Orestes kills Clytemnestra, his mother, in the aftermath of her murder of Agamemnon. The brief mythic account makes the killing a link in a cycle of violence within one family: Clytemnestra dies at the hands of the son born of her union with Agamemnon, and Orestes becomes the next object of punishment.

Place in the Mythic Sequence

The account first identifies Orestes as the child born to Clytemnestra and Agamemnon. After Clytemnestra kills Agamemnon, the narrative turns to the son’s later act against her. The sequence binds the two deaths together rather than presenting Orestes’ deed as an isolated event: violence passes from one generation to the next.

The Matricide and Its Aftermath

Orestes kills Clytemnestra, and the account immediately carries the consequence beyond the act itself: the Furies torment him afterward. The killing therefore does not settle the family’s violence or end its consequences. Instead, the son who kills his mother becomes subject to further pursuit and suffering.

Narrative Significance

Set beside the story of Agamemnon’s return and death, Orestes’ act supplies a compressed classical parallel for a life marked by violence and its aftermath. The account moves from a mother’s killing of her husband to a son’s killing of his mother, then to the Furies’ punishment of the son. Its economy makes the succession itself decisive: each death gives way to another consequence rather than restoring order.