| Taking of Oichalia (Oechalia) |
| The Taking of Oichalia is one of the fragmentary remains of Homerica. |
| There are too few surviving fragments to tell the story of The Taking of Oichalia in a poetic fashion but the plot and outcome have been pieced together from extant artwork. |
| There are towns in Thessaly, on the island of Euboea and in Messenia named Oichalia; the primary interest in ancient Greek history is the Oichalia where Herakles (Heracles) had his encounter with Prince Eurytos (Eurytus) but we cannot be exactly sure in which of these locations that encounter took place. |
| Prince Eurytos (Eurytus) of Oichalia was seeking a manly husband for his daughter Iole; Eurytos devised an archery competition in which the winner would marry the fair Iole; Herakles, as subtle with his bow as he was brutal with his club, entered the contest and won; Eurytos must have known that Herakles was presumed to have murdered his first wife, Megara, so it’s difficult to blame Eurytos when he refused to allow Iole to marry Herakles; with no hesitation, Herakles killed Eurytos and his sons and, to add to Iole’s dishonor and sorrow, Herakles took her as his mistress instead of his wife. |
| The existing fragments of The Taking of Oichalia may be summarized as follows: |
| Fragment 1 - Herakles sacked Oichalia for the sake of Iole, daughter of Eurytos; there are conflicting reports as to who actually wrote The Taking of Oichalia; some assert that Homer wrote the poem while he was a guest of Kreophylos (Creophylus) of Samos; others say that Kreophylos wrote the poem and Homer allowed Kreophylos to take credit for the composition; |
| Fragment 2 - A single line: Ragged garments, even those which now you see; a line from The Odyssey: book 14, line 343 in which the disguised Odysseus tells the swineherd Eumaios (Eumaeus) that he was taken as a slave and dressed in rags; |
| Fragment 3 - There are differences of opinion as to whether Eurytos had two or four sons; |
| Fragment 4 - While living in Corinth, Medeia (Medea) killed King Kreon (Creon) but left her children at the altar of Hera Akraea (Acraea) thinking that Jason would care for them; in their outrage, the people of Corinth killed the children and blamed Medeia. |
| For the complete translations of Homerica, including The Taking of Oichalia, 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. |
| Taphians |
| A division of the Greeks from a non-specific location; the swineherd of Odysseus, Eumaios, owned a man named Mesaulios (Mesaulius) who was a Taphian; during the siege of Troy, the Greek captain, Mentes, was a Taphian. |
| Odyssey (lattimore), book 1, lines 105, 181, 417 (Taphos) and 419; book 14, line 452; book 15, line 426; book 16, line 426 |
| Odyssey (Loeb), book 1, lines 105, 181, 417 (Taphos) and 419; book 14, line 452; book 15, line 427; book 16, line 426 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 1, lines 123, 210, 476 (Taphos) and 478; book 14, line 514; book 15, line 479; book 16, line 472 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 1, lines 132, 223 (Taphos), and 471; book 14, line 534; book 15, line 519; book 16, line 518 |
| Tawny (Xanthos) |
| One of the chariot horses of the Trojan hero, Hector; his other horses were: Aithon (Aethon), Lampos (Lampus) and Podargos (Podargus). |
| There are several ways in which the name Xanthos is transliterated in The Iliad; Robert Fagles names him Golden; Robert Fitzgerald uses the name Tawny; the Richmond Lattimore and Loeb Classical Library translations simply use the literal name but spell it differently: Lattimore spells it as Xanthos and Loeb spells it as Xanthus. |
| The Liddle and Scott Greek-English Lexicon defines Xanthos as Yellow and Golden Hair (referring to bay or chestnut horses). |
| It is interesting to note that when we encounter Xanthos in The Iliad as one of the chariot horses of Achilles, Fitzgerald uses the literal name Xanthos instead of Tawny; inexplicably, Robert Fagles calls him Roan Beauty instead of Golden. |
| The names of Hector’s other horses are rendered in the various translations as: |
| 1) Aithon: |
| Blaze (Fagles) |
| Dusky (Fitzgerald) |
| Aithon (Lattimore) |
| Aethon (Loeb) |
| 2) Lampos: |
| Sliver Flash (Fagles) |
| Dapple (Fitzgerald) |
| Lampos (Lattimore) |
| Lampus (Loeb) |
| 3) Podargos: |
| Whitefoot (Fagles and Fitzgerald) |
| Podargos (Lattimore) |
| Podargus (Loeb) |
| Iliad (Lattimore and Loeb), book 8, line 185; book 16, line 149; book 19, lines 400, 405 and 420 |
| Iliad (Fagles), book 8, line 210; book 16, line 178; book 19, lines 473, 478 and 497 |
| Iliad (Fitzgerald), book 8, line 211; book 16, line 173; book 19, lines 441, 448 and 467 |
| Teiresias |
| tee reh SEE ahs |
| The famous blind prophet from Thebes; Teiresias played a significant role in the destinies of cursed King Oedipus of Thebes and the renowned wanderer Odysseus. |
| Teiresias is usually thought to have been blinded as a punishment for seeing the goddess Athene (Athena) bathing and then to have been awarded the gift of prophecy as a consolation for his blindness. |
| There is another version as to why Teiresias was blind and why he had prophetic powers; Teiresias was on Mount Kithaeron (Cithaeron) when he saw two snakes mating; Teiresias killed the female snake and was transformed into a woman; he then killed the male snake and became a man again; because of his newfound insight, Zeus and Hera engaged Teiresias to resolve a dispute; they asked him which of the two sexes achieved the most pleasure from intimate relations; Teiresias told them that women are ten times more stimulated by intimacy than men; at this point the story becomes counterintuitive because, for some reason, Hera was insulted by his answer and blinded Teiresias; Zeus was sympathetic and gave Teiresias prophetic powers but did not restore his vision. |
| Teiresias lived for at least seven generations and possibly nine; he was alive at the founding of the city of Thebes, i.e. the time of Kadmos (Cadmus) and was still alive when the sons of Oedipus, Eteokles (Eteocles) and Polyneikes (Polyneices), fought for the kingship of Thebes. |
| Oedipus became the king of Thebes after he had unwittingly killed his father and married his mother; because of this sacrilege and unholy alliance, Thebes and the surrounding countryside was plunged into a period of hardship and famine; after a confusing proclamation from the Oracle at Delphi, Oedipus called upon Teiresias to use his prophetic gift to find the reason for the pestilence; Teiresias told Oedipus that Thebes was being punished because he (Oedipus) had offended the Immortals and that the punishment would continue as long as Oedipus was king; this answer almost cost Teiresias his life but Oedipus spared him because of his age and blindness. |
| After Oedipus abdicated the throne of Thebes, a dispute erupted between his sons, Eteokles and Polyneikes; as a compromise, the two brothers agreed to share the throne by taking turns as ruler; Eteokles was first to take the throne but when he refused to step down, Polyneikes assembled an army and attacked the city; the army he assembled was known as the Seven Against Thebes because because Polyneikes and six other commanders each attacked one of the seven gates of Thebes; Eteokles and Polyneike were both killed in the fighting so their uncle Kreon (Creon) became the new king; Kreon gave Eteokles a proper burial but insisted that the body of Polyneikes be left for the dogs and birds to mutilate; Teiresias tried to warn King Kreon that his dishonorable acts would bring down the wrath of the Immortals but Kreon would not heed the warning and compounded his injustice by punishing Antigone when she gave her brother Polyneikes a humble burial; Kreon sentenced Antigone to death for defying his commands but Antigone’s murder only precipitated the death of Kreon’s son and wife just as Teiresias had warned. |
| Ten years after the failure of the Seven Against Thebes, the sons of the Seven, the Epigoni, successfully captured the city; Teiresias and his daughter Manto were taken captive and sent to Delphi as a tribute to Apollon but Teiresias died at Kolophon (Colophon) before he and Manto reached Delphi; Manto was freed by the priestesses of Apollon and told to marry the first man she met after leaving the sanctuary; she met and married a Mycenaean man named Rhakios (Rhacius); their son Mopsos (Mopsus) was also a seer of great renowned. |
| Even after his death, Teiresias was sought after for his prophetic insights; when Odysseus began his journey home after the Trojan War, he encountered the Cyclops son of Poseidon (lord of the Sea) named Polyphemos (Polyphemus); when Polyphemos began to kill Odysseus’ crew, he was blinded and humiliated in the ensuing fight; from that moment on, Poseidon was determined to punish Odysseus and consequently delayed his homecoming for ten years. |
| When Odysseus was stranded on the island of Aiaia (Aeaea), he was advised by the Dread Goddess Kirke (Circe) to go to the entrance of the Underworld and seek out Teiresias; Kirke insisted that speaking with the “shade” of Teiresias was the only way that Odysseus could find a way to appease Poseidon and return to his home and family; Odysseus did as Kirke suggested and after an elaborate sacrifice, found Teiresias in the company of the “shades” of many famous and infamous characters; Teiresias told Odysseus that he would indeed see his home and best of all, there would be an end to Poseidon’s bitterness. |
| Text References |
| Telamon |
| tel ah MON |
| The son of Aiakos (Aeacus) and Endies; he was also the grandson of Zeus and the nymph Aegina (Aigina). |
| Telamon was the father of Aias (Ajax) and Teukros (Teucer). |
| Telamon and his brother Peleus were complicated men because their lives were punctuated with noble as well as base deeds; Telamon and Peleus killed their half-brother Phokos (Phocus) and were forced to flee their home on the island of Aegina; Telamon settled in Attica and Peleus moved to Phthia; the two brothers did not meet again until they both answered the summons of Jason and joined the crew of the Argo to became Argonauts. |
| The three greatest adventures in ancient Greece were the Kalydonian (Calydonian) Hunt, the Quest for the Golden Fleece and the Trojan War; Telamon participated in the Kalydonian Hunt and the Quest for the Golden Fleece but was too old to fight in the Trojan War; regarding the Kalydonian Hunt, a savage boar had been released into the countryside around the city of Kalydon (Calydon) by the goddess Artemis in order to punish King Oineus for his failure to make a proper sacrifice to her; King Oineus’ son Meleagros (Meleager) organized the hunt and Telamon was one of the heroes who helped track down the boar. |
| The voyage of the Argo and the Quest for the Golden Fleece came after the Kalydonian Hunt; Telamon and his brother Peleus were both chosen by Jason to became Argonauts; the crew which Jason assembled were the finest and bravest young men in ancient Greece; their quest was for the Golden Fleece which was in the Garden of Ares in the distant eastern land of Kolchis (Colchis). |
| When the Argonauts were on their way to Kolchis, Herakles (Heracles) and Polyphemos (Polyphemus) left the Argo to search for their lost companion Hylas who had been kidnapped by a spring-nymph; when the three men did not return to the Argo, the ship set sail without them; Telamon denounced Jason and demanded that the Argo turn back and find their shipmates; at that moment, the half-man/half-fish seer Glaukos (Glaucus) rose from the sea and told the Argonauts to sail on; he assured them that the will of Zeus had been done and that Herakles and Polyphemos were destined for a fate other than the retrieval of the Golden Fleece; Telamon sincerely apologized to Jason and from that point on was Jason’s strongest supporter and defender. |
| When the Argonauts arrived at Kolchis, Telamon accompanied Jason to King Aietes’ palace; the king told Jason that he could have the Golden Fleece if he would harness two savage bronze bulls, plow a field and plant dragon’s teeth; Telamon encouraged Jason and said that he would gladly help even if it meant his death; after the field was plowed, Telamon went to the distraught King Aietes and secured the dragon’s teeth for Jason to plant. |
| After the Quest for the Golden Fleece was completed, Telamon became lord of the island of Salamis and married Eriboea; Aias was the son of Telamon and Eriboea but Teukros was born out of wedlock to a woman named Hesione; both brothers fought at Troy but Aias was destined to be one of the greatest heroes of the Trojan War; before the birth of Aias, Herakles was a guest of Telamon; to show his respect for Telamon, Herakles prayed to his father Zeus to send a sign that Telamon would have a noble son; at that moment, an eagle flew over and it was clear that Zeus had blessed Telamon; to commemorate the occasion, Telamon named his son Aias which is a variation on the Greek word for eagle, i.e. aietos. |
| We can make assumptions as to the time period in which Telamon lived; the Trojan War is tentatively dated at 1250 BCE and Telamon was an old man (over 50 years old) at the time of the war; that would mean the Telamon was probably born circa 1300 BCE; the final fate of Telamon is not recorded. |
| Text References |
| Telamonian Aias (Ajax) |
| tel ah MON ee an EH ahs |
 |
| Aias; one of the Greek heroes at the siege of the city of Troy; Telamonian Aias means Aias, the son of Telamon; the Romans rendered his name as Ajax. |
| Aias was the son of King Telamon and Eriboea of the island of Salamis; before Aias was born, Herakles (Heracles) was a guest of Telamon and prayed that Telamon would have a manly son; at that moment, Zeus sent an omen in the form of an eagle to signify his blessing; Telamon and Herakles both realized the import of the omen and when Telamon’s son was born, he was given the name Aias as a variation on the Greek word for eagle, i.e. aetos. |
| When Helen was taken from her home and husband in Sparta, Aias was one of the many notable men who went to her rescue; at the siege of Troy, Aias was the commander of the twelve ship contingent from Salamis, which would have been approximately fourteen hundred men. |
| Aias took his troops to Troy to fulfill the oath he had made to Helen’s father, King Tyndareus of Sparta; when Helen was a young girl she was kidnapped and after her brothers safely returned her to her home, she was still the focus of attention from every man who met her; Helen was the daughter of Zeus and therefore semi-divine. |
| When Helen was old enough to marry, her father’s household was besieged with anxious young men from every part of Greece; Aias was one of Helen's suitors; Tyndareus quickly realized that no matter which man he chose to be Helen's husband, there would always be the possibility of her being kidnapped again; Tyndareus very wisely made all the suitors swear a solemn and scared oath that they would come to Helen's rescue if she was ever taken from her chosen husband; Aias took the oath but Helen was finally married to Prince Menelaos (Menelaus) of Mycenae. |
| When Helen deserted Menelaos for Prince Alexandros (Paris) of Troy, an armada was assembled and over one thousand ships with over sixty thousand men sailed to Troy to rescue Helen. |
| The war became known as the Trojan War and lasted for ten brutal years; the Trojan War took place circa 1250 BCE and we might assume that Aias was in his early or mid-twenties when the war began. |
| The supreme commander of the Greek forces against the Trojans was King Agamemnon of Mycenae; Agamemnon knew that, second only to Achilles, Aias was the best warrior in his army; Aias was a very large man and never shirked from the most intense fighting on the battlefield; Aias had a companion who was also named Aias and was often referred to as Lesser Aias because he was somewhat smaller than Telamonian Aias; when the two fought together they were called the Aiantes which is the plural form of the name Aias. |
| Aias carried a shield that was almost as tall as he was; when not fighting hand-to-hand with the Trojans, he would effectively use the shield to hide an archer so that the archer could shoot an arrow and then duck behind the massive shield for protection before the Trojans could retaliate; when Patroklos (Patroclus) was killed by Prince Hector, Aias fought so fiercely that the Trojans were forced to retreat. |
| After the death of Patroklos, Achilles held athletic games for his fallen companion; when the wrestling competition was announced, Aias immediately stepped forward assuming that no one would dare stand to fight him; to everyone’s surprise, Odysseus rose to the challenge; Odysseus was not a large man but his fighting abilities were never questioned; Odysseus was able to throw Aias to the ground but could not pin him; Achilles let the fight continue until he was sure that there could be no winner without one of the men getting seriously hurt. |
| Zeus decreed that the walls of Troy would eventually be toppled but he was also intent that it would be a slow and bloody process; in the tenth year of the war, the Greeks devised a clever plan whereby the Trojans would open their gates and unwittingly allow the Greeks to enter the city; a large Wooden Horse was constructed with enough room in the belly of the beast to hide some Greek warriors; the Greeks then sailed their ships to a nearby island out of sight of Troy; the Trojans assumed that the Wooden Horse was a peace offering and that the war was over; once the Wooden Horse was inside the walls of Troy, Helen became suspicious of the horse and the intentions of the Greeks; she walked around the Wooden Horse imitating the voices of different men’s wives to see if any of the men she suspected to be hiding in the horse would answer; all the men hiding inside the horse remained silent; when the Trojans relaxed their guard, the Greeks emerged from the horse and the real slaughter began; in The Odyssey, we are simply told that the best Greek warriors were inside the Wooden Horse so we can assume that Aias was included in that category. |
| Aias’ final act of supreme valor was when Achilles was killed; the Trojans wanted Achilles’ armor and to mutilate his body but Aias and Odysseus successfully repelled all Trojan advances; finally, Odysseus held off the Trojans while Aias picked up Achilles’ body and carried it to safety; when Odysseus and Aias argued over who deserved Achilles’ armor, the wise and somewhat older King Nestor of Pylos suggested that a spy be sent to the walls of Troy to see which of the two fighters the Trojans most respected; the conclusion seemed to be that any woman could have carried the body of Achilles out of the fighting but only a real man could have held back the Trojan assault; Odysseus was awarded Achilles’ armor; when Odysseus encountered the “shade” of Aias in the Underworld, Aias would not acknowledge him because he was still angry. |
| There is a popular story in which Aias is said to have killed himself out of jealously when Odysseus was awarded the armor of Achilles but in The Odyssey (book 4, lines 499-511), Aias is said to have drowned because he mocked the Immortals and Poseidon (lord of the Sea) shattered the island where Aias committed the blasphemy, sending the hero to the bottom of the sea. |
| Odyssey (Lattimore), book 3, line 109; book 4, lines 499, 502, 509 and 511; book 11, lines 469, 543, 550 and 553; book 24, line 17 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 3, line 121; book 4, lines 560 and 570; book 11, lines 531, 620, 627, 628, 632, 643; book 24, line 17 |
| Odyssey (Loeb), book 3, line 109; book 4, lines 499 and 509; book 11, lines 469, 543, 550 and 553; book 24, line 17 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 3, line 117; book 4, lines 534 and 545; book 11, lines 550, 643, 646, 654 and 658; book 24, line 17 |
| Catalogues of Women and Eoiae, fragment 68, line 55 |
| The Great Eoiae, fragment 3 |
| The Little Iliad, fragments 1, 3 and 4 |
| Telemachos (Telemachus) |
| tee leh MAH hoos |
| Telemachos was the son of King Odysseus and Penelope of the island of Ithaka (Ithaca); he was born at the beginning of one of the most important events in ancient Greek history, the Trojan War; Telemachos was an infant when his father, Odysseus, sailed for the Trojan War and he is only mentioned twice in The Iliad; when Odysseus finally returned to Ithaka, twenty years had elapsed and Telemachos was a young man; The Odyssey tells the story of Odysseus’ return home and Telemachos plays an important role in that saga. |
| During his father’s absence, Telemachos was raised by his mother, Penelope, and educated in the ways of manhood by an old man named Mentor; Mentor was also the teacher and guardian of Odysseus when he was growing up and the admiration and trust Odysseus bestowed on Mentor made is name synonymous with role-model and inspirational-teacher. |
| When Odysseus had not returned home for twenty years, it became an accepted fact that Penelope would remarry and her new husband would assume control of Odysseus’ kingdom; men who presumed themselves worthy of the hand of Penelope gathered on Ithaka; some were sincere and others were simply opportunists; these men became known as The Suitors; their presence in Odysseus’ palace became so self-indulgent and expensive that Penelope and Telemachos were almost overwhelmed. |
| Penelope devised a ploy to delay the suitors; she said that she could not possibly choose a new husband until she had completed a funeral shroud for Odysseus’ aged father, Laertes; each day the suitors would see Penelope working on the shroud but each night she would secretly undo a portion of that day’s work so that she could delay completion of the shroud and thus not be required to choose a new husband. |
| The goddess Athene (Athena) assumed the guise of Mentor and advised Telemachos to go in search of news of his father; with Athene’s protection, Telemachos first went to the home of King Nestor in Pylos; Nestor had no news for Telemachos but advised him to go to Sparta and see Menelaos (Menelaus); Nestor also sent his son, Peisistratos (Peisistratus), to accompany Telemachos. |
| At the palace of King Menelaos of Sparta, Telemachos, heard of his father’s exploits during the Trojan War but Menelaos was unable to account for Odysseus’ whereabouts after he left Troy; the conversation was so depressing that Helen, Menelaos’ wife, administered a calming drug to the two men so that they could recover their good spirits and not be troubled by sad memories. |
| Without any encouraging news of his father’s homecoming, Telemachos returned to Ithaka; meanwhile, the suitors were plotting evil against Telemachos; they planned to ambush him as his ship neared Ithaka; again, the goddess Athene intervened so that Telemachos could safely reach port. |
| Odysseus had been through many trials on his way home because he had offended Poseidon (lord of the Sea) but, by the time Telemachos returned to Ithaka, Odysseus was already on the island; Odysseus was also under the protection of Athene and was now in the guise of an old beggar; he met Telemachos but did not reveal his true identity; in his disguise, Odysseus went to his palace and observed the suitors in their indulgent and belligerent ways; he began plotting the punishment of the suitors but knew that he could not do it alone. |
| When Odysseus thought the time was right, he took Telemachos into his confidence and, with the help of a few loyal servants, confronted the suitors; a bloodbath ensued; Telemachos did his share of the killing and proved himself worthy of his father’s trust and admiration. |
| As the story of The Odyssey ends, we are not told of the fate of Telemachos but later writers continued the saga of the Trojan War with a series of poems called The Epic Cycle; the poem, The Returns, states that Telemachos married the Dread Goddess, Kirke (Circe), and that Kirke’s son, Telegonos (Telegonus), eventually married Penelope. |
| Iliad (Lattimore and Loeb), book 2, line 260; book 4, line 354 |
| Iliad (Fagles), book 2, line 304; book 4, line 412 |
| Iliad (Fitzgerald), book 2, line 298; book 4, line 426 |
| Returns, fragment 4 |
| Temple of Artemis at Ephesus |
| One of the Seven Wonders of the World. |
| Six of the Seven Wonders of the World were constructed by the Greeks and the most amazing of the Greek structures was The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus; constructed at the city of Ephesus in Asia Minor, circa 356 BCE, under the supervision of the engineer/architect Chersiphron. |
| The temple was gigantic by Greek standards and was larger than the Parthenon at Athens or the Temple of Zeus at Olympia; the site of the temple was once occupied by another, smaller, temple but the original structure was utterly destroyed in 356 BCE by fire when a man named Herostratus set fire to the wooden roof; the flames were so intense that the building, although made of marble, was ruined; Herostratus is reputed to have bragged that he would be remembered long after the men who had built the temple had been forgotten. |
| The new temple was constructed on the same site and, although the proposed design was traditional, the scope and budget surpassed any previous construction project except for those in Egypt and Babylon; the new temple was a massive structure and measured 425 feet (130 meters) in length and 225 feet (78 meters) wide; the 60 foot columns were set on a 10 foot base and surmounted by a wooden roof that added another 20 feet (6 meters) to the overall height; the base of the temple had fourteen pairs of columns on each side and six pairs on each end. |
| A gold and ivory statue of Artemis was the centerpiece of the temple but there were numerous other statues decorating the interior and exterior; the building was surrounded by beautifully landscaped gardens and glades full of wild beasts suitable for the habitat of the Goddess of the Hunt, Artemis. |
| The temple supported a large staff of musicians as well as a choir and was well financed by Persian and Greek benefactors; the temple was a magnet for travelers and pilgrims not only because of its grandiose beauty but also because of its location in Asia Minor rather than on the Greek mainland; Persians, Greeks and Europeans revered the goddess, Artemis, and found a commonality in her worship. |
| The city of Ephesus was devoted to the goddess and each spring there was a festival in her honor where contributions of jewels, gold, silver, silk and other valuable gifts were presented to the priests and priestesses of the goddess; the city of Ephesus and the temple were plundered in 262 CE by the Goths and, as a result, the temple was rebuilt but never restored to its former grandeur; finally, in 401 CE, the Patriarch of Constantinople supervised the utter destruction of the temple; the remaining temple artifacts were looted and the massive stones were used to build churches and civic buildings. |
| After hundreds of years of peaceful splendor, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus became relegated to the mist of legend and the once powerful symbol of Greek culture was doomed to be lost in time until the ruins were finally excavated in 1858 CE by the English engineer, John T. Wood. |
| Tenedos |
| An island in the Aegean Sea near the entrance to the Dardanelles. |
| The island is now called Bozcaada; with an area of 15 square miles (39 square kilometers) it is a relatively small island approximately 16 miles (26 kilometers) south of the Dardanelles and was in close proximity to the city of Troy. |
| When the Greek fleet was sailing to Troy, they stopped at Tenedos; while feasting, one of the Greek soldiers, Philoktetes (Philoktetes), was bitten by a venomous snake; Philoktetes was taken to the island of Lemnos and left until his wound could heal while the others went on to attack Troy. |
| When the Greeks plundered Tenedos, a woman named Hekamede (Hecamede) was taken by Achilles as a slave and given to the old warrior, Nestor. |
| During the Trojan War, Poseidon (lord of the Sea) hid his chariot in a cave between the islands of Tenedos and Imbros. |
| After ten years of bitter fighting, Troy was still un-assailed and the Greeks were in turmoil; the god, Apollon (Apollo) was punishing the Greeks for their ill treatment of his priest, Chryses, and when Chryses prayed to Apollon he referred to the god as the Lord of Tenedos. |
| After the Greeks had reduced Troy to ashes, they made preparations to return the their homes; the Greek commander, Agamemnon, stayed at Troy and tried, unsuccessfully, to appease the goddess Athene (Athena) with sacrifices for the desecration of her temple but others left Troy as quickly as possible and made their sacrifices on Tenedos. |
| In historical times, while putting down the revolt of the Greek colonies in Ionia, the Persian king, Darius, sent his fleet to Tenedos and used a method called “netting” to capture and enslave the inhabitants; netting was a successful maneuver that the Persians used exclusively on islands; the Persian soldiers would join hands and march from one side of an island to the other and snare all the inhabitants regardless of where they were hiding. |
| Fifteen years later, when the Persians were preparing to invade Greece (circa 480 BCE), the people of Tenedos, having only one city on the island, were not threatened by the Persian King Cyrus because he did not see them as an asset or an enemy. |
| Approximate East Longitude 26º 04' and North Latitude 39º 50' |
| The Kypria, fragment 1 |
| Histories, book 1.151; book 6.31 |
| Iliad (Lattimore), book 1, lines 38 and 453; book 11 line 624; book 13, line 33 |
| Iliad (Loeb), book 1, lines 38 and 452; book 11 line 625; book 13, line 33 |
| Iliad (Fagles), book 1, lines 45 and 540; book 11 line 736; book 13, line 41 |
| Iliad (Fitzgerald), book 1, lines 45 and 520; book 11 line 718; book 13, line 38 |
| Odyssey (Lattimore and Loeb), book 3, line 159 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 3, line 176 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 3, line 172 |
| Thebes 1 |
| THEE bs |
| The city of seven gates; the principal city in the province of Boeotia; founded by the legendary Kadmos (Cadmus) when he was searching for his sister Europa. |
| After Zeus abducted Europa, Kadmos conducted an unsuccessful search for his sister; in desperation, Kadmos went to the oracle at Delphi for assistance; the Pythia (priestess) told Kadmos to leave the temple and follow a cow until it laid down to rest and to build a city on that site; Kadmos did as he was told and built the city of Thebes. |
| Kadmos went to a nearby spring and was forced to kill the dragon which protected the spring; he took the teeth of the dragon and, on the advice of the goddess, Athene (Athena), sowed them in the earth; a crop of warriors, called Sparti, sprang from the dragon’s teeth; Kadmos threw a stone in their midst and the Sparti fought amongst themselves until only five remained; the remaining five warriors became the founding families of Thebes. |
| Thebes has had many distinctions in its long and glorious history: |
| 1) After the city was established by Kadmos, the walls were constructed by Amphion and Zethos; the two brothers were the sons of Zeus and Antiope; Amphion built the foundations and bulwarks of Thebes by moving the stones with the enchanting music from his kithara (lyre); Zethos married the nymph, Thebe, and the newly completed city was named after her; in the play, Antiope by Euripides, the story was expanded and the twin boys, now grown to manhood, avenged the harsh treatment their mother had received at the hands of her uncle and aunt, Lykus (Lycus) and Dirke (Dirce); as punishment for their ill-treatment of Antiope, Lykus was deposed as the king of Thebes and Dirke was killed cruelly on the horns of a bull. |
| 2) Aktaeon was the grandson of Kadmos and was turned into a stag and killed by his own hunting dogs as punishment for offending the goddess, Artemis; he either saw her naked while she was bathing or was too boastful of his hunting skills. |
| 3) Thebes was the home of the infamous Sphinx which had the head and breast of a woman, the body of a lion and the wings of an eagle; she was the offspring of the serpent, Echidna, and the two-headed dog, Orthos; she was the sister of the Nemean Lion; the Sphinx was seated on a rock outside the city of Thebes and posed a riddle to travelers as they passed; if they answered incorrectly, she killed them; the Sphinx was beaten at her own game by Oedipus. |
| 4) One of the most notable incidents involving Thebes was the ascension of Oedipus to the throne of the city; Oedipus was the unwanted son of King Laius and Queen Iokaste (Jocasta); the infant was abandoned in the wilderness but was saved by a sympathetic servant of the king and eventually taken to Corinth; the king and queen of Corinth, Polybos and Merope, raised Oedipus as their son but when he became an adult he was told by the oracle at Delphi that he would be the murderer of his father; Oedipus loved Polybos, who he assumed to be his natural father, and fled Corinth so that the prophecy could not be fulfilled; while traveling to Thebes, Oedipus met King Laius on the road and unwittingly killed his father when the two men had an argument; Oedipus then encountered the Sphinx and correctly answered her riddle which caused the Sphinx’s death; the people of Thebes were now without a king and finally rid of the Sphinx so when Oedipus arrived, the people wanted him to marry the king’s widow and become their new king; Oedipus did not realize that he was marrying his own mother; after Oedipus and Iokaste had four children, the truth was finally known and Oedipus blinded himself and fled Thebes in disgrace; the lives and deaths of his sons were the next tragic episode to befall Thebes. |
| 5) Seven Against Thebes is the continuation of the tragic story of Oedipus; the eldest of the two sons of Oedipus, Eteokles (Eteocles), took the throne of Thebes after his father’s self-imposed exile and the younger son, Polyneikes (Polyneices) was forced into exile in Argos where he formed a coalition of seven armies to reclaim the city; the seven armies Polyneikes formed were led by Amphiaraus; Kapaneus (Capaneus); Eteoklus (Eteoclus); Hippomedon; Parthenopaeus; and Tydeus; the city of Thebes was called the City of Seven Gates and thus each army was to attack one of the gates; before the attack, Polyneikes went to his exiled father and begged for his blessing but Oedipus cursed Polyneikes and predicted that Polyneikes and his brother, Eteokles, would both die without honor in the battle for the city; the attack failed and the two brothers died on each other’s spear. |
| 6) The Epigoni were the children of the Seven Against Thebes who, under the leadership of King Adrastus of Argos, captured Thebes after the failure of their fathers; the name, Epigoni, literally means After-Born referring to the sons of the chiefs of the first siege of Thebes; the Epigoni were: Diomedes, Aigialeus, Alkmaeon (Alcmaeon), Thersandros, Promachos (Promachus), Sthenelos and Polydorus. |
| 7) Thebes was the birthplace of Herakles (Heracles); his mother, Alkmene (Alcmene) lived in Thebes when he was conceived and born; when Odysseus was at the entrance to the Underworld to seek the advice of the Theban seer, Teiresias, he encountered the “shade” of Alkmene. |
| 8) During a battle at the end of the Trojan War, Diomedes was fighting a Trojan ally named Glaukos and each man announced their linage and the accomplishments of their ancestors; Diomedes told the story of how his father, Tydeus, had once gone to Thebes as a messenger for the Achaeans; he challenged the Theban men to competitions and bested them all; the goddess Athene (Athena) secretly accompanied Tydeus and saved his life when the disgruntled Thebans ambushed him as he was leaving the city. |
| 9) Thebes was the home of Andromache before she married the Trojan hero, Hector; Andromache was the daughter of the king of Thebes, Eetion, but when she married Hector she was an orphan because Achilles had killed Eetion and Andromache’s seven brothers; Achilles honored Eetion after murdering him by burning his body without stripping his armor and then piled a burial mound over his remains; the nymphs of the mountains planted elm trees over the mound as a tribute to Eetion; Andromache’s mother was captured by Achilles and returned for ransom but the goddess, Artemis, killed her with a shower of arrows. |
| 9) One of the most horrific events to ever happen at Thebes was when Alexander the Great reduced the city to rubble (circa 335 BCE); after assuming the title of King of the Macedonians, Alexander tried to maintain his dominance over the other Greek cities with negotiations and threats; the leaders of Thebes unwillingly submitted to Alexander’s demands but as soon as Alexander became preoccupied with his military conquests directed at the rebellious nations in northern Greece, the Thebans began to talk openly about regaining their liberty and autonomy; Alexander had left at contingent of soldiers at Thebes in the Kadmeia (Cadmeia), i.e. the citadel of Thebes, to assure its continued submission but when the Thebans allowed exiled leaders to return to the city, the rebellious atmosphere became openly hostile towards Alexander; the Thebans barricaded the Macedonian troops in the Kadmeia and rumors began to circulate that Alexander had been killed; when Alexander heard the news from Thebes, he immediately marched his army to the city and camped within sight of the city walls; Alexander sent envoys to reason with the leaders of Thebes but they were determined to fight for their independence regardless of any threats or promises that Alexander made; Alexander held a meeting of his officers and asked their advice; since the Thebans had surrendered to the Persians without a fight when they invaded Greece in 480 BCE, Alexander’s commanders wanted revenge; the battle lines were drawn and the siege of the city began; after hours of fierce fighting, Alexander called up his reserves; the Thebans had no reserves and began to taunt the Macedonians and their allies for their lack of courage and stamina; the taunting enraged Alexander’s army and, when the walls were finally breached, no mercy was shown to the defenders; the Macedonians who had been barricaded in the Kadmeia fought their way free and the Theban army was literally crushed between the two pincers of Alexander’s soldiers; nearly all the Theban men were killed and the women and children who hadn’t been killed in the attack were sold into slavery; the historian, Arrian, reports that Alexander allowed the descendants of the poet, Pindar, to keep their lives and possessions because he held the poet in such high regard; the city was reduced to rubble and when word of the slaughter reached the other Greek cities, panic and dread consumed the populations except for the Spartans, who remained opposed to Alexander and even sided with the Persians to defeat him. |
| Approximate East Longitude 23º 19' and North Latitude 38º 21' |
| Iliad (Lattimore), book 4, lines 378 and 406; book 5, line 804; book 6, line 224; book 10, line 286; book 14, lines 114 and 323; book 19, line 98; book 23, line 679 |
| Iliad (Loeb), book 4, lines 378 and 406; book 5, line 804; book 6, line 223; book 10, line 286; book 14, lines 114 and 323; book 19, line 99; book 23, line 679 |
| Iliad (Fagles), book 4, lines 441 and 472; book 5, line 926; book 6, line 267; book 10, line 335; book 14, lines 140 and 387; book 19, line 114; book 23, line 756 |
| Iliad (Fitzgerald), book 4, lines 458 and 490; book 5, line 916; book 6, line 265; book 10, line 318; book 14, lines 131 and 363; book 19, line 111; book 23, line 776 |
| Odyssey (Lattimore), book 10, line 492; book 11, lines 264, 265 and 275; book 15, line 247 |
| Odyssey (Loeb), book 10, line 492; book 11, lines 263, 265 and 275; book 15, line 247 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 10, line 541; book 11, lines 299 and 312; book 15, line 276 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 10, line 547; book 11, lines 300 and 316; book 15, line 307 |
| Works of Days, line 533 |
| Diodorus Siculus, 17.8-14 |
| Plutarch Lives, Alexander, 10.11 |
| Arrian, 1.7 |
| Argonautika, book 1, lines 735-741; book 4, line 1090 |
| Thelxiope (or Thelxinoe) |
 |
| One of the Sirens; Thelxiope’s name means Charming-With-Her-Voice; if her name is actually Thelxinoe, it means Charming-The-Mind. |
| The Sirens are part woman and part bird; they inhabit the island of Anthemoessa; they are children of the Muse, Terpsichore and the river, Achelous; her sisters are Molpe and Aglaophonus; their names also reflect their vocally seductive prowess: Molpe means Song and Aglaophonus means Lovely-Sounding. |
| The Sirens lure mariners with their seductive singing to the rocky shore and the memorized sailors die in their wrecked ships; the Dread-Goddess Kirke (Circe) warned Odysseus about the irresistible lure of the Sirens so that when he came near their island, he had his sailors put wax in their ears so that they could not hear the enchanted singing but he had himself lashed to the mast so he could hear the Siren’s song without flinging himself into the sea and swimming to his doom. |
| The Argonauts passed the island of the Sirens several generations before Odysseus; the master musician, Orpheus, played his lyre for the sailors and all but one was able to resist the Siren’s song; the Argonaut, Boutes, jumped into the water and swam towards Anthemoessa but before he could reach the deadly shore he was plucked from the water by Aphrodite (goddess of Love) and deposited safely in the Libyan desert. |
| Odyssey (Lattimore and Loeb), book 12, lines 39+ |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 12, lines 44+ |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 12, lines 46+ |
| Argonautika, book 4, lines 885-921 |
| Catalogues of Women, fragment 47 |
| Themistokles (Themistocles) |
| (527?-460? BCE) An Athenian statesman and military commander. |
| His visionary leadership prior to the second Persian invasion (480 BCE) induced the Athenians to build a navy capable of withstanding the Persian fleet; his victory over the Persians near the island of Salamis was decisive and, although Athens had been burned, saved Greece from Persian occupation. |
| When the Persians were mounting their invasion of Greece, the Athenians asked the oracle at Delphi for guidance; the priestess told the Athenians to retreat from Athens and make their stand on the divine isle, Salamis. |
| The majority of the Greek commanders wanted to leave Salamis and fight the Persians nearer to the isthmus so they would have a place to retreat if the Persians won the sea battle; the Pan-Hellenic forces were commanded by the Spartan, Eurybiades; the Athenians were organized and commanded by Themistokles. |
| Themistokles warned Eurybiades that if the Greeks withdrew from Salamis the war would be lost for three reasons: 1) the Persians would have the advantage in open water and the seas around Salamis were confining and therefore not advantageous for the superior numbers of the Persian fleet, 2) if the Greeks moved away from Salamis, the various Greek contingents would not fight as a single force and each individual army and navy would flee to their respective homes and be conquered one by one, and 3) Themistokles warned Eurybiades that if the fleet withdrew from Salamis, the entire Athenian contingent (more than half the naval force) would remove to their colony of Siris in Italy and leave the Greeks of the Peloponnesian Peninsula to defend themselves. |
| Eurybiades saw the tactical logic of Themistokles’ arguments but the other Greeks were not convinced and still wanted to retreat to the open waters near the isthmus to fight; Themistokles put a clever plan into motion that would end all debate and force the Greeks to stand and fight; he sent his servant secretly to the camp of Xerxes and told the king that the Greeks were planning to flee Salamis and, if the Persians acted quickly, they could surprise the Greeks and defeat them; Xerxes accepted the bait and deployed his navy so as to surround Salamis and block all escape routes; as dawn approached, the Greeks took to their ships and the battle was joined. |
| The Persians made several small conquests but the overall movements of the fleet were disorganized and lacked the discipline of the seasoned Greek sailors who soundly defeated the Persians. |
| Themistokles was later accused of financial mismanagement and was forced to leave Athens. |
| Histories, book 7.143-144 and 7.173; book 8.4, 8.19, 8.22, 8.75-83, 8.92, 8.108-112 and 8.123-125 |
| Thesmophoriazusae (Thesmophoriazusia) |
| A comic play by Aristophanes produced in 411 BCE at Athens; usually called The Poet and the Woman but the Greek name was Thesmophoriazusae, which might be rendered as Women Celebrating the Thesmophoria, i.e. the Women’s Festival of the goddess, Demeter. |
| This is one of Aristophanes’ more ribald plays and might not be suitable for younger readers. |
| It seems that the women of the city of Athens have decided to kill the poet, Euripides, because of the demeaning way in which he portrays women in his plays; the women put Euripides in the same category as the accursed Persians and declare him an enemy of the state; Euripides persuades his father-in-law, Mnesilochos (Mnesilochus), to dress like a woman and attend the Women’s Assembly in order to speak out on Euripides’ behalf; at first, Mnesilochos speaks well for Euripides and seems to be generating some sympathy for the doomed poet but an informant arrives and tells the women that a male spy has invaded their assembly; it doesn’t take long for the women to deduce that the only woman to speak out for Euripides is the intruder. |
| At this point the play takes a unique turn; I have to admit that I was more than a little surprised when Mnesilochos snatched up a baby from a woman in the assembly and threatened to kill it unless he was allowed to leave the hall unharmed; I won’t tell you how the situation is resolved but I will say that it’s scenes like this which demonstrate Aristophanes’ true comic genius. |
| After Mnesilochos is taken prisoner and restrained, Euripides enters the scene to save his father-in-law from the wrath of the women; the comic banter between Mnesilochos and Euripides is dialogue taken from Euripides’ tragedies and turned into farcical parodies. |
| Although the play mocks Euripides, there is an element of respect for his work laced throughout the puns and jokes; the net result of reading this play is that I wanted to read more plays by Euripides and Aristophanes. |
| Aristophanes’ plays are sometimes difficult to appreciate because he was a very contemporary poet, i.e. he was writing for the Athenian audience of his day; he would use puns, parody regional accents and speak directly to the audience in ways that force modern translators to seek out the contextual meaning rather than the literal meaning of the poet’s words; for that reason, I suggest that if you find a translation that is difficult to enjoy, please don’t blame Aristophanes, simply look for a translation that you can enjoy; you may find this play at your local library or you can order it from the Book Shop on this site. |
| Thoas 2 |
| Thoas was one of the huge monsters collectively known as the Giants; the Giants were the children of Gaia (Earth) engendered by the blood of Ouranos (the Heavens). |
| The Giants waged an unsuccessful war on the Olympians and were severely punished after their defeat; the poet Hesiod states that the Giants were banished to the Underworld but Apollodorus of Athens clearly describes the brutal death of the Giants. |
| The Giants were mostly human in form but their bodies were massive and they were invincible in their might; they had long drooping locks on their heads and chins; their feet had scales like a dragon or serpent; whether they actually had the feet of dragons or whether they were simply scaled was a point of contention among several of the ancient authors; the traveler and historian, Pausanias, disputed the fact that the Giants literally had dragon feet but ancient artwork generally represented the Giants with serpent-like feet. |
| The origin of the Giants was either Phlegrae or Pallene but it has been suggested that the two names represent the same place; the Immortals were given an oracle which stated that the Giants could not be killed by a god or goddess so they decided to enlist the aid of Herakles (Heracles) to do the actual killing; when Gaia learned of the oracle, she began the preparation of a drug that would protect her awful children but Zeus culled a cunning brew of his own that would make the Giants vulnerable to the wrath of the Immortals; in order to have the time necessary for the creation of the drug, Zeus forbade Eos (Dawn), Selene (Moon) and Helios (Sun) to shine until his task was complete. |
| The goddess Athene (Athena) summoned Herakles and the war against the Giants began: |
| Thoas and Agrios (Agrius) were beaten with brazen clubs by the Fates; their brothers all met a similar doom: |
| Alkyoneos (Alcyoneus) - Alkyoneos was one of the two most powerful of the Giants; he was brazen in his contempt for the Olympian Gods and even stole the cattle of Helios from Erythia; he was immortal as long as he remained on his home soil, i.e. he could not be killed by man, god or beast as long as he remained in the land of his birth; he was, however, the first of the Giants to die; Herakles shot Alkyoneos with an arrow and the mighty Giant fell to the ground where he was revitalized by the earth and began to recover from the wound; at the advice of Athene, Herakles dragged Alkyoneos out of Pallene where he was no longer protected by his native soil and he died. |
| Porphyrion - Alkyoneos and Porphyrion were the two most powerful Giants; while Alkyoneos and Herakles were fighting, Porphyrion joined the battle but was immediately distracted by an intervention from Zeus; an irresistible longing for the goddess Hera overcame Porphyrion and he began to tear at the goddesses’ garments; Herakles killed Alkyoneos while Porphyrion was lustfully distracted and Zeus struck the unsuspecting Giant with a thunderbolt and rendered him helpless but not dead; Herakles shot Porphyrion with an arrow and killed him. |
| The other Giants also met cruel fates at the hands of Herakles and the Immortals; to list them briefly: |
| Ephialtes was shot with an arrow in the left eye by Apollon and then in the right eye by Herakles. |
| Eurytos (Eurytus) was killed by Dionysos with a thyrsus, i.e. a wand wreathed in ivy and vine leaves with a pine cone at the top. |
| Klytios (Clytius) was killed by the goddess Hekate (Hecate) with torches; presumably he was burned to death. |
| Mimas was killed when Hephaistos (Hephaestus) showered him with missiles of hot metal. |
| Enkelados (Enceladus) tried to run away but Athene dropped the island of Sicily on him. |
| Polybotes was chased by Poseidon to the island of Kos (Cos) where the god broke off a piece of the island (called Nisyrum) and hurled it at the desperate Giant. |
| Hippolytus (Hippolytos) was killed by Hermes who was wearing the Helm of Hades which made him invisible. |
| Gration was killed by Artemis; the other (unnamed) Giants were struck by thunderbolts from Zeus; Herakles shot and killed each of the Giants with arrows as they lay suffering. |
| Pausanaus, book vii, chapter 29 |
| Library, book I, chapter VI |
| Theogony, line 185 |
| Thrasymedes |
| One of the sons of Nestor and Eurydike (Eurydice). |
| Iliad (Lattimore and Loeb), book 9, line 81; book 10, line 255; book 14, line 10; book 16, line 321; book 17, lines 378 and 705 |
| Iliad (Fagles), book 9, line 95; book 10, line 298; book 14, line 11; book 16, line 379; book 17, lines 437 and 794 |
| Iliad (Fitzgerald), book 9, line 96; book 10, line 281; book 14, line 12; book 16, line 376; book 17, lines 426 and 796 |
| Odyssey (Lattimore and Loeb), book 3, lines 39, 414, 442 and 448 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 3, lines 43, 463, 494 and 503 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 3, lines 44, 448, 478 and 486 |
| Timoleon |
| tee moh LEH on |
| A Greek commander from the city of Corinth who, circa 337 BCE, was sent to the city of Syracuse on the island of Sicily to depose the tyrant, Dionysius II. |
| Syracuse had been under the control of Dionysius II until he was forced to flee Sicily in 354 BCE because of a revolution led by his uncle, Dion; Dion was a good man and wanted freedom for the Syracusans for the sake of justice and not for personal gain; regardless of his noble ideals and efforts, Dion was assassinated; after Dion’s death, Syracuse was ruled by a series of failed tyrannies until Dionysius returned from exile and resumed control of Syracuse and the eastern half of Sicily. |
| Sicily had been colonized by the Corinthians circa 734 BCE and control of the island had been generally divided between the colonists from Corinth and the Carthaginians from Africa; armed conflicts between the two powers was constant but the division of the island remained relatively constant; the Greeks referred to the Carthaginians as barbarians. |
| When Dionysius returned to Sicily, the island was in shambles; many of the formerly prosperous cities were deserted and the Carthaginians were massing for a military takeover of the entire island; there was a local tyrant named Hicetas of the city of Leontini who gave sanctuary to refugees from Syracuse when Dionysius returned and pretended to support the Greek inhabitants of Sicily while he was secretly negotiating with the Carthaginians; the Greeks hoped that the Corinthians would send military assistance to dispose of Dionysius, establish a free government in Syracuse, and put the Carthaginians back on the defensive; Hicetas thought that sending envoys to Corinth was a good idea because he assumed that the Corinthians would refuse to send assistance and he would be free to join forces with the Carthaginians against Dionysius. |
| The plea from the Sicilians was treated with urgent consideration in Corinth; many men were recommended to command the mission to Sicily and Timoleon’s nomination seemed to be an act of inspiration rather than a logical choice; Timoleon was the son of Timodemus and Demariste; he had an older brother named Timophanes and their relationship had proved to be one of the most turbulent aspects of Timoleon’s life; Timophanes was headstrong and felt that he was destined for greatness; he was recklessly brave in battle and, circa 367 BCE, would have been killed if Timoleon had not saved his life; Timophanes’ downfall came when the Corinthians voted to maintain four hundred mercenaries instead of a standing army of citizens; when they placed Timophanes in command of the mercenaries, he began executing people who opposed him and declared himself to be the tyrant of Corinth; Timoleon appealed to his brother’s moral decency and tried to persuade him to renounce his greed for power; Timophanes mocked Timoleon and it became evident that only death would cure Timophanes of his mad ambitions; whether Timoleon actually killed his brother is not clear but he did take some sort of active role in the assassination. |
| The news of Timophanes murder was welcomed by freedom loving Corinthians but there were some who thought the murder of a brother, regardless of the reasons, was unforgivable; Timoleon’s mother was one of the people who would not forgive him; Timoleon became withdrawn and spent most of his time in the country and very little time in Corinth; twenty years passed without Timoleon engaging in any sort of public or private enterprise; despite all his self doubts, Timoleon was still regarded as a good man who had shown his bravery and tact on the battlefield and had sacrificed his family ties and reputation to kill a tyrant; with all that in mind, Timoleon was nominated to lead a Corinthian expedition to Sicily. |
| As Timoleon was preparing for his voyage to Sicily, a letter arrived from Hicetas saying that he had made a deal with the Carthaginians and that their fleet would be ready to fight any Corinthian attempt to land on Sicily; this inflamed the Corinthians and transformed their tepid support into eager enthusiasm; to add to the public approval of the expedition, the priestesses of Persephone dreamed that they had seen Persephone and her mother Demeter making ready for a journey and saying that they were going to accompany Timoleon to Sicily; one of Timoleon’s ships was thus named The Sacred Ship of Demeter and Persephone; Timoleon went to the Oracle at Delphi and as he entered the shrine, a fillet with images of the goddess Nike (Victory) fell onto Timoleon’s head as if he was being crowned by Apollon and was assured of success. |
| There is an element to Timoleon’s voyage to Sicily which goes beyond the normal historical telling of the event; after consulting the Oracle at Delphi, Timoleon returned to Corinth to consult the priestesses of Demeter and Persephone and seek their blessings; when he arrived at the temple, the priestesses told him that they had received favorable dreams during the night and that the goddesses would guide and protect Timoleon and his fleet; as if on cue, a blazing torch appeared in the western sky; the torch remained in the sky and led the ships all the way to Sicily; the soldiers and sailors who were with Timoleon knew that they would be outnumbered when they reached Sicily but the blazing sign from the goddesses assured them that they would be victorious; it is reasonable to assume that the blazing torch in the sky was witnessed by nearly a thousand men. |
| As the fleet of ten ships sailed from Corinth (344 BCE), they received word from Hicetas that he had laid siege to Syracuse and had Dionysius trapped in the acropolis on the harbor island of Ortygia; Hicetas said that he would allow Timoleon to come to Syracuse but if he tried to bring his fleet, the Carthaginians would stop him; when Timoleon arrived at Rhegium in southern Italy, he met with Carthaginian envoys from Hicetas and saw twenty Carthaginian ships anchored in the bay; the people of Rhegium were opposed to having the barbarian Carthaginians as rulers of Sicily and so they helped Timoleon contrive a plan to escape the Carthaginian fleet. |
| Timoleon told the Carthaginians that he would agree to all their terms but wanted a public discussion with the citizens of Rhegium as witnesses to assure the Carthaginian’s good faith; this stipulation was agreed to and the city was called into assembly; the gates were closed and a series of lengthy speeches were delivered; while Timoleon and the Carthaginian commanders were occupied inside the city walls, Timoleon’s fleet sailed into the open sea and headed for Sicily; Timoleon waited for an opportune moment and with the help of the people of Rhegium, secretly left the assembly and took a waiting ship so he could join the rest of his fleet. |
| Timoleon arrived on Sicily at the small port city of Tauromenium which was ruled by a benevolent tyrant named Andromachus; when the Carthaginians learned of this, they sent an envoy to Andromachus and demanded the surrender of Timoleon; threats were made by the Carthaginians but Andromachus stood firm in his support of Timoleon and made counter threats; when Hicetas heard the news that Timoleon was on Sicily, he called for more ships from the Carthaginians to protect Syracuse; at that time Syracuse was in desperate straits because Hicetas controlled the city, the Carthaginians controlled the harbor and Dionysius controlled the acropolis on Ortygia; messages were sent to Timoleon by the Syracusans saying that they did not welcome his advance into the city; other Sicilian cities did the same except for the city of Adranum which sent invitations to both Hicetas and Timoleon. |
| Timoleon marched to Adranum but when he neared the city he learned that Hicetas had already arrived and was making camp; Timoleon had only twelve hundred men and Hicetas had five thousand; Timoleon insisted that his men march on Adranum with all speed and catch Hicetas off guard; the plan worked; Hicetas’ men took flight when they saw the attack coming; hundreds were killed and many more were captured alive; the people of Adranum opened their gates and welcomed Timoleon; Adranum was sacred to the Sicilian god called Adranus; it was said that when Timoleon engaged Hicetas in battle, the temple doors opened of their own accord and the spear of Adranus began to tremble and sweat appeared to run down the face of Adranus’ statue; with the victory at Adranum and the tacit blessing of Adranus, the other cities of Sicily sent messages of welcome and support to Timoleon. |
| Dionysius also sent a message to Timoleon and offered to surrender; Timoleon sent two commanders and four hundred soldiers secretly into the acropolis and took control of the citadel and the vast stores of supplies; Dionysius was conveyed out of the acropolis and taken to Timoleon; in 343 BCE Dionysius was put on a ship with a small fortune and transported to Corinth; Dionysius had been tyrant of Syracuse for a total of twenty two years and was now destined to spend his remaining days in quiet retirement. |
| With Dionysius banished from Sicily, Timoleon was soon able to take control of Syracuse and the harbor from Hicetas and the Carthaginians; seeing the outlying Greek colonies in disarray, the Carthaginians tried to expand their hold on Sicily; with a smaller army, Timoleon defeated the Carthaginians and reestablished the traditional boundaries which separated the Greeks and Carthaginians, that is, the Carthaginians on the western portion of the island and the Greeks on the eastern portion. |
| Timoleon used his military strength to banish or kill the tyrants of the other Greek cities on Sicily and became the supreme Greek commander on the island; he established a constitution but that did not restrict or inhibit his authority; over fifty thousand Greek settlers immigrated to Sicily after Timoleon had pacified the island; Timoleon eventually resigned from the government because of failing health and died in Syracuse circa 330 BCE. |
| Plutarch’s Lives, Timoleon |
| Diodorus Siculus, book 16.66 |
| Trojan Horse |
 |
| The fall of Troy was accomplished by use of the Wooden Horse which is also called the Trojan Horse; the horse was designed by a man named Epeios (Epeius) with the inspiration of the goddess Athene (Athena). |
| After ten years of an unsuccessful siege on the walls of Troy, the Achaean Greeks devised a plan by which they would pretend to abandon the war and retreat back to their homes; the Greeks built a hollow Wooden Horse in which they could hide some of their best warriors; the horse was then left in front of the gates of Troy with the assumption that the Trojans would take it into the city as a trophy. |
| Some of the Trojans thought that the Wooden Horse was a symbol of peace and a tribute to the goddess Athene; others thought that the Wooden Horse was a trick and should be burned where it stood; the Trojan seer Laokoon (Laocoon) tried to warn King Priam that the Wooden Horse was a trick and not a peace offering but Poseidon (lord of the Sea), who was clearly on the side of the Greeks, sent one of his giant sea-serpents to kill Laokoon and one (or both) of his sons; Priam assumed that Laokoon was killed because he was giving false prophecy and ordered the Wooden Horse to be brought inside the walls of the city. |
| The Trojan War was not simply a dispute between nations or a feud over territory; the war was started and perpetuated by the Immortals with the intention of ridding the earth of a good portion of the human population; a beautiful young woman from Sparta was used as the bait to lure a handsome prince of Troy; the love affair between Helen and Alexandros (Paris) was all that was needed to set the mainland Greeks against the Trojans; the Trojans were actually Greeks even though they lived on the coast of Asia Minor but their common heritage did not prevent the war. |
| Zeus decreed that the walls of Troy would eventually be toppled but he was also intent that it would be a slow and bloody process; the construction of the Wooden Horse was the signal that the war was coming to an end; with the Achaean Greeks apparently gone and the Wooden Horse inside the city walls, the Trojans were ecstatic; they believed that they had survived ten years of fierce fighting and that their city would become prosperous again. |
| Helen had been living with the Trojans for ten years and was sympathetic to their survival even though her Spartan husband Menelaos (Menelaus) was in the Greek army fighting to free her from her supposed captivity; Helen knew the Greeks well and suspected a trick when she saw the Wooden Horse; when the horse was brought into the city, Helen walked around it imitating the voices of different men’s wives to see if any of the men she suspected to be hiding in the horse would answer; with one exception, all the men hiding inside the horse remained silent; Odysseus forcefully restrained a man named Antiklos (Anticlus) when he tried to answer Helen’s convincing imitation of his wife. |
| After a day and night of celebration, the Trojans collapsed into a state of exhaustion; the soldiers inside the Wooden Horse emerged from hiding and opened the gates of the city; the entire invading army entered the city, leveled the walls of Troy and killed or enslaved every Trojan citizen. |
| The first mention of the Wooden Horse is in The Odyssey and there are very few details as to the size of the horse or exactly how many men were concealed inside; we are simply told that the best of the Achaean warriors were inside the horse; Menelaos, Odysseus, Diomedes and Antiklos were listed as being inside the horse but the other warriors are not named; however, later authors seem to have had no trouble in filling in the blanks; the number of warriors inside the horse began to vary from thirty to fifty and then seemed to stabilize at forty; also, the names of the men inside the Wooden Horse were finally revealed by authors writing fifteen hundred years after the Trojan War and seven hundred years after Homer. |
| Modern authors have proposed that the Trojan Horse was not a hollow troop carrier in the shape of a horse but instead a battering ram, i.e. a long wooden pole with a horse head on the end; others have speculated that the Trojan Horse was an earthquake brought on by Poseidon who is credited with giving mankind the horse; Poseidon, a.k.a. the Earth Shaker, wanted Troy to fall and he created the horse, therefore the Trojan Horse was an earthquake; the correlation is strained at best; another far reaching explanation of the Trojan Horse is that it was not a wooden structure but simply the Achaean Greeks disguised as a Trojan cavalry unit which gained access to the city by just riding through the gates; the problem with all these explanations is that Homer did not use the term Trojan Horse, he consistently called it a Wooden Horse and said that there were men concealed inside. |
| I mention these alternate explanations because it seems that some of us have not yet learned the lesson so clearly demonstrated by Heinrich Schliemann; Mr. Schliemann (1822-1890 CE) proposed that there had been a real city named Troy in antiquity; he was promptly ridiculed by contemporary scholars who were convinced that Troy was a mythical city in a fictional story; since Homer and other ancient authors spoke of Troy as a real place and Alexander the Great and Julius Cesar both claimed to have visited the ruins of Troy, Heinrich Schliemann reasoned that Troy actually existed and that the ruins could be found by following the clues found in The Iliad and The Odyssey; Mr. Schliemann found Troy and history had to be rewritten; let’s apply the same logic to the Wooden Horse and assume that the Greeks actually built a huge Wooden Horse and that Trojans unwittingly took the horse into their doomed city. |
| The Little Iliad, fragment 1, line 19 |
| Odyssey (Lattimore and Loeb), book 4, lines 271-280; book 8, lines 492-520; book 11, lines 522-532 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 4, lines 304-324; book 8, lines 552-576; book 11, lines 596-609 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 4, lines 289-311; book 8, lines 526-550; book 11, lines 621-639 |
| Trojan War |
 |
| The ten year war between the Trojans and the Achaean Greeks who sought to retrieve Helen from her supposed kidnapper, Prince Alexandros (Paris) of Troy (Ilium). |
| The story of the Trojan War was told eloquently in The Iliad by Homer and elaborated on in The Odyssey and the surviving fragments of the Epic Cycle; the Trojan War has been tentatively placed at 1250 BCE. |
| The cause of the war cannot be blamed on the Trojans or the Achaean Greeks; the kidnapping of Helen was only the superficial reason for the war; Zeus decreed that there would be a long, bloody war for the purpose of punishing and diminishing the human race; thousands of mortal men and women would have to die in order to achieve that goal; also, many of the children of the Immortals (demigods) would have to die before Troy could be conquered; Zeus put a series of events into motion to make the war inevitable. |
| One of the first events to set the stage for the Trojan War was the marriage of Peleus and Thetis; the Nereid, Thetis, was given to Peleus (a mortal) because of his undying devotion to the gods on Mount Olympos; the marriage was also a punishment for Thetis because she had rejected Zeus’ amorous advances. |
| In order to honor Thetis, Zeus’ sister/wife Hera invited all the Immortals to the wedding; the goddess Eris was in attendance but she did not come to celebrate, she came to do what she does best, cause trouble; Eris cast down a golden apple with the inscription, ‘For the most beautiful one’; Hera, Athene and Aphrodite (goddess of Love) all assumed that the golden apple was for them and when the intended conflict arose, the Trojan prince Alexandros (Paris) was asked to make the final decision as to which goddess deserved the golden apple; Aphrodite promised Paris the hand of the most beautiful mortal woman in Greece, Helen; Paris could not refuse such a prize; he chose Aphrodite as the most beautiful goddess; Hera and Athene never forgave the insult; the walls of Troy toppled and all of Paris’ family paid with their lives for his greed and desire; this event has come to be known as The Judgment of Paris although, at that time, it seemed to be just another demonstration of the rivalry between the Immortals. |
| Helen was the most beautiful woman to have ever been born; she was the daughter of Zeus and a mortal woman named Leda; Theseus, the future king of Athens, kidnapped Helen when she was a young girl because he could not resist her beauty when he saw her dancing at the Temple of Artemis at Sparta; Helen was finally rescued by her brothers but the incident made Helen’s foster father, King Tyndareus of Sparta, wary of Helen’s future; when it came time to choose a husband for Helen, King Tyndareus made a very wise and fateful decision; when his palace was besieged with suitors for Helen, he immediately realized that no matter which man he chose to be Helen’s husband, there would always be the possibility of her being kidnapped again; Tyndareus made all the suitors swear a solemn and sacred oath that they would come to Helen’s rescue if she was ever taken from her chosen husband; all the suitors took the oath and Helen was finally married to Prince Menelaos (Menelaus) of Mycenae. |
| To fulfill her promise to Alexandros, Aphrodite arranged for Prince Alexandros to visit Menelaos and Helen at Sparta; when Menelaos was called away on business, Aphrodite enchanted Alexandros and Helen and they fell hopelessly in love; they took Helen’s wedding dowry and fled to Troy; Menelaos did not understand that Aphrodite was involved and assumed that Alexandros had kidnapped his wife and stolen the dowry; Menelaos called on his brother Agamemnon to help rescue Helen because King Agamemnon of Mycenae was the most powerful man in Greece; the call went out to all the rich and noble men who had once been suitors of Helen; they came willingly to fulfill the oath they had made to protect Helen; the most notable exception was Achilles; he had been too young to be a suitor of Helen but he voluntarily joined Agamemnon and Menelaos simply for the pleasure of fighting in a war. |
| An armada of over 1,183 ships with approximately sixty thousand men sailed for Troy; the Trojans called on their allies to help protect the city and they were waiting for the Achaeans when the first ships arrived; Protesilaus (Protesilaos) was the first Greek soldier to set foot on the beach at Troy and he was immediately killed by Prince Hector; the war continued for nine years without either side being able to achieve a decisive victory. |
| Several attempts were made to find a peaceful alternative to the war; Odysseus and Menelaos went to King Priam of Troy and diplomatically asked that Helen be returned; Priam refused; since the war was divinely decreed, such negotiations were doomed before they began. |
| In the tenth year of the war, the Immortals entered the fighting; Apollon rained arrows on the Achaean Greeks because Agamemnon offended his priest Chryses by refusing the ransom he offered for his captive daughter, Chryseis; Agamemnon appeased Apollon by returning Chryseis but enraged Achilles by taking his captive girl Briseis as a replacement for Chryseis. |
| Another failed attempt to end the war was initiated by Prince Alexandros; he challenged Menelaos to a one-on-one fight for Helen and her dowry; both sides agreed that the winner of the personal combat would decide the war; if Menelaos won, the Trojans would surrender their city; if Alexandros won, the Achaeans would leave Trojan territory and never return; Menelaos had knocked Alexandros to the ground and was going to win the fight when Aphrodite snatched Alexandros from the battlefield before the death blow could be delivered; a dispute immediately arose because the Achaeans believed that Menelaos had clearly won the fight but the goddess Athene decided the question with a subtle manipulation of one of the Trojan archers; she took the guise of a mortal and persuaded a soldier named Pandaros (Pandarus) to shoot an arrow into the Achaeans thus wounding Menelaos; the war began again. |
| Because of his anger towards Agamemnon, Achilles refused to fight and the Achaeans started suffering defeat after defeat until the Trojans were able to set fire to the Achaean ships; Achilles companion Patroklos (Patroclus) donned Achilles’ armor, mounted Achilles’ chariot and rode onto the fighting to make the Trojans and Achaeans think that the most dangerous man on earth had put aside his anger towards Agamemnon and returned to the battlefield; the ruse worked until Patroklos became too bold and got too close to the walls of Troy; Apollon knocked Patroklos to the ground and Prince Hector killed him; the fight for the possession of Achilles’ armor and the body of Patroklos was one of the most intense confrontations of the war; Hector was able to take Achilles’ armor but the body of Patroklos was rescued and returned to Achilles. |
| Achilles put aside all his anger towards Agamemnon and was given new armor crafted by the god Hephaistos (Hephaestus); Achilles raged into the Trojan defenses and killed every Trojan man and beast he encountered; his intention was to fight his way to Prince Hector and exact revenge for the death of his beloved companion Patroklos; Zeus weighed the souls of Achilles and Hector and decided that it was time for Hector to die. |
| The death of Hector was a truly sad affair; he tried to reason with Achilles but Achilles was splattered with blood and gore and would only be satisfied when he killed Hector and disgraced his body in full view of his family; Achilles tied Hector’s body to his chariot and dragged it around the city walls so that every Trojan could see the results of his heartless victory. |
| The Trojans found new strength and continued to fight valiantly; the Achaeans were forced to accept the fact that they would never win the war with their ineffective siege strategy; Odysseus proposed a clever plan whereby the Trojans would open their gates and expose the city to its ultimate doom; by all accounts, Odysseus was a clever man and it should not be surprising that he could conceive such a novel idea as constructing a Wooden Horse which could conceal a small group of warriors; Athene was clearly on the side of the Achaean Greeks and her inspiration helped a man named Epeios (Epeius) design and build the Wooden Horse Odysseus suggested; the idea was to leave the Wooden Horse in front of the gates of Troy to entice the Trojans to accept it as a peace offering declaring the end of the war; the Achaeans would complete the charade by sailing their ships to a nearby island out of sight of the Trojans; by all appearances, the Achaeans had given up the war and sailed for home. |
| Some of the Trojans thought the Wooden Horse was a symbol of peace and a tribute to the goddess Athene; others thought that the Wooden Horse was a trick and should be burned where it stood; the Trojan seer Laokoon (Laocoon) tried to warn King Priam that the Wooden Horse was a trick and not a peace offering but Poseidon (lord of the Sea), who was also on the side of the Greeks, sent one of his giant sea-serpents to kill Laokoon and one (or both) of his sons; Priam assumed that Laokoon was killed because he was giving false prophecy and ordered the Wooden Horse to be brought inside the walls of the city. |
| Helen had been living with the Trojans for ten years and was sympathetic to their survival even though her Spartan husband, Menelaos, was in the Greek army fighting to free her from her supposed captivity; Helen knew the Greeks well and suspected a trick when she saw the Wooden Horse; when the horse was brought into the city, Helen walked around it imitating the voices of different men’s wives to see if any of the men she suspected to be hiding in the horse would answer; with one exception, all the men hiding inside the horse remained silent; Odysseus forcefully restrained a man named Antiklos (Anticlus) when he tried to answer Helen’s convincing imitation of his wife. |
| After a day and night of celebration, the Trojans collapsed into a state of exhaustion; the soldiers inside the Wooden Horse emerged from hiding and opened the gates of the city; the entire invading army entered the city and the final stage of the carnage began; with the aid of Apollon, Prince Alexandros was allowed to kill Achilles but this feat only guaranteed his own death at the hands of Achilles’ son, Neoptolemus (Neoptolemos); the slaughter of the Trojans went beyond casualties of war and became atrocities; Odysseus, who was an otherwise civilized and noble individual, threw Hector’s infant son from the walls of Troy; King Priam was killed while seeking sanctuary in the Temple of Athene; Princess Polyxena, who was only a young girl, was butchered at the grave of Achilles as if she was an animal; the walls of Troy were finally toppled and every Trojan citizen was killed or enslaved. |
| But the death toll of the Trojan War was not yet complete; King Agamemnon was killed by his wife as soon as he returned to his palace in Mycenae; the valiant fighter Telamonian Aias was drowned by Poseidon and of the fifteen hundred men who went to Troy with Odysseus, all but Odysseus perished in the war or on the voyage home. |
| The Trojan War was one of the most glorious and savage events of Western Civilization; the will of the Immortals was accomplished with the curious side effect that some of the warriors who fought in the war are still remembered while the immortal gods and goddesses who perpetuated the war are mostly forgotten. |
| Troy (Ilion) |
| An ancient Greek city in Asia Minor in the province of Mysia between the rivers Skamandros (Scamander) and Simoeis (Simois); located near the coast of the Aegean Sea; an hours walk southwest of the Hellespont (Dardanelles Straits); according to The Iliad, Troy was founded by the grandson of Zeus, Tros, and thrived for three generations until the city was sacked under the reign of King Priam; the Troy of The Iliad was utterly destroyed circa 1250 BCE by the mainland Greeks and never re-established to its former glory or wealth. |
| After over a hundred years of excavation, the different layers of the ruins of ancient Troy have been divided into nine classifications designated with the Roman numerals I-IX with subdivisions of each classification indicated by lowercase letters, i.e. the original foundations of Troy are named Ia-Ik; the city we normally think of as the Troy of The Iliad is called Troy VI, i.e. Troy six, and is assumed to have been destroyed circa 1250 BCE. |
| The geographic location of Troy was vitally important to its continued habitation and prosperity; the fortunes of the Trojans fluctuated over the centuries but the city was continuously occupied and constantly revitalized after either natural disasters or armed conquests reduced the city to rubble and dust; the walls and buildings of the various cities were made of mud-brick and each successive city was built on the ruins of the previous foundations; the mud-brick construction made it impossible to reuse the raw materials and so the old city was simply leveled and the newest incarnation of the city was built on the ruins and therefore each new city was elevated slightly higher than the preceding city. |
| The original foundations of the city date to the Early Bronze Age circa 2900-2450 BCE; it was a modest city and covered an area approximately 100 yards in diameter; this phase of Troy is commonly known as Troy Ia-k. |
| The second incarnation of Troy, designated Troy IIa-h, also existed in the Early Bronze Age and lasted from circa 2450-2200 BCE; the size of the city increased and covered an area of approximately 900 square yards; this Troy, with towers and a megaron, also included a settlement outside the city’s circuit walls; at least two phases of Troy II were destroyed by what appears to be severe natural disasters; level IIg is called the Burnt City because the condition of the rubble strongly suggests that the wooden parts of the city were not merely torn down, but rather burned to the ground. |
| Troy III existed from circa 2200-1700 BCE and is divided into the subdivisions a-d; this was during the Middle Bronze Age and the city doubled in size. |
| The cities of Troy IVa-e and Va-d seem to be less prosperous for the rulers and citizens of the city; these subdivisions are generally included in the time period that covers Troy III. |
| Homer’s Troy, Troy VI, dates from the Middle and Late Bronze Age and consists of levels a-h; this was probably the city that the Greeks destroyed after their ten year siege; the city was only slightly larger than Troy III but there are indications that this phase of the city was the most prosperous incarnation yet; the circuit wall was longer and thicker than any previous city wall and the outer settlement was larger than ever before; the city supported a population of five to ten thousand permanent residents; also of significance during this phase of Troy’s development is the fact that excavators found horse skeletons in the ruins of these levels and corresponds to Homer’s characterization of ‘the horse taming Trojans.’ |
| Troy VII, like the previous reconstructions of the city, was built on the ruins of preceding city; Troy VII existed in the Late Bronze Age, i.e. 1250-1050 BCE; although there are those who believe that this is the Troy of The Iliad, it has been pointed out that Troy VII appears to have been hastily built and the workmanship seems inferior to the prosperous city and outer settlement of Troy VI; the final phase of Troy VII was destroyed by fire and it is assumed that this is a sign of conquest rather than natural disaster. |
| Troy VIII is considered to be the last Greek attempt to keep Troy as a permanent settlement and, although a smaller and more humble city, might have lasted until as late as 85 BCE; Troy VIII is assumed to have been populated by settlers from Thessaly or another northern Greek state; the historian, Herodotus (484?-425? BCE) (book 7, chapter 43), mentions that the Persian king, Xerxes, stopped at Troy on his way to conquer Greece and sacrificed one thousand cattle to the goddess, Athene (Athena) of Ilion; the Magi, the priests and magicians who accompanied Xerxes, made libations to the ancient heroes of Troy; Herodotus then makes a strange statement, he says that Xerxes and his company were seized with fear during the night but he does not elaborate as to the cause of their fear; also, Herodotus does not elaborate as to the population of Troy when Xerxes arrived or comment as to the physical condition of the city; Alexander the Great is also said to have visited Troy on his way to conquer the Persian Empire; the city was finally leveled in 85 BCE by the Roman legate, Flavius Fimbria. |
| Troy remained a pile of rubble until Julius Caesar visited the city circa 48 BCE; he began a rebuilding project which was continued by his successor, Caesar Augustus; the Romans believed that Troy was the mother-city of Rome because after the Trojan hero, Aineias (Aeneas), fled Troy, he found his way to the Italian peninsula and eventually united the tribes of Latium to form the basis of the Roman Empire. |
| Despite the historical references to Troy by historians such as Herodotus and Arrian, the actual existence of the city seems to have been considered a mere myth by serious scholars until the mid-eighteenth century; the most notable, and perhaps notorious, true believer in the actual existence of Troy was the wealthy businessman named Heinrich Schliemann; although Schliemann may not have been the first man to excavate the ruins of Troy, he is certainly the most famous; since his monumental and highly publicized discovery circa 1870 CE, Troy has become a well researched archeological site as well a popular tourist attraction. |
| One of the finest books on the subject is Troy c. 1700-1250 BC, by Fields, Spedaliere and Spedaliere, (ISBN 0841767034); the text is engaging and the illustrations are excellent; this book can be ordered from the Book Shop on this site. |
| Tyndareus (Tyndareos) |
| teen dah REE us |
| King Tyndareus of Sparta; Tyndareus was a man of patience and resolve; he and his wife Leda had two daughters named Klytemnestra (Clytemnestra) and Timandra but Leda had three other children with the king of the Immortals, Zeus; Zeus fathered Helen, Kastor (Castor) and Polydeukes (Polydeuces or Pollux) with Leda but Tyndareus raised them as if they were his own children. |
| The ages of Leda’s children are not known with certainty but it is assumed that Kastor and Polydeukes were the oldest, followed by Klytemnestra, Helen and Timandra. |
| After accepting the fact that Leda had children with a god, Tyndareus was plagued with an additional burden because Helen was one of the most beautiful girls to ever walk the earth; Helen was kidnapped when she was a young girl by two otherwise respectable men, Theseus and Peirithoos (Pirithous); Kastor and Polydeukes eventually rescued Helen but not before she became pregnant by Theseus; Helen gave her child Iphigenia (Iphianassa) to her sister Klytemnestra because Klytemnestra was married to the powerful king of Mycenae, Agamemnon. |
| When Helen was old enough to marry, Tyndareus was besieged with offers from men of wealth and influence; kings and princes offered riches in exchange for Helen; Tyndareus knew that his daughter had a profound influence on men and that unless a way could be found to control the proud men who had assembled at his palace, there would be endless bickering and bloodshed when her husband was finally chosen; Tyndareus made all the suitors swear a solemn oath that they would accept whichever husband he chose for Helen and furthermore, they would avenge anyone who tried to take her from her chosen husband; Helen was allowed to marry a young Mycenaean prince named Menelaos. |
| After Helen’s marriage, Kastor and Polydeukes became Argonauts and joined Jason in the Quest for the Golden Fleece; neither brother returned from the Quest as a mortal; Zeus made Kastor and Polydeukes immortal with the condition that while one of them lived on the surface of the earth, the other would reside in the Underworld. |
| When Tyndareus made Helen’s suitors take the oath to protect Helen and honor her husband, he had no idea that he was setting the stage for the Trojan War but he died before the carnage began; after Tyndareus died, Menelaos became the king of Sparta. |
| When Helen was taken from her home by the Trojan prince Alexandros (Paris), Menelaos and his brother, Agamemnon, called on the kings and princes to fulfill the oath they had given to Tyndareus; the Trojan War began circa 1250 BCE. |
| Odyssey (Lattimore and Loeb), book 11, lines 298 and 299; book 24, line 199 |
| Odyssey (Fagles), book 11, line 341; book 24, line 219 |
| Odyssey (Fitzgerald), book 11, lines 344 and 345; book 24, line 224 |
| Catalogues of Women and Eoiae, fragment 67; fragment 68, lines 4, 7, 20, 38 and 72 |
| XVII Hymn to the Dioskuri (Dioscuri) |
| XXXIII Hymn to the Dioskuri (Dioscuri) |
| The Kypria, fragment 1, line 17 |
| Argonautika, book 1, line 148; book 3, line 517 |
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