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Why does Penelope unravel Laertes’s funeral shroud each night?
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Odyssey: A Reader’s Guide to Homer’s Epic
Engraving of Homer by Hieronymus Wierix, 16th century; in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
In Homer’s Odyssey, Penelope unravels the funeral shroud she weaves for her father-in-law, Laertes, as a clever delaying tactic to fend off 108 aggressive suitors.12
During Odysseus’s 20-year absence, these suitors pressured Penelope to remarry and depleted the resources of the royal household. To maintain her constancy and avoid choosing a new husband, she insisted that she could not remarry until the shroud was finished. By secretly unraveling her daily progress each night, she ensured the work remained perpetually incomplete, allowing her to hold onto the hope of her husband's return. This ruse successfully stalled the suitors for three years until one of her maids eventually revealed the secret.12