Agave

Definition: In Greek mythology, according to the Theban stories, Agave was the mother of Pentheus and the daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia. She denied that Dionysus (her niece and the son of Semele, sister of Agave) was the son of Zeus and so was punished, along with her sisters, by being turned into a frenzied maenad. In her frenzy, Agave thought her son Pentheus was a wild beast. She tore her own son apart. The Greek tragedy known as The Bacchae or The Bacchantes, by Euripides, tells the story of Agave, Dionysus, and Pentheus.

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