Procne or Progne is a minor figure in Greek mythology. She was an Athenian princess as the elder daughter of a king of Athens named Pandion. Procne was married to the king of Thrace, Tereus, who instead lusted after her sister Philomela. Tereus forced himself on Philomela and locked her away. When Procne discovered her sister and her gruesome fate, she took revenge against her husband by murdering their only child, a young boy named Itys. Procne's story serves as an origin myth for the nightingale.
Philomela and Procne, Elizabeth Jane Gardner.
Procne and Philomela from Apollo's temple at Thermos, 630–625 BC
Furies in Procne and Tereus's wedding night, engraving by Virgil Solis, 1581.
Procne rescues Philomela, 1767 engraving, Getty Research Institute.
Thrace is a geographical and historical region in Southeast Europe. Bounded by the Balkan Mountains to the north, the Aegean Sea to the south, and the Black Sea to the east, it comprises present-day southeastern Bulgaria, northeastern Greece, and the European part of Turkey, roughly the Roman Province of Thrace. Lands also inhabited by ancient Thracians extended in the north to modern-day Northern Bulgaria and Romania and to the west into Macedonia.
The physical–geographical boundaries of Thrace: the Balkan Mountains to the north, the Rhodope Mountains (highlighted) and the Bosporus.
Thrace in the Odrysian Kingdom showing several Thracian tribes. Sapeia was Northern Thrace and Asteia was Southern Thrace.
Skudrian (Thracian) soldier of the Achaemenid army, circa 480 BC. Xerxes I tomb relief.
Thracian Tomb of Kazanlak.
