Fiction: Incorporeal Punishment (Klytaimnestra / Erinyes)
Hello my lovelies,
this started as a quite solemn prompt when I was mourning my grandmother's passing. It turned into something much hotter than I expected. The Furies / Erinyes are just pure fire for erotica, it turns out. And speaking of fire, they are described with flaming hair by several ancient sources, so this is what my brilliant illustrator Sinita gave them! She even combined the look with the snakes hair that is also described by other authors.
Find the illustrated version here. 🎨
Glossary
Aigisthos: Agamemnon's cousin who was taken as a lover by Klytaimnestra and helped her kill Agamemnon when he returned from the Trojan War. He ruled Mycenae for seven years until Klytaimnestra's son Orestes avenged the death of his father by killing both of them.
Erinyes: better known by their Latin name the Furies, underworld deities of punishment, especially murderers of family members. The are servants of Hades and Persephone for whom they oversee the torture of criminals in Tartaros. Their names are given as Alekto, Megaira, and Tisiphone. When one of the Erinyes is alone, she is one single Erinys.
Eumenides: according to the Greek Lexicon by Suidas, some ancient folks preferred to call the Erinyes by the euphemism Eumenides, the Kindly Ones
Klytaimnestra: Sister of Helen of Troy and wife of Agamemnon, whom she murdererd with an axe upon his return from the Trojan War alongside Kassandra, his prisoner. She had a love affair with Agamemnon's cousin Aigisthos and both of them were murdered by her son Orestes. Orestes was haunted by the Erinyes for killing his mother but Athena and Apollon defended him in a trial that acquitted Orestes, which is where this story starts.
Orestes: Klytaimnestra's and Agamemnon's son who murdered her to avenge the murder of his father and was haunted by the Erinyes for matricide. In Aischylos' Oresteia, he is put on trial and released after both Apollon and Athena defend him.
Pyriphlegethon: lit. "the fire-flaming one", one of the five rivers in the underworld. According to Homer's Odyssey and Plato's Phaedo, the Pyriphlegethon feeds into the river Acheron as a stream of fire.
The title is a play on the term "corporal punishment". As a shade, Klytaimnestra doesn't have a real body any more, she is incorporeal.
