In Defense of Medusa
Medusa is one of the most popular figures of Greek mythology. Most of us know her from the story of the Greek hero Perseus, in which she is described as a female humanoid monster with snakes as her hair, as well as the ability to turn anyone into stone with just her gaze. In the classic story of Perseus, Medusa was beheaded by him, in which her head was used as a weapon. However, there is so much more about Medusa’s characterization than just a typical evil monster in a hero’s adventure that must be slain. In fact, her backstory is quite interesting as it allows us to approach this character from a different perspective, and to do that we must start from the very beginning.
Most sources regarding Medusa’s origins tell us that she was one of the daughters of Phorcys, the Greek primordial sea god, and Ceto, the Greek primordial sea goddess. Medusa was part of what is known as the Gorgon sisters, with Stheno being the eldest sibling, Euryale as the middle sibling, and Medusa as the youngest sibling. Out of the three Gordon sisters, Medusa was the only one who was mortal while her other two sisters were immortal, which explains why Perseus could kill her. Looking back to her early life, Medusa was once a beautiful mortal who served the Greek virgin goddess of wisdom, Athena, as her priestess in which she took a vow of celibacy, a vow of abstaining from any form of marriage and sexual relations. Unfortunately, Medusa’s peaceful days as a priestess were disturbed by a storm of chaos in the form of Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea.
Poseidon was charmed by Medusa’s beauty, but instead of approaching her slowly like any decent person would, Poseidon proceeded to rape her in the sacred temple of Athena. Following this tragedy was another misfortune waiting for Medusa, and that was Athena’s punishment. When Athena found out about this incident, she was enraged for this act of defilement of her sacred temple. Yet, the person who she chose to punish was not Poseidon, but rather Medusa for breaking her vow of celibacy. Athena cursed Medusa by turning her into a hideous form of being with venomous snakes as her hair, along with eyes that would turn anyone who stare into her to stone, the form of Medusa that we are used to seeing. Medusa’s sisters, Stheno and Euryale, defended Medusa for what has happened to her, but they were also cursed by Athena to become similar monsters like Medusa. Hence, they are known as the Gorgon sisters. The three of them were then banished from civilization to an excluded island where they would spend the rest of their life. The event that followed are stated in the story of Perseus.
To conclude, Medusa is what people would call a misunderstood character. She did not do anything wrong as what happened to her was out of her power. A bit of a fun fact, she accepted her fate and stayed on the island with her sisters. She would only kill intruders who came to the island with the intention of killing her, which in my opinion is a form of self-defense. Quite a tragic story per se.
References
Garcia, B. (2013, August 20). Medusa. Retrieved from World History Encyclopedia: https://www.ancient.eu/Medusa/
Glennon, M. (2017, March). Medusa in Ancient Greek Art. Retrieved from The Metropolitan Museum of Art: https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/medu/hd_medu.htm
Regula, D. (2019, July 1). The Curse of Medusa From Greek Mythology. Retrieved from ThoughtCo: https://www.thoughtco.com/greek-mythology-medusa-1524415
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. (2020, January 31). Medusa. Retrieved from Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Medusa-Greek-mythology