Euripides' 431 BCE tragedy shows a woman abandoned by the husband for whom she betrayed her family and her homeland. Medea's revenge destroys not only Jason's new wife and father-in-law but her own children. The play horrified its original audience and continues to horrify. Euripides gives Medea the most persuasive rhetoric, the most sympathetic arguments, even as she commits the unforgivable. The ending, with Medea ascending in the sun god's chariot, refuses any comfort. The play asks what is left when everything is taken away.