EoiaeGreat_Eoiae

The Eoiae, or Great Eoiae, is usually referred to as the Catalogue of Women which is attributed to the poet Hesiod; the Catalogue was widely quoted in the ancient world and many fragments survive.

Each chapter of the Catalogue began with the English equivalent of the word “Eoiae” which can be translated as “Or like her . . . ,” the poem would then go on to name a particular woman and then tell the story of her ancestors and descendants, for example: from the beginning of the Shield of Herakles which tells the story of Alkmene (Alcmene), “Or like her who left the home of her fathers and came to Thebes with warlike Amphitryon, even Alkmene, daughter of the leader of men, Elektryon . . . etc.”

The Catalogue of Women was an attempt by Hesiod to trace the Greek families as they descended through the mothers rather than the fathers because, it is assumed, the Immortals would seed the mortal race through the women they seduced; the only complete poem from The Catalogue of Women extant is The Shield of Herakles.

For the complete translations of the Catalogue of Women, I recommend the Loeb Classical Library volume 57, ISBN 0674990633; you can sometimes find this book at the library or you can order it from the Book Shop on this site which is linked to Amazon.com.