. The ancient Greeks and Romans recognized this in their myths and legends.
Only if you are the kind of man who would lure your daughter by saying you had found her a husband only to MURDER her because you wanted to go attack a city and gosh darn it the wind just was not cooperating.
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