Hecuba is a tragedy by Euripides, written c. 424 BC. It takes place after the Trojan War but before the Greeks have departed Troy. The central figure is Hecuba, wife of King Priam, formerly queen of the now-fallen city. It depicts Hecuba's grief over the death of her daughter Polyxena and the revenge she takes for the murder of her youngest son, Polydorus.

Tragedy is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy is to invoke an accompanying catharsis, or a "pain [that] awakens pleasure,” for the audience. While many cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, the term tragedy often refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western civilization. That tradition has been multiple and discontinuous, yet the term has often been used to invoke a powerful effect of cultural identity and historical continuity—"the Greeks and the Elizabethans, in one cultural form; Hellenes and Christians, in a common activity," as Raymond Williams puts it.