Leaena

• an heroic courtesan of Athens, in the time of Harmodius and Aristogīton, Plin. 7, 23, 23, § 87; 34, 8, 19, § 72; Lact. 1, 20.

(Λέαινα).

1. An Athenian hetaera, beloved by Aristogeiton, or, according to Athenaeus, by Harmodius. On the murder of Hipparchus she was put to the torture, as she was supposed to have been privy to the conspiracy; but she died under her sufferings without making any disclosure, and, if we may believe one account, she bit off her tongue, that no secret might be wrung from her. The Athenians honoured her memory greatly, and in particular by a bronze statue of a lioness (λέαινα) without a tongue, in the vestibule of the Acropolis. (Paus. 1.23; Athen. 13.596e; Plut. de Garr. 8; Polyaen. 8.45.) Pausanias tells us (l.c.) that the account of her constancy was preserved at Athens by tradition.

2. An hetaera, one of the favourites of Demetrius Poliorcetes, at Athens. (Mach. apud Athen. xiii. p. 577d; comp. Plut. Dem. 26.) [E.E]

(Λέαινα). The mistress of Aristogiton or of Harmodius (q.v.). On the murder of Hipparchus she was tortured, but refused to betray her friends, and, according to one account, bit off her own tongue to make any revelation impossible. She died of her sufferings, and in her memory the Athenians erected on the Acropolis a bronze lioness (λέαινα) without a tongue (Pausan. i. 23, 2).

• tortured by Hippias: Paus. 1.23.2
• her monument: Paus. 1.23.2