Odysseus’ wife, queen of Ithaka, who waits twenty years for him in The Odyssey.
With more than a hundred suitors in her house pressing her to remarry, she promises to choose one when she finishes weaving a shroud for her father-in-law. She weaves by day and unpicks it by night, for three years. Patience as a weapon.
Played by Anne Hathaway in The Odyssey (film) (2026).
The suitors’ crime, eating up her house for years, is a breach of Xenia, sacred hospitality.