Penelope from the odyssey biography samples

Wife of Odysseus in Greek mythology

For other uses, see Penelope (disambiguation).

Fictional character

Penelope (^[1]pə-NEL-ə-pee; Ancient Greek: Πηνελόπεια, Pēnelópeia, or Πηνελόπη, Pēnelópē)^[2] is a character in Homer's Odyssey. She was the queen of Ithaca and was the daughter of Spartan king Icarius and Asterodia.^[3] Penelope is known for her fidelity to her husband Odysseus, despite the attention of more than a hundred suitors during his absence.

In one source, Penelope's original name was Arnacia or Arnaea.^[4]

Etymology

Glossed by Hesychius as "some kind of bird"^[5] (today arbitrarily identified with the Eurasian wigeon, to which Linnaeus gave the binomial Anas penelope), where -elōps (-έλωψ) is a common Pre-Greek suffix for predatory animals;^[6] however, the semantic relation between the proper name and the gloss is not clear.

In folk etymology, Pēnelopē (Πηνελόπη) is usually unde