The center of the play is Hecuba, the exiled queen of Troy, and her
sorrow at the death of her family and her city at the end of the Trojan
War. In Euripides' play, the ladies of Troy are depicted after their
city has been taken over, their husbands have been killed, and their
remaining families have been sold into slavery. Athena and Poseidon, two
Greek gods, are talking about how to punish the Greek soldiers for
tolerating Ajax the Lesser's rape of Cassandra as the story opens.Upon
her arrival, the widowed princess Andromache finds that her youngest
daughter, Polyxena, had been killed by her mother's enemies.The Greek
authorities are worried that the little kid would one-day exact revenge
on his father Hector. She is still alive, as is made clear in the book's
conclusion.Many of the Trojan ladies mourn the loss of the land that
gave them a good upbringing throughout the book. Hecuba in particular
makes it clear that Troy had been her home her entire life, only for her
to see herself as an elderly grandmother witnessing the destruction of
Troy, the deaths of her husband, her children, and her grandchildren
before being sold into slavery by Odysseus.