Eurydc
(Εὐρυδίκη). (1) The wife of Orpheus, who, while fleeing before Aristaeus, was bitten by a serpent in the grass and died of the wound. Her disconsolate husband determined to descend to the lower world, to endeavour to procure her restoration to life. Pluto and Persephon listened to his prayer; and Eurydic was allowed to return, on the express condition that Orpheus should not look back upon her till they had arrived in the regions of day. Fearing that she might not be following him, the anxious husband looked back and thereby lost her. (See Orpheus.)
(2) The wife of Amyntas, king of Macedonia (Justin, vii. 4, 5). She had, by her husband Alexander, Perdiccas and Philip, and one daughter called Euryon, who was married to Ptolemy Alorites. A criminal infatuation for her daughter's husband, to whom she offered her hand and the kingdom, made her conspire against Amyntas, who must have fallen a victim to her infidelity, had not Euryon discovered it. Amyntas forgave her. Alexander ascended the throne after his father's death, and perished by the ambition [p. 643] [figure in text: Hermes, Eurydic, and Orpheus. (Villa Albani.)]
of his mother. Perdiccas, who succeeded him, shared his fate; but Philip, who was the next in succession, secured himself against all attempts from his mother, and ascended the throne with peace and universal satisfaction. Eurydic fled to Iphicrates, the Athenian general, for protection. The manner of her death is unknown.
(3) A daughter of Antipater, and the wife of Ptolemy I. of Egypt, by whom she had several children. After the death of Alexander the Great she proceeded to Alexandria for the purpose of rejoining her husband, and brought with her Berenic, her niece, who proved the source of all her misfortunes; for Berenic inspired Ptolemy with so strong a passion that he took her as his second wife, and allowed himself to be controlled by her influence ( Pyrr. 4). Eurydic and her children retired to the court of Seleucus, king of Syria. One of her daughters subsequently married Agathocles, son of Lysimachus; and another, Demetrius Poliorcetes. Ptolemy Ceraunus, the eldest of her sons, seized upon the kingdom of Macedonia. Eurydic followed him to that country, and contributed to conciliate the minds of the Macedonians towards him, through the respect which they entertained for the memory of her father Antipater. Ptolemy Ceraunus having been slain, B.C. 280, in a battle against the Gauls, Macedonia was delivered up to the ravages of these barbarians, and Eurydic fled for protection to the city of Cassandrea. In order to attach the inhabitants more strongly to her interests, she gave them their freedom; and they, through gratitude, established a festival called after her, Eurydicea. The rest of her history is not known.
(4) A daughter of Amyntas and Cynan. Her previous name was Adea, afterwards changed to Eurydic. She married Arrhidaeus, the half-brother of Alexander, and for some time, through the aid of Cassander, defended Macedonia against Polysperchon and Olympias. Having been forsaken, at length, by her own troops, she fell into the hands of Olympias, together with her husband. Both were put to death by that queen (Justin, xiv. 5).