Source Verification: Pentheus

Every claim below is either what a named ancient source attests, in its own line or section, or a point where the sources themselves disagree.

What the Sources Attest

Who was Pentheus and how did he die?

Pentheus was a king of Thebes, the son of Echion and Agave, a daughter of Cadmus. Apollodorus says he succeeded Cadmus and tried to stop the Bacchic frenzy that Dionysus had brought on the Theban women. He went to Mount Cithaeron to spy on them. There his mother Agave, in her madness, took him for a wild beast and tore him limb from limb. The fullest account is Euripides's Bacchae, where the god himself leads Pentheus to the mountain dressed as a maenad. Ovid and Theocritus tell the death differently, but both, like Euripides, make his mother and her sisters his killers.

Source: Apollodorus, Library 3.4.2; Apollodorus, Library 3.5.2

Who killed Pentheus in The Bacchae?

His mother Agave, with her sisters Ino and Autonoe and the other Theban women, though the play makes Dionysus the one truly responsible. The messenger says Agave, acting as priestess, began the slaughter. Pentheus threw off his headband and begged her to know him, but she was possessed by the god. She tore out his shoulder, not by her own strength, the messenger says, but with strength the god gave her hands. Ino and Autonoe joined in. Dionysus had announced the plan before the dressing scene: Pentheus would go to Hades slaughtered by his mother's hands. When Agave recovers, Cadmus tells her plainly that she and her sisters killed him.

Source: Euripides, Bacchae 1114-1136

In the play 'The Bacchae,' why does Dionysus say the name Pentheus means sorrow?

Because the name Pentheus sounds like the Greek word penthos, grief or mourning, and Euripides builds the pun into the play. Strictly, Dionysus says less than that. When the king gives his name and parents, the disguised god replies that his name suits him for misfortune. Tiresias makes the pun openly earlier, warning Cadmus that Pentheus must not bring penthos into his house. The play then makes the name come true. Cadmus carries in the gathered pieces of his grandson's body, Agave recognizes the head she thought was a lion's, and the family goes into exile. English translations usually lose the wordplay.

Source: Euripides, Bacchae 505-508; Euripides, Bacchae 365-369

Where Accounts Differ

how Pentheus reaches the maenads
where Pentheus is caught
what Agave takes him for
how the body is torn
who warns Pentheus
whether the killing was just

How Pentheus reaches the maenads differs. Euripides's Bacchae has the disguised Dionysus dress him as a woman and lead him to Cithaeron. Ovid's Metamorphoses has him go alone and undisguised, in anger, after Acoetes escapes.
Where he is caught differs. Euripides and the Corinthian story in Pausanias put him in a tree. Theocritus hides him in a lentisk bush on a cliff. Ovid places him on an open, treeless plain.
Agave mistakes him for a lion in Euripides and for a boar in Ovid. Apollodorus says only that she thought him a wild beast.
The tearing of the body is told two ways. Euripides has Agave tear out his shoulder first, with Ino and Autonoe joining in. Ovid gives his right arm to Autonoe and the other to Ino.
The warnings differ. In Euripides, Tiresias and Cadmus argue with Pentheus face to face. In Ovid, Tiresias foretells his death in detail, and Cadmus and Athamas try to restrain him.
The sources judge the killing differently. Theocritus calls it a deed not to be blamed, done at the god's behest. In Euripides, Cadmus calls the god's punishment just but too severe.

Sources

Primary sources

Euripides, Bacchae 1-63
Euripides, Bacchae 210-262
Euripides, Bacchae 266-369
Euripides, Bacchae 434-518
Euripides, Bacchae 537-555
Euripides, Bacchae 604-641
Euripides, Bacchae 660-861
Euripides, Bacchae 912-976
Euripides, Bacchae 1043-1152
Euripides, Bacchae 1165-1329
Euripides, Bacchae 1330-1392
Apollodorus, Library 3.4.2
Apollodorus, Library 3.5.2
Ovid, Metamorphoses 3.511-581
Ovid, Metamorphoses 3.582-691
Ovid, Metamorphoses 3.692-733
Theocritus, Idyll 26
Pausanias, Description of Greece 2.2.6
Pausanias, Description of Greece 2.2.7