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Tisiphone, a MythSource painting
Greek

Tisiphone

Avenger of Murder · Avenger of Blood · The Fury

01Identity

Tisiphone in Greek tradition

As an Erinys, Tisiphone is an avenging spirit concerned with murder, kin-slaying and blood guilt. Born from drops of Uranus’s blood that fell on Earth after Cronus wounded him, she joined Alecto and Megaera in dwelling in the underworld and tormenting the unatoned dead. At Hera’s command, Tisiphone entered Athamas’s house, bringing fear and madness that led him to kill Learchus after mistaking his son for a stag.

Top questions

The quick answers

  • Who is Tisiphone?

    Tisiphone is a Greek being associated with vengeance for murder, punishment of kin-slaying, blood guilt, retribution against criminals, and madness inflicted on the guilty.
    Source

    Source

    • Classical Mythology a to Z
    • Greek Myths & Tales

  • What is Tisiphone associated with?

    Tisiphone is associated with vengeance for murder, punishment of kin-slaying, blood guilt, retribution against criminals, and madness inflicted on the guilty.
    Source

    Source

    • Classical Mythology a to Z
    • Greek Myths & Tales

  • What family links are recorded for Tisiphone?

    Father: Uranus, Mother: Gaia.
02Family

Tisiphone’s family, at a glance

UranusGaia
Tisiphone
03The names

The names Tisiphone answers to

Erinys

An Erinys, or avenging spirit

SourceClassical Mythology a to Z

Fury

An avenging underworld spirit

SourceClassical Mythology a to Z

Dira

A Roman Fury or dread avenger

SourceClassical Mythology a to Z

04The myths

The myths of Tisiphone

2 myths, with sources recorded for each.

Tisiphone Maddens Athamas and Ino

Tisiphone entered the house of Athamas at Hera’s command. Fear, grief and madness followed her. The doors seemed black, the posts shook, and Athamas and Ino tried to flee. Tisiphone blocked their way. Snakes covered her arms and hair, hissed around her shoulders, and spat poison. She drew two snakes from her hair and threw one at Athamas and one at Ino. The serpents crawled across their breasts and filled their minds with violent confusion.

Hera’s anger arose because Athamas and Ino had taken in the young Dionysos, her husband’s child by another woman. Hera also sought the ruin of Athamas and his house. Under the madness sent by Tisiphone, Athamas saw his elder son Learchus as a white stag. He seized his bow, cried out that he had found the animal, and shot him with an arrow. He then tore apart the boy’s still-quivering body.

Ino seized her younger son Melicertes and fled. Athamas pursued her. Dionysos temporarily blinded him, so Athamas mistook a she-goat for Ino and began to beat it. Ino reached the Molurian Rock with Melicertes. She leaped into the sea and was drowned. The rock later gained an evil reputation because Sciron threw strangers from it.

Zeus remembered Ino’s kindness to Dionysos. He therefore did not send her ghost to Tartarus. He made her the goddess Leucothea, and made Melicertes the god Palaemon.

Tisiphone Maddens Athamas and Ino, a MythSource painting of the scene

3 sources· checked 2026-08-18

  1. 1The Greek MythsT1
  2. 2Apollodorus, The LibraryT1

    Quote

    “Hera sent Tisiphone against Athamas and Ino, driving Athamas to kill Learchus and Ino to leap into the sea with Melicertes, whom Zeus later made divine.”

    Apollodorus, The Library

  3. 3The Library of Greek Mythology (Oxford World's Classics)T1

The Birth of Tisiphone and the Erinyes

Cronus attacked Uranus while he slept. Mother Earth, angered because Uranus had thrown the Cyclopes into Tartarus, had persuaded the Titans to rebel against him. She gave Cronus a flint sickle, and he used it to wound and castrate his father. He held the severed genitals in his left hand, then threw them and the sickle into the sea by Cape Drepanum.

Drops of blood from Uranus's wound fell upon Mother Earth. She conceived and bore the Three Erinyes, also called the Furies. Their names were Alecto, Tisiphone, and Megaera. The same blood also produced the nymphs of the ash tree, called the Meliae. In another account, the blood that fell on Earth produced the Furies and the Giants, who were born later.

The Erinyes became female divinities who punished the guilty. They avenged crimes of parricide and perjury, and embodied the torment of an evil conscience and the remorse that follows wrongdoing. Their home was the lower world. There, Hades and Persephone employed them to chastise and torment the dead who had committed crimes during their lives and had not been reconciled with the gods before entering Hades.

The Birth of Tisiphone and the Erinyes, a MythSource painting of the scene

3 sources· checked 2026-08-18

  1. 1The Greek MythsT1
  2. 2Apollodorus, The LibraryT1

    Quote

    “The blood of Uranus that fell upon Earth produced the Erinyes, Alecto, Tisiphone and Megaera, who punished parricide, perjury and other unatoned crimes among the dead.”

    Apollodorus, The Library

  3. 3Greek Myths & TalesT1

Also mentioned in

Stories elsewhere on MythSource that mention Tisiphone, each on that figure’s page.

Continue the road

More of Tisiphone’s family, sourced

GaiaMother