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Autonoe

Mythology
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, mother of Actaeon who was transformed into a stag and killed by his own hounds after viewing Artemis bathing. She represents maternal grief in tragedy.

Detailed Definition
Autonoe, a Theban princess, suffered the tragic loss of her son Actaeon after he saw Artemis bathing. Her grief exemplifies maternal sorrow in myth. Poets invoke Autonoe to underscore the devastating consequences of divine wrath, voyeurism, and the fragility of mortal life in tragic and elegiac poetry.
Example
Example in poetry:
Autonoe, daughter of Cadmus and mother of Actaeon, appears in Ovid’s Metamorphoses; Poets use Autonoe to explore maternal grief after Actaeon’s transformation and death; In Theban cycles, her exile symbolizes familial collapse; “Autonoe’s tears” could evoke irreversible loss in elegy; Her name (“self-minded”) suits poems about tragic independence.
Additional Notes
Autonoe’s tragedy—her son Actaeon torn apart by hounds after seeing Artemis bathing—explores divine wrath, voyeurism, and maternal grief. She appears in Euripides’ Bacchae, where she participates in Pentheus’s dismemberment, linking two Theban tragedies. Her story is rich for psychoanalytic or feminist readings on punishment, gender, and the limits of human sight.
Also Known As
Autonoë
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