Hecuba Hecuba See More Hecuba Pictures > Hecuba or Hecabe was the queen of Troy in Greek mythology, wife of King Priam and mother to nineteen children, the most famous of them being Hector , Paris and Cassandra . She was the daughter of King Dymas of Phrygia and the Naiad Euagora. Other alternatives are also given by various sources around who her parents were. Hecuba made a few appearances in the Homeric epic Iliad, which accounts the events of the Trojan War . Following her son Hector 's advice, she offered a gown from Alexander's treasure to the goddess Athena , praying for help. She also tried to stop Hector from duelling with Achilles ; her pleads were not heard, though, and Hector met his doom during that fight. In another text, she was mentioned as being the mother of Troilus , after consorting with the god Apollo . A prophecy said that if Troilus would become twenty years old, then Troy would not fall; however, he was slain by Achilles , thus dooming the fate of the city as well. Hecuba Is also called Hecabe, Hecube.

Hector | Greek mythology | Britannica.com Greek mythology Hecuba Hector, in Greek legend , the eldest son of the Trojan king Priam and his queen Hecuba . He was the husband of Andromache and the chief warrior of the Trojan army. In Homer’s Iliad he is represented as an ideal warrior and the mainstay of Troy . His character is drawn in most favourable colours as a good son, a loving husband and father, and a trusty friend. His leave-taking of Andromache in the sixth book of the Iliad, and his departure to meet Achilles for the last time, are movingly described. He is an especial favourite of Apollo , and later poets even described him as son of that god. His chief exploits during the Trojan War were his defense of the wounded Sarpedon, his fight with Ajax , son of Telamon (his particular enemy), and the storming of the Greek ramparts. When Achilles , enraged with Agamemnon , deserted the Greeks, Hector drove them back to their ships, which he almost succeeded in burning. Patroclus , the friend of Achilles, who came to the help of the Greeks, was slain by Hector with the help of Apollo.

Then Achilles, to revenge his friend’s death, returned to the war, slew Hector, dragged his body behind his chariot to the camp, and afterward round the tomb of Patroclus. Aphrodite and Apollo preserved it from corruption and mutilation. Priam , guarded by Hermes, went to Achilles and prevailed on him to give back the body, which was buried with great honour. Hector was afterward worshipped in the Troad and also at Tanagra, east of Thebes . King Priam of Troy mourning over the body of his son Hector. © Photos.com/Jupiterimages Hector - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up) In Homer’s epic poem the Iliad, Hector is the son of the Trojan King Priam and the greatest of the Trojan heroes. When the Greeks besieged Troy, Hector’s wife, Andromache, begged him not to fight, but Hector embraced their child and left to join the battle. Hector killed Patroclus, a friend of the Greek hero Achilles, and in revenge Achilles killed Hector. Achilles then drove his chariot around the walls of Troy, dragging Hector’s body behind him. Priam finally begged his son’s body from Achilles.

The Trojans, mourning, burned Hector’s body, and buried his ashes. When the fighting resumed, Troy fell to the Greeks. (See also Achilles; Homeric legend.) Article History Hecuba dictionary definition | Hecuba defined HECTOR, in Greek mythology, son of Priam and Hecuba, the husband of Andromache. HECUBA (Gr. According to Euripides (in the Hecuba), her youngest son Polydorus had been placed during the siege of Troy under the care of Polymestor, king of Thrace. When the Greeks reached the Thracian Chersonese on their way home Hecuba discovered that her son had been murdered, and in revenge put out the eyes of Polymestor and murdered his two sons. Hecuba) measures 8 to 9 in. Greek & Roman Mythology - Tools PRIAM 100.00% Son of Laomedon and Strymo, brother of Tithonus and Hesione, the last king of Troy.

Originally his name was Podarces (the swift-footed); the name Priamus, which is interpreted to mean "ransomed," is supposed to have been given to him after the first sacking of Troy by Heracles. Heracles allowed Hesione to select one of the prisoners, and when she decided in favour of her sole surviving brother, she was permitted to ransom him with her veil. Legends represented him as rich alike in treasures and in children. He had fifty sons and fifty daughters by different wives; by his second wife, Hecuba (Gr. Hekabe) alone, nineteen sons; among them Hector, Paris, Deiphobus, Helenus, Polydorus, Troilus; by his first, Arisbe, Aesacus. Among his daughters were Creusa, the wife of Aeneas, Cassandra, and Polyxena.

In his young days he was a migbty warrior, as in the conflict with the Amazons; but at the outbreak of the Trojan War, he was so old and feeble that he took no part in the combat, and only twice left the city to conclude the compact for the duel between Paris and Menelaus, and to beg the dead body of Hector from Achilles. He met his death in the sack of the city by the band of Neoptolemus, at his family altar, whither he bad fled with Hecuba and his daughter. The name of Priam (q.v.) in his youth. POLYDORUS 34.98% Youngest son of Priam and of Laothoe, his father's favourite son. He was killed while yet a boy by Achilles. The tragedians make him the son of Priam and Hecuba, who, before the fall of Troy, committed him with many treasures to the care of their guest-friend, the Thracian king Polymestor (or Polymnestor). After the capture of Troy Polymestor puts the boy to death, in order to get possession of the gold, and throws the body into the sea.

The waves cast it up on the Trojan shore, and here Hecuba finds it, just as Polyxena is on the point of being sacrificed. Out of revenge she, with the help of the captive Trojan women, kills the two children of the murderer, and blinds Polymestor himself. According to another version, Ilione, Priam's daughter and Polymestor's wife, brings up the brother, who has been committed to her charge, as her own son, while she gives up her child Delphilus (or Delpylus) instead of Polydorus. The Greeks, who wish to exterminate the race of Priam, win over Polymestor by promising him the hand of Electra and a large present of money in return for the murder of Polydorns. Polymestor then murders his own son, and is blinded and killed by Ilione. POLYMESTOR 31.65% A Thracian king. He murdered Polydorus, the son of Priam, who had been entrusted to his protection, and was blinded by Hecuba and the captive Trojan women. (Cp.

POLYDORUS POLYXENA 26.86% Daughter of Priam and Hecuba, the betrothed of Achilles, who, at his wedding with her in the temple of the Thymbraean Apollo, was killed by Paris. After the fall of Troy the shade of Achilles demanded the expiation of his death with her blood, and she was sacrificed on his funeral pyre. LAOMEDON 25.61% Son of Ilus and Eurydice, father of Priam, Tithonus, and Hesione, and king of Ilium. Apollo and Poseidon served him for wages, the former pasturing his flock on Mount Ida, while the latter, either alone or with the help of Apollo and Aeacus (q.v.), built the walls of the town. But Laomedon defrauded the gods of the payment that had been agreed upon. Apollo therefore visited the land with a plague, and Poseidon sent a sea-monster, to whom the king was forced to offer his daughter Hesione.

Heracles, on his way back from the Amazons, found the maiden chained to a rock in the sea, and he offered to kill the monster if he were given the magic horses which Zeus had bestowed on Tros in exchange for Ganymede, whom be had carried off. Laomedon agreed to this, but again broke his promise. Accordingly Heracles (q.v.) subsequently waged war against him, and after capturing the city, slew him and all his sons, except Priam. EURYPYLUS 22.14% Son of Telephus and Astyoche. Astyoche, bribed by her brother Priam with the present of a golden vine, persuaded Eurypylus to bring the last succour to the Trojans shortly before the fall of the city. After performing deeds of bravery, he fell at the hand of Neoptolemus. DEIPHOBUS 22.04% Son of Priam and Hecuba, and one of the chief Trojan heroes, next to, Hector, after whose death he was the leader of the Trojan army. It was he and Paris who were said to have slain Achilles.

In the later story he is the husband of Helen, after Paris' death, and is betrayed by her to Menelaus n the taking of Troy. According to Homer's account he was surprised by Odysseus and Menelaus in his own house, and overcome only after a hard struggle. ACAMAS 20.84% Son of Theseus and Phaedra, was brought up with his brother Demophoon by Elephenor, king of Eubcea, and sent with Diomedes as ambassador to Troy, to persuade Priam to send Helen back in peace. After the fall of Troy, in which he took a prominent part as one of the heroes concealed in the wooden horse, he with his brother recovered his father's sovereignty over Attica, and then led a colony from Athens to Cyprus, where he died. (Comp. DEMOPHOÖN, RHESUS 19.46% Son of Eioneus, or Strymon, and one of the Muses, king of the Thracians.

He came to help Priam, but, in the very night after his arrival before Troy, was surprised by Diomedes and Odysseus, and slain by the former, together with twelve of his companions, while Odysseus took away his swif horses of glistening whiteness. It had been prophesied that, if these fed on Trojan fodder, or drank of the Xanthus before Troy, the town could not be taken. RHESUS 19.46% Son of Eioneus, or Strymon, and one of the Muses, king of the Thracians. He came to help Priam, but, in the very night after his arrival before Troy, was surprised by Diomedes and Odysseus, and slain by the former, together with twelve of his companions, while Odysseus took away his swif horses of glistening whiteness. It had been prophesied that, if these fed on Trojan fodder, or drank of the Xanthus before Troy, the town could not be taken. TROILUS 19.39% A younger son of Priam and Hecuba, who was slain by Achilles.

According to the later legend, Achilles lay in wait for the boy when he was exercising his horse near a well in front of the city, and slew him as he fled to the temple of Thymbraean Apollo, just by the altar of the god, at the very spot where he himself was destined afterwards to meet his fate. According to another account, Troilus ventured to meet Achilles in open conflict, but was dragged to death by his own horses. (See VASES , fig. 10.) AESACUS 19.32% Son of Priam by Arisbe, who had learnt the art of interpreting dreams from his maternal grandfather Merops, and being consulted by his father as to Hecuba's bad dreams before the birth of Paris, advised him to expose a child so clearly doomed to be the destruction of Troy. In despair at having caused the death of his wife Asterope (or Hesperia) he threw himself into the sea, and was changed into a bird, the diver. HECUBA 19.10% The daughter of the Phrygian Dymas, or, according to another story, of Cisseus, and wife of Priam.

(See PRIAMUS .) After the fall of Troy she was made a slave, and fell to the lot of Odysseus. Her son Polymestor had been slain by Polymestor, king of Thrace, on whom she took vengeance by putting out his eyes on the Thracian coast. On this she was changed into a dog, and threw herself into the sea. Her tomb served as a landmark for sailors. PARIS 18.32% The second son of Priam and Hecuba. His mother having dreamt before this birth that she had brought forth a firebrand, which set all Troy in flames, Priam had the new-born babe exposed on Mount Ida by the advice of his son Aesacus. Here a she-bear suckled the babe for five days; then a shepherd found him, and reared him with his own children. Paris won the name of Alexandros ("protector of men") by his bravery as a shepherd, defending herdsmen and cattle. On Mount Ida he married (Enone, daughter of the river-god Cebren. He decided the strife of the goddesses Hera.

Aphrodite, and Athene for the golden apple of Eris (see PELEUS , having been appointed arbiter by Hermes at the command of Zeus. Paris preferred the possession of the fairest woman, promised him by Aphrodite, to power and riches, or wisdom and fame, promised by Hera and Athene respectively. He therefore awarded to Aphrodite the prize of beauty, but drew upon himself and his fatherland the irreconcilable hatred of the goddesses whom he had passed over. When Priam was once celebrating funeral games in memory of his lost son, and commanded the finest bull in all the herds grazing on the mountain to be brought as a prize, Paris came to Troy as its driver. He took part in the contests, and vanquished his brothers, even Hector. Seized with envy, they wished to kill him; but Cassandra recognised him, and he was joyfully received by his parents. In spite of the warning of the forsaken (Enone, who still loved him tenderly, Paris set out on a voyage to Sparta, at the instigation of Aphrodite.

Here he carried off Helen, the wife of Menelaus, whom the goddess herself had quickly inspired with love for the handsome stranger. With her he carried away the treasures of his host, and brought her through Egypt and Phoenicia to Troy. In the war that arose from his deed, Paris showed himself, according to Homer, sometimes valiant and courageous, especially as an archer, but chiefly only at the persuasion of others; at other times cowardly and effeminate. The Trojans detested him as the cause of the disastrous war. After he had treacherously slain Achilles (q.v.), he himself was fatally wounded by an arrow of Heracles, while in single combat with Philoctetes. His corpse was dishonoured by Menelaus, but yet was afterwards given to the Trojans for burial. According to another account, when he knew his death was near, he asked to be carried to (Enone. When they had parted, she had bidden him come to her, if he should ever be mortally wounded; but now, mindful of the sorrow she had endured, (Enone rejected him, and he died soon after his return to Troy.

When (Enone, repenting of her cruelty, hastened with the remedy, and found him already dead, she hanged herself. In sculpture Paris is represented as a beautiful beardless youth with a Phrygian cap. ILIONE 17.57% Daughter of Priam and Hecuba, and wife of the Thracian prince Polymestor. Her youngest brother Polydorus was entrusted to her care by her parents, and she brought him up as her own son, while she gave out that her own son Deiphilus or Deipylus was Polydorus. When Polymestor (who was bribed by the Greeks) murdered the supposed Polydorus, Ilione blinded and killed him. TITHONUS 17.13% Son of Laomedon of Troy, brother of Priam, carried off by Eos on account of his beauty. She obtained for him from Zeus the gift of immortality, but forgot at the same time to ask for eternal youth. When he afterwards became completely wrinkled and bent by age, and was powerless to move without assistance, and merely chirped like a cicada, she shut him up in a solitary chamber.

According to another version, Eos changed him into a cicada. His sons were Emathion and Memnon (q.v.). HELENUS 15.96% The son of Priam and Hecuba, who, like his sister Cassandra, was endowed with the gift of prophecy. When Deiphobus, after the death of Paris, took Helena to wife, Helenus went over to the Greeks; or (as another story has it) was caught by Odysseus in an ambush. He revealed to the enemy the fact that Troy could not be taken without the aid of Neoptolemus and Philoctetes; and he is also said to have suggested the plan of out-witting the Trojans by means of the wooden horse. After the fall of Troy he was carried away by Neoptolemus, and advised him to settle in Epirus. After his death Helenus took Andromache to wife, and became king of the Chaonians. AMAZONS 15.82% A mythical nation of women-warriors, whose headquarters are placed by early Greek legend in Themiscyra, on the Thermodon, on the southern shore of the Euxine.

In later accounts they also appear on the Caucasus and on the Don, where the nation called Sauromatae was supposed to have sprung from their union with the Scythians. They suffered no men among them; the sons born of their intercourse with neighbouring nations they either killed or sent back to their fathers; the girls they brought up to be warriors, burning the right breast off for the better handling of the bow. Their chief deities were said to be Ares and the Taurian Artemis. Even in Homer they are represented as making long marches into Asiatic territory; an army of them invading Lycia is cut to pieces by Bellerophon; Priam, then in his youth, hastens to help the Phrygians against them. They gained a firm footing in Greek song and story through Arctinus of Miletus, in whose poem their queen Penthesileia, daughter of Ares, as Priam's ally, presses hard on the Greeks, till she is slain by Achilles.

After that they became a favourite subject with poets and artists, and a new crop of fable sprang up: Heracles wars against them, to win the girdle of their queen, Hippolyte; Theseus carries off her sister Antiope, they in revenge burst into Attica, encamp on the Areopagus of Athens, and are pacified by Antiope's mediation, or, according to another version, beaten in a great battle. Grave-mounds supposed to cover the bones of Amazons were shown near Megara, and in Euboea and Thessaly. In works of art the Amazons were represented as martial maids, though always with two breasts, and usually on horseback; sometimes in Scythian dress (a tight fur tunic, with a cloak of many folds over it, and a kind of Phrygian cap), sometimes in Grecian (a Dorian tunic tucked up and the right shoulder bare), armed with a half-moon shield, two-edged axe, spear, bow, and quiver, etc.

The most famous statues of them in antiquity were those by Phidias, Polyclitus, and Cresilas, to one or other of which, as types, existing specimens are traceable. (See cut.) Among the surviving sculptures representing an Amazonian contest should be especially mentioned the reliefs from the frieze of Apollo's temple at Bassae in Arcadia (in the British Museum, London). NEOPTOLEMUS 15.70% Son of Achilles and Deidamia. He was brought up by his grandfather Lycomedes in Scyros. After Achilles' death, however, he was taken by Odysseus to Troy, since, according to the prophecy of Helenus, that town could be taken only by a descendant of Aeacus. Here, like his father, he distinguished himself above all by a courage which none could withstand. He slew Eurypylus, son of Telephus, and was one of the heroes in the Wooden Horse, where he alone remained undaunted. Later legend depicted him as fierce and cruel: at the, taking of Troy he killed the aged Priam at the altar of Zeus, hurled Hector's son.

Astyanax, down from the walls, and offered up Polyxena, upon his father's tomb. In Homer he arrives safely with much booty at Phthia, his father's home, and weds Menelaus' daughter Hermione, who was promised him during the siege of Troy [Od. iv 5]. Later legend represents him as accompanied by Andromache, Hector's wife, who is allotted him as part of his booty, and Helenus, and then, on the strength of a prophecy of Helenus, as going to Epirus and settling there. It was to a son of his by Lanassa, granddaughter of Heracles, that the later kings of Epirus traced back their descent, and accordingly styled themselves Aeacidoe, while from his son by Andromache, Molossus, the district of Molossia was said to derive its name. He afterwards went to Phthia, to reinstate his grandfather Peleus in his kingdom (whence he had been expelled by Acastus), and wedded Hermione.

He soon, however, met his death at Delphi, whither, according to one story, he had gone with dedicatory offerings, or, according to another, to plunder the temple of Apollo in revenge for his father's death. The accounts of his death vary, some attributing it to Orestes, the earlier lover of Hermione; others to the Delphians, at the instance of the Pythian priestess; others again to a quarrel about the meat-offerings. The scene of his death was the altar, a coincidence which was regarded as a judgment for his murder of Priam. His tomb was within the precincts of the Delphic temple, and in later times he was worshipped as a hero with annual sacrifices by the Delphians, as he was said to have vouchsafed valuable assistance against the Gauls when they threatened the sacred spot [B.C. 279; Pausanias, x 23].

Hecuba Encyclopedia > Literature and the Arts > Classical Literature, Mythology, and Folklore > Folklore and Mythology Hecuba Hecuba (hĕkˈyŏbə) [ key ], in Greek mythology, chief wife of Priam, king of Troy. Hecuba bore to Priam 19 children, including Paris, Hector, Troilus, Cassandra, and others who were prominent in the Trojan War. To save Polydorus, her youngest son, from the Greeks, Hecuba sent him to Polymnestor, king of Thrace. After the sack of Troy she was allotted to Odysseus, who on his way home stopped at Thrace. Learning there that Polymnestor had murdered Polydorus, Hecuba, in revenge, blinded the king and killed his children. She is an important character in Euripides' plays Hecuba and The Trojan Women. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2012, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. Hecuba, Greek mythology, Greek Culture HOME > CULTURE > Hecuba, Greek mythology, Greek Culture He cuba's life was one of grief and sorrow.

She saw withher own eyes her eldest born Hector killed and insulted by Achilles. She saw her son Polites slain in front of her by Pyrrhus. And she saw her husband,the aged Priam,dragged towards the household altar and ruthlessly butchered there. After the fall of Troy she was carried into slavery . Greek Culture Shehad the misfortune to witness her daughter Polyxena,her soleconsolation in bondage ,sacrificed at the tomb of Achilles. She had the sad fate to see washed ashore the corpse of her young estson Polydorus,who had been entrusted to the Thracian king for safekeeping. Greek & Roman Mythology - Tools HECUBA 100.00% The daughter of the Phrygian Dymas, or, according to another story, of Cisseus, and wife of Priam. (See PRIAMUS .) After the fall of Troy she was made a slave, and fell to the lot of Odysseus. Her son Polymestor had been slain by Polymestor, king of Thrace, on whom she took vengeance by putting out his eyes on the Thracian coast.

On this she was changed into a dog, and threw herself into the sea. Her tomb served as a landmark for sailors. POLYMESTOR 63.74% A Thracian king. He murdered Polydorus, the son of Priam, who had been entrusted to his protection, and was blinded by Hecuba and the captive Trojan women. (Cp. POLYDORUS POLYXENA 54.10% Daughter of Priam and Hecuba, the betrothed of Achilles, who, at his wedding with her in the temple of the Thymbraean Apollo, was killed by Paris. After the fall of Troy the shade of Achilles demanded the expiation of his death with her blood, and she was sacrificed on his funeral pyre. DEIPHOBUS 44.38% Son of Priam and Hecuba, and one of the chief Trojan heroes, next to, Hector, after whose death he was the leader of the Trojan army. It was he and Paris who were said to have slain Achilles. In the later story he is the husband of Helen, after Paris' death, and is betrayed by her to Menelaus n the taking of Troy.

According to Homer's account he was surprised by Odysseus and Menelaus in his own house, and overcome only after a hard struggle. PRIAM 41.75% Son of Laomedon and Strymo, brother of Tithonus and Hesione, the last king of Troy. Originally his name was Podarces (the swift-footed); the name Priamus, which is interpreted to mean "ransomed," is supposed to have been given to him after the first sacking of Troy by Heracles. Heracles allowed Hesione to select one of the prisoners, and when she decided in favour of her sole surviving brother, she was permitted to ransom him with her veil. Legends represented him as rich alike in treasures and in children. He had fifty sons and fifty daughters by different wives; by his second wife, Hecuba (Gr. Hekabe) alone, nineteen sons; among them Hector, Paris, Deiphobus, Helenus, Polydorus, Troilus; by his first, Arisbe, Aesacus. Among his daughters were Creusa, the wife of Aeneas, Cassandra, and Polyxena.

In his young days he was a migbty warrior, as in the conflict with the Amazons; but at the outbreak of the Trojan War, he was so old and feeble that he took no part in the combat, and only twice left the city to conclude the compact for the duel between Paris and Menelaus, and to beg the dead body of Hector from Achilles. He met his death in the sack of the city by the band of Neoptolemus, at his family altar, whither he bad fled with Hecuba and his daughter. TROILUS 39.06% A younger son of Priam and Hecuba, who was slain by Achilles. According to the later legend, Achilles lay in wait for the boy when he was exercising his horse near a well in front of the city, and slew him as he fled to the temple of Thymbraean Apollo, just by the altar of the god, at the very spot where he himself was destined afterwards to meet his fate. According to another account, Troilus ventured to meet Achilles in open conflict, but was dragged to death by his own horses. (See VASES , fig.

10.) AESACUS 38.91% Son of Priam by Arisbe, who had learnt the art of interpreting dreams from his maternal grandfather Merops, and being consulted by his father as to Hecuba's bad dreams before the birth of Paris, advised him to expose a child so clearly doomed to be the destruction of Troy. In despair at having caused the death of his wife Asterope (or Hesperia) he threw himself into the sea, and was changed into a bird, the diver. ILIONE 35.39% Daughter of Priam and Hecuba, and wife of the Thracian prince Polymestor. Her youngest brother Polydorus was entrusted to her care by her parents, and she brought him up as her own son, while she gave out that her own son Deiphilus or Deipylus was Polydorus. When Polymestor (who was bribed by the Greeks) murdered the supposed Polydorus, Ilione blinded and killed him. POLYDORUS 35.23% Youngest son of Priam and of Laothoe, his father's favourite son.

He was killed while yet a boy by Achilles. The tragedians make him the son of Priam and Hecuba, who, before the fall of Troy, committed him with many treasures to the care of their guest-friend, the Thracian king Polymestor (or Polymnestor). After the capture of Troy Polymestor puts the boy to death, in order to get possession of the gold, and throws the body into the sea. The waves cast it up on the Trojan shore, and here Hecuba finds it, just as Polyxena is on the point of being sacrificed. Out of revenge she, with the help of the captive Trojan women, kills the two children of the murderer, and blinds Polymestor himself. According to another version, Ilione, Priam's daughter and Polymestor's wife, brings up the brother, who has been committed to her charge, as her own son, while she gives up her child Delphilus (or Delpylus) instead of Polydorus.

The Greeks, who wish to exterminate the race of Priam, win over Polymestor by promising him the hand of Electra and a large present of money in return for the murder of Polydorns. Polymestor then murders his own son, and is blinded and killed by Ilione. HELENUS 32.14% The son of Priam and Hecuba, who, like his sister Cassandra, was endowed with the gift of prophecy. When Deiphobus, after the death of Paris, took Helena to wife, Helenus went over to the Greeks; or (as another story has it) was caught by Odysseus in an ambush. He revealed to the enemy the fact that Troy could not be taken without the aid of Neoptolemus and Philoctetes; and he is also said to have suggested the plan of out-witting the Trojans by means of the wooden horse. After the fall of Troy he was carried away by Neoptolemus, and advised him to settle in Epirus. After his death Helenus took Andromache to wife, and became king of the Chaonians.

ANTENOR 27.08% A Trojan of high rank, husband to Athena's priestess Theano, the sister of Hecuba. When Menelaus and Odysseus, after the landing of the Greeks, came as envoys to Troy, demanding the surrender of Helen, he received them hospitably, protected them from Paris, and then as always advised peace. Because of this leaning to the Greeks, it was alleged in later times that he betrayed his native city by opening its gates to the enemy; in return for which his house, known by the panther's hide hung out of it, was spared, and he and his friends allowed to go free. One account was, that he sailed with Menelaus, was driven out of his course to Cyrene, and settled there, where his descendants the Antenoridae were worshipped as heroes. Another, which became the accepted tradition, represented him as leading the Heneti, when driven out of Paphlagonia, by way of Thrace and Illyria, to the Adriatic, and thence to the mouth of the Padus (Po), where he founded Patavium. (Padua), the city of the Veneti.

CASSANDRA 24.50% In Homer Cassandra is the fairest of the daughters of Priam and Hecuba. For the promise of her love, Apollo conferred upon her the gift of prophecy; she broke her word, and the god punished her by letting her retain the gift, but depriving her of the power of making her hearers believe her. Her utterances were therefore laughed to scorn as the ravings of a mad woman. It was in vain that, at the birth of Paris, she advised that he should be put to death, and that, when Helen came to Troy, she prophesied the destruction of the city. When the city was taken, she was dragged by Ajax the son of Oileus from the altar of Athene, at which she had taken refuge; but Agamemnon rescued her and took her as his slave to Mycenae. Here she was slain by Olytaemnestra when Agamemnon was murdered. She was worshipped with Apollo in several places under the name of Alexandra. PARIS 12.30% The second son of Priam and Hecuba.

His mother having dreamt before this birth that she had brought forth a firebrand, which set all Troy in flames, Priam had the new-born babe exposed on Mount Ida by the advice of his son Aesacus. Here a she-bear suckled the babe for five days; then a shepherd found him, and reared him with his own children. Paris won the name of Alexandros ("protector of men") by his bravery as a shepherd, defending herdsmen and cattle. On Mount Ida he married (Enone, daughter of the river-god Cebren. He decided the strife of the goddesses Hera. Aphrodite, and Athene for the golden apple of Eris (see PELEUS , having been appointed arbiter by Hermes at the command of Zeus. Paris preferred the possession of the fairest woman, promised him by Aphrodite, to power and riches, or wisdom and fame, promised by Hera and Athene respectively. He therefore awarded to Aphrodite the prize of beauty, but drew upon himself and his fatherland the irreconcilable hatred of the goddesses whom he had passed over.

When Priam was once celebrating funeral games in memory of his lost son, and commanded the finest bull in all the herds grazing on the mountain to be brought as a prize, Paris came to Troy as its driver. He took part in the contests, and vanquished his brothers, even Hector. Seized with envy, they wished to kill him; but Cassandra recognised him, and he was joyfully received by his parents. In spite of the warning of the forsaken (Enone, who still loved him tenderly, Paris set out on a voyage to Sparta, at the instigation of Aphrodite. Here he carried off Helen, the wife of Menelaus, whom the goddess herself had quickly inspired with love for the handsome stranger. With her he carried away the treasures of his host, and brought her through Egypt and Phoenicia to Troy. In the war that arose from his deed, Paris showed himself, according to Homer, sometimes valiant and courageous, especially as an archer, but chiefly only at the persuasion of others; at other times cowardly and effeminate. The Trojans detested him as the cause of the disastrous war.

After he had treacherously slain Achilles (q.v.), he himself was fatally wounded by an arrow of Heracles, while in single combat with Philoctetes. His corpse was dishonoured by Menelaus, but yet was afterwards given to the Trojans for burial. According to another account, when he knew his death was near, he asked to be carried to (Enone. When they had parted, she had bidden him come to her, if he should ever be mortally wounded; but now, mindful of the sorrow she had endured, (Enone rejected him, and he died soon after his return to Troy. When (Enone, repenting of her cruelty, hastened with the remedy, and found him already dead, she hanged herself. In sculpture Paris is represented as a beautiful beardless youth with a Phrygian cap. EURIPIDES 9.44% The third of the three great Attic tragedians. He was born in the island of Salamis, in 480 B.C., on the very day of the great battle. His father Mnesarchus is said to have been a tradesman or tavern-keeper, his mother Clito a seller of herbs.

His parents, however, must have had some means, judging by the fact that they gave him a careful gymnastic education to fit him for the athletic contests. This was because they had misinterpreted an oracle given them before his birth which promised the child crowns of victory. Euripides is said in his boyhood really to have gained the prize in a public contest of this kind, but in fact lie was destined to win victories in a very different arena. He associated much with the philosophers Anaxagoras and Socrates, with the latter of whom he enjoyed an intimate friendship during the whole of his life. He also had instruction from the sophists Protagoras and Prodicus. Thus he received the best of education in philosophy and rhetoric. It was in his twenty-fifth year (B.C. 455) that he first put a tetralogy on the stage. He did not win a prize till his forty-third year, and seems indeed to have been victorious only four times in all; but he was none the less indefatigable in writing tragedies.

He took a lively interest in the important events and the public questions of the time; but personally be kept aloof from public life, avoided society, and lived mostly in the enjoyment of an excellent library, amid his studies and poetical creations. He was twice unfortunate in his marriage, a fact which may have encouraged him in his surly, unsociable ways. His first wife, Chaerile, he had to divorce for infidelity. She bore him three daughters, the youngest of whom, who was named after her mother, put several of her father's tragedies on the stage after his death. His second wife, Melito, parted from him at her own desire. In 409, at the age of 71, he left Athens; it was said to get away from the ceaseless attacks of the comedians, and from his domestic troubles. He went to Magnesia in Thessaly, where he was received as a guest of the city. Thence he went on to Pella to the court of Archelaus, king of Macedonia, who had gathered round him a number of poets and artists, and who treated him with great respect. Here he spent the last two years of his life and died B.C.

405. According to a story for which there is little authority, he was torn to pieces by a pack of hounds when returning from a nocturnal festivity. The number of his tragedies is variously given as seventy-five, seventy-eight, and ninety-two.

Eighteen have come down to us: the Alcestis, Andromache, Bacchae (or the arrival of Dionysus at Thebes and the murder of Pentheus), Hecuba, Helena, Electra, the Heraclidae (or Demophoon of Athens protecting the descendants of Heracles against the persecution of Eurystheus); Heracles in Madness, the Suppliants (or the mothers of the Seven Chiefs who had fallen before Thebes, at whose prayers Theseus compelled the Thebans to bury the dead heroes); Hippolytus, Iphigenia at Aulis, Iphigenia among the Tauri, Ion, Medea, Orestes, Rhesus, the Troades (or the royal house of Troy after the conquest of the city); the Phoenissae (so called after the chorus of Phoenician maidens, an incident in the story of Eteocles and POlynices); and a satyric drama, the Cyclops, the only example of this style of composition which has survived. The earliest of these pieces in point of time is the Alcestis, performed in B.C. 438.

It is also noticeable because, although not a satyric drama in the proper sense, it has comic features towards the end, and was actually performed at the end of a tetralogy in place of a satyric drama. The Bacchae, on the other hand, was written in Macedonia in the poet's last years, and performed after his death at the same time as the Iphigenia at Aulis. The genuineness of the Rhesus was doubted even in antiquity. A great number of fragments have survived from about sixty pieces, and in particular from the Phaethon. The tragedies of Euripides are of very unequal merit. Some of them, for instance lofty style of Sophocles, others approach it, as the Medeaand Iphigenia in Tauris. But others, as for instance the Andromache and Electra, are very carelessly put together. His strong point is not artistic composition, well contrived disposition, or the coherent design which gives the inner motive of the action.

It is sufficient, in support of this statement, to call attention to his habit of prefixing to every piece a prologue, explaining the story to the spectators, and connected loosely (if at all) with the play; to the very slight connexion between the chorus and the action, and to his liking for bringing in a deus ex machina to cut a difficult knot. On the other hand, it must be allowed that Euripides is a master in the art of devising pathetic situations, and shows extraordinary power in representing human passion, especially the resistless might of love in the case of women. In his religious views be differs essentially from Aeschylus and Sophocles. With Euripides the gods are not moral powers, and fate is not so much the result of a higher dispensation as a perverseness of accident. The lack of grandeur is also a point which distinguishes him from his great predecessors. Instead of their sublime ideas he gives us maxims of worldly wisdom, often to all appearance dragged in without occasion. The motives of action are not so pure as in Aeschylus and Sophocles, and the characters of the heroes are not raised above the level of ordinary life, but brought down to it.

So fond is he of giving prominence to the faults of women, that he has been called a woman-hater. He pays more attention to the course of politics than his predecessors, and is indeed influenced by political considerations in his sketches of character. In deference to the democratic leanings of his public, he makes his kings cruel tyrants, without dignity or majesty, and the heroes of the Peloponnese, in particular, he treats with unconcealed dislike. His dialogues are often overloaded with rhetoric and sophistical dialectic. But, in spite of all these faults, for which the spirit of the age is mainly responsible, be is a great poetical genius. He was very popular with his contemporaries, and has been still more so with succeeding generations. The tragedians of the next age made him their model and pattern without qualification, and the Roman poets preferred paraphrasing his dramas to those of the other tragedians. TROJAN WAR 4.46% The story of the Trojan War, like the story of the Argonauts, underwent, in the course of time, many changes and amplifications. The kernel of the story is contained in the two epic poems of Homer: the Iliad and the Odyssey.

The incidents, either narrated or briefly touched upon in these, were elaborated or developed by the post-Homeric poets, partly by connecting them with other popular traditions, and partly by the addition of further details of their own in ation. While in Homer it is simply the rape of Helen which is the occasion of the war, a later legend traced its origin to the marriage of Pelous and Thetis, when Eris threw down among the assembled gods the golden apple inscribed For the fairest. The quarrel that ensued between Hera, Athene, and Aphrodite for the prize of beauty was decided by Paris in favour of Aphrodite, who in return secured him the possession of Helen, while Hera and Athene became, from that time onward, the implacable enemies of the whole Trojan race. According to Homer, after Helen had been carried off by Paris, Menelaus and Agamemnon visited all the Greek chieftains in turn, and prevailed on them to take part in the expedition which they were preparing to avenge the wrong. According to the later account, the majority of the chieftains were already bound to follow the expedition by an oath, which they had sworn to Tyndareos.

Agamemnon was chosen commander-in-chief; next to him the most prominent Greek heroes are his brother Menelaus, Achilles and Patroclus, the two Ajaxes, Teucer, Nestor and his son Antilochus, Odysseus, Diomedes,Idomeneus, and Philoctetes, who, however, at the very outset of the expedition had to be left behind, and does not appear on the scene of action until just before the fall of Troy. Later epics add the name of Palamedes. The entire host of 100,000 men and 1,186 ships assembled in the harbour of Aulis. Here, while they were sacrificing under a plane tree, a snake darted out from under the altar and ascended the tree, and there, after devouring a brood of eight young sparrows and the mother-bird himself, was turned into stone. This omen Calchas, the seer of the host, interpreted to mean that the war would last nine years, and terminate in the tenth with the destruction of Troy [Iliad ii 299-332].

Agamemnon had already received an oracle from the Delphian god that Troy would fall when the best of the Greeks quarrelled. In Homer the crossing to Troy follows immediately; but in the later story the Greeks at first land by mistake in Mysia, in the country of Telephus (q.v.), and being dispersed by a storm and driven back to Greece, assemble afresh at Aulis, whence they are only permitted to set out after the sacrifice of Iphigenia (an incident entirely unknown to Homer). On the Greek side the first to fall is Protesilaiis, who is the first to land. The disembarkation cannot take place until Achilles has slain the mighty Cycnus (q.v., 2). After pitching their camp, Odysseus and Menelaus proceed as ambassadors to Troy, to demand the surrender of Helen. But this proposal, in spite of the inclination of Helen herself and the admonition of the Trojan Antenor, falls to the ground, owing to the opposition of Paris, and war is declared.

The number of the Trojans, whose chief hero is Hector, scarcely amounts to the tenth part of that of the besiegers; and although they possess the aid of countless brave allies, such as Aeneas, Sarpedon, and Glaucus, in their fear of Achilles they dare not risk a general engagement. On the other hand, the Achaeans can do nothing against the well-fortified and defended town, and see themselves confined to laying ambuscades and devastating the surrounding country, and compelled by lack of provisions to have resource to foraging expeditions in the neighbourhood, undertaken by sea and by land under the generalship, of Achilles. At length the decisive tenth year arrives. The Homeric Iliad narrates the events of this year, confining itself to the space of fifty-one days. Chryses, of Apollo, comes in priestly garb into camp of the Greeks to ransom his daughter Chryseis from Agamemnon. He is rudely repulsed, and Apollo consequently visits the Greeks with a plague. In an assembly of the Greeks summoned by Achilles, Calchas declares the only means of appeasing the god to be the surrender of girl without ransom.

Agamemnon assents to the general wish; but, by way of compensation, takes from Achilles, whom he considers to be the instigator of the whole plot, his favourite, slave Briseis. Achilles withdraws in a rage to his tent, and implores his mother Thetis to obtain from Zeus a promise that the Greeks should meet with disaster in fighting the Trojans until Agamemnon should give her son complete satisfaction [Il. i]. The Trojans immediately take the open field, and Agamemnon is induced by a promise of victory, conveyed in a dream from Zeus, to appoint the following day for a battle [ii]. The hosts are already standing opposed to one another, prepared for fight, when they agree to a treaty that the conflict for Helen and the plundered treasures be decided by a duel between Paris and Menelaus. Paris is overcome in the duel, and is only rescued from death by the intervention of Aphrodite [iii].

When Agamemnon presses for the fulfilment of the treaty, the Trojan Pandarus breaks the peace by shooting an arrow at Menelaus, and the first open engagement in the war begins [iv], in which, under the protection of Athene, Diomede performs miracles of bravery and wounds even Aphrodite and Ares [v]. Diomede and the Lycian Glaucus are on the point of fighting, when they recognise one another as hereditary guest-friends. Hector goes from the battle to Troy, and the day ends with an indecisive duel between Hector and Ajax son of Telamon. In the armistice ensuing both sides bury their dead, and the Greeks, acting on the advice of Nestor, surround the camp with a wall and trench [vii]. When the fighting begins afresh, Zeus forbids the gods to take part in it, and ordains that the battle shall terminate with the discomfiture of the Greeks [viii]. On the following night Agamemnon already begins to meditate flight, but Nestor advises reconciliation with Achilles. The efforts of the ambassadors are, however, fruitless [ix].

Here-upon Odysseus and Diomede go out to reconnoitre, capture Dolon, a Trojan spy, and surprise Rhesus (q.v.), king of the Thracians, the newly arrived ally of the enemy [x]. On the succeeding day Agamemnon's bravery drives the Trojans back to the walls of the town; but he himself, Diomede, Odysseus, and other heroes leave the battle wounded, the Greeks retire behind the camp walls [xi], to attack which the Trojans set out in five detachments. The opposition of the Greeks is brave; but Hector breaks the rough gate with a rock, and the stream of enemies pours itself unimpeded into the camp [xii]. Once more the Greek heroes who are still capable of taking part in the fight, especially the two Ajaxes and Idomeneus, succeed with the help of Poseidon in repelling the Trojans, while Telamonian Ajax dashes Hector to the ground with a stone; but the latter soon reappears on the battlefield with fresh strength granted him by Apollo at the command of Zeus [xiii].

Poseidon is obliged to leave the Greeks to their fate; they retire again to the ships, which Ajax in vain defends [xv]. The foremost ship is already burning, when Achilles gives way to the entreaties of his friend Patroclus, and sends him, clad in his own armour, with the Myrmidons to the help of the distressed Greeks. Supposing it to be Achilles himself, the Trojans in terror flee from the camp before Patroclus, who pursues them to the town, and lays low vast numbers of the enemy, including the brave Sarpedon, whose corpse is only rescued from the Greeks after a severe fight. At last Patroclus himself is slain by Hector with the help of Apollo [xvi]; Achilles' arms are lost, and even the corpse is with difficulty saved [xvii]. And now Achilles repents of his anger, reconciles himself to Agamemnon, and on the following day, furnished with new and splendid armour by Hephaestus at the request of Thetis [xviii], avenges the death of his friend on countless Trojans and finally on Hector himself [xxii].

With the burial of Patroclus and the funeral games established in his honour [xxiii], the restoration of Hector's corpse to Priam, and the burial of Hector, for which Archilles allows an armistice of eleven days [xxiv], the Iliad concludes. Immediately after the death of Hector the later legends bring the Amazons to the help of the Trojans, and their queen Penthesilea is slain by Achilles. Then appears Memnon, who is also mentioned by Homer; at the head of his Aethiopians he slays Antilochus son of Nestor, and is himself slain by Achilles. And now comes the fulfilment of the oracle given to Agamemnon at Delphi; for at a sacrificial banquet a violent quarrel arises between Achilles and Odysseus, the latter declaring craft and not valour to be the only means of capturing Troy. Soon after, in an attempt to force a way into the hostile town through the Scaean gate, or, according to later legend, at the marriage of Priam's daughter Polyxena in the temple of Thymbraean Apollo, Achilles falls slain by the arrow of Paris, directed by the god.

After his burial, Thetis offers the arms of her son as a prize for the bravest of the Greek heroes, and they are adjudged to Odysseus. Thereupon his competitor, the Telamonian Ajax, slays himself. For these losses, however, the Greeks find some compensation. Acting on the admonition of Helenus, son of Priam, who had been captured by Odysseus, that Troy could not be conquered without the arrows of Heracles and the presence of a descendant of Aeacus, they fetch to the camp Philoctetes, the heir of Heracles, who had been abandoned on Lemnos, and Neoptolemus, the young son of Achilles, who had been brought up on Seyros. The latter, a worthy son of his father, slays the last ally of the Trojans, Eurypylus, the brave son of Telephus; and Philoctetes, with one of the arrows of Heracles, kills Paris. Even when the last condition of the capture of Troy, viz.

the removal of the Palladium from the temple of Athene on the citadel, lias been successfully fulfilled by Diomede and Odysseus, the town can only be taken by treachery. On the advice of Athene, Epeius, son of Panopeus, builds a gigantic wooden horse, in the belly of which the bravest Greek warriorsconceal themselves under the direction of Odysseus, while the rest of the Greeks burn the camp and embark on board ship, only, however, to anchor behind Tenedos. The Trojans, streaming out of the town, find the horse, and are in doubt what to do with it. According to the later legend, they are deceived by the treacherous Sinon, a kinsman of Odysseus, who has of his own free will remained behind. He pretends that he has escaped from the death by sacrifice to which he had been doomed by the malice of Odysseus, and that the horse has been erected to expiate the robbery of the Palladium; to destroy it would be fatal to Troy, but should it be set on the citadel, Asia would conquer Europe.

The fate of Laocoon (q.v.) removes the last doubt from the minds of the Trojans; the city gate being too small, they break down a portion of the wall, and draw the horse up to the citadel as a dedicatory offering for Athene. While they are giving themselves up to transports of joy, Sinon in the night opens the door of the horse. The heroes descend, and light the flames that give to the Greek fleet the preconcerted signal for its return. Thus Troy is captured; all the inhabitants are either slain or carried into slavery, and the city is destroyed. The only survivors of the royal house are Helenus, Cassandra, and Hector's wife Andromache, besides Aeneas (q.v.; for the fate of the rest see DEIPHOBUS , HECUBA , POLYDORUS , 2 , POLYXENA , PRIAM , TROILUS ). After Troy has been destroyed and plundered, Agamemnon and Menelaus, contrary to custom, call the drunken Greeks to an assembly in the evening.

A division ensues, half siding with Menelaus in a desire to return home at once; while Agamemnon and the other half wish first to appease by sacrifice the deity of Athene, who has been offended by the outrage of the Locrian Ajax (see AIAS , 1). The army consequently sets out on its journey in two parts. Only Nestor, Diomede, Neoptolemus, Philoctetes, and Idomeneus reach home in safety; while Menelaus and Odysseus have first to undergo wanderings for many a long year. Death overtakes the Locrian Ajax on the sea, and Agamemnon immediately after his arrival home. Priam Priam . Hector takes the armor from his parents Priam and Hecuba vase painting by Euthymides, c. 510 BC Detail of Priam of the vase painted by Euthymides In Greek mythology, Priam (Greek Priamos, Πρίαμος) (from priamai 'to buy') was the king of Troy during the Trojan War , and son of Laomedon .

Priam had a number of wives (his first was Arisbe); his chief wife, Hecuba , bore him twenty children. Another wife, Laothoe, was the mother of Lycaon . He also fathered Cebriones with a slave. Priam was originally called Podarge (or Podarces) and he kept himself from being killed by Heracles by giving him a golden veil embroidered by his sister, Hesione . After this, Podarge changed his name to Priam, meaning "ransomed". Priam expressed a desire to recover his sister Hesione, whom Heracles had carried into Greece, and married to Telamon, his friend. To carry this plan into execution, Priam manned a fleet, of which he gave the command to his son Paris , with orders to bring back Hesione. Paris, to whom Aphrodite had promised the fairest woman in the world , neglected, in some measure, his father's injunctions, and, as if to make reprisals upon the Greeks, carried away Helen , the wife of Menelaus , king of Sparta, during the absence of her husband. This violation of hospitality caused the Trojan war.

All the suitors of Helen, at the request of Menelaus , assembled to avenge the abduction of his wife, and the combined armament set sail for Troy. Priam might have averted the impending blow by the restoration of Helen; but this he refused to do when the ambassadors of the Greeks came to him for that purpose. Troy was accordingly beleaguered, and frequent skirmishes took place, in which the success was various Polydorus , Priam's youngest son, was sent with gifts of jewelry and gold to the court of King Polymestor to keep him safe during the Trojan War. The fighting was getting vicious and Priam was frightened for the child's safety. Departure of Hector, Hecuba , Priam , Deipohobus, Cebriones and others Priam asks Achilles for the the return of the body of the dead Hector The siege was continued for ten successive years, and Priam had the misfortune to see the greater part of his sons fall in defence of their native city.

Hector , the eldest of these, was the only one upon whom now the Trojans looked for protection and support; but he, too, fell a victim to his own courage, and was slain by Achilles . The father thereupon resolved to go in person to the Grecian camp, and ransom the body of the bravest of his children. The gods interested themselves in his behalf, and Hermes was directed to guide the aged monarch in safety amid the dangers of the way, and conduct him to the tent of Achilles. The meeting of Priam and Achilles was solemn and affecting. The conqueror paid to the Trojan monarch the reverence due to his dignity, his years, and his misfortunes; and Priam, as a suppliant, addressed the prince who had robbed him of the greatest and best of his sons. Achilles was moved by his tears and entreaties. He restored Hector , and permitted Priam a truce of twelve days for the funeral of his son.

Some time after Troy was betrayed into the hands of the Greeks by Antenor and Aeneas , and Priam was slain by Neoptolemus , the son of Achilles, at the foot of the altar of Zeus Herceus; the wounded Polites , one of the sons of Priam, also fell, who, after the example of his father and mother, had fled thither for protection during the burning of the city ( Hom. Il. xxiv . 139 foll.; Verg. Aen.ii. 507 foll.; Horace, Carm.x. 14; Hygin. Fab.110). After Troy fell, Polymestor threw Polydorus to his death to take the treasure for himself. Hecuba eventually avenged her son. Priam's Children Apollodorus: Library and Epitome 3.12.5 and he married first Arisbe, daughter of Merops, by whom he had a son Aesacus, who married Asterope, daughter of Cebren, and when she died he mourned for her and was turned into a bird.

But Priam handed over Arisbe to Hyrtacus and married a second wife Hecuba, daughter of Dymas, or, as some say, of Cisseus, or, as others say, of the river Sangarius and Metope. The first son born to her was Hector; and when a second babe was about to be born Hecuba dreamed she had brought forth a firebrand, and that the fire spread over the whole city and burned it. When Priam learned of the dream from Hecuba, he sent for his son Aesacus, for he was an interpreter of dreams, having been taught by his mother's father Merops. He declared that the child was begotten to be the ruin of his country and advised that the babe should be exposed. When the babe was born Priam gave it to a servant to take and expose on Ida; now the servant was named Agelaus. Exposed by him, the infant was nursed for five days by a bear; and, when he found it safe, he took it up, carried it away, brought it up as his own son on his farm, and named him Paris.

When he grew to be a young man, Paris excelled many in beauty and strength, and was afterwards surnamed Alexander, because he repelled robbers and defended the flocks. And not long afterwards he discovered his parents. After him Hecuba gave birth to daughters, Creusa, Laodice, Polyxena, and Cassandra. Wishing to gain Cassandra's favours, Apollo promised to teach her the art of prophecy; she learned the art but refused her favours; hence Apollo deprived her prophecy of power to persuade. Afterwards Hecuba bore sons, Deiphobus, Helenus, Pammon, Polites, Antiphus, Hipponous, Polydorus, and Troilus: this last she is said to have had by Apollo.

By other women Priam had sons, to wit, Melanippus, Gorgythion, Philaemon, Hippothous, Glaucus, Agathon, Chersidamas, Evagoras, Hippodamas, Mestor, Atas, Doryclus, Lycaon, Dryops, Bias, Chromius, Astygonus, Telestas, Evander, Cebriones, Mylius, Archemachus, Laodocus, Echephron, Idomeneus, Hyperion, Ascanius, Democoon, Aretus, Deiopites, Clonius, Echemmon, Hypirochus, Aegeoneus, Lysithous, Polymedon; and daughters, to wit, Medusa, Medesicaste, Lysimache, and Aristodeme.

Hecuba - Euripides - Ancient Greece - Classical Literature AGAMEMNON POLYMESTOR, King of the Thracian Chersonese At the beginning of the play, the ghost of young Polydorus explains how he came to be there on the shores of the Chersonese peninsula of Thrace, how he had been sent by King Priam to the protection of his friend, the Thracian king Polymestor , as the war began to go badly for the Trojans, carrying a quantity of gold and jewellery to pay for his safekeeping there, but how Polymestor had cynically murdered him for the treasure after the fall of Troy, casting the boy's body into the sea. The shade of Polydorus also explains how the victorious Greeks and their Trojan captives had weighed anchor in that very same place on their way home, and now remained there becalmed at the command of the ghost of the Greek warrior Achilles , and how, in order to placate the spirit of Achilles and allow the Greeks to continue home, Polydorus� own sister Polyxena must be sacrificed.

Queen Hecuba of Troy, herself now one of the captives, is introduced, anguishing over a nightmare she has had, and mourning her great losses of her husband and sons in the Trojan War, and now the added torment of having to sacrifice her own daughter, Polyxena . The Chorus of captive Trojan women express their sympathy for Hecuba �s plight. Polyxena joins her mother in a moving and pitiful scene of lament, until Odysseus comes to fetch Polyxena for the sacrifice. The eloquent and persuasive Odysseus tries to persuade Hecuba not to take the loss of her daughter too much to heart. Hecuba , for her part, attempts to shame Odysseus into releasing her daughter, but he is unmoved. Polyxena herself is resigned to her fate, declaring that she prefers death to slavery. The herald Talthybius describes the death of Polyxena , and the grief-stricken Hecuba orders that her corpse not be touched, calling for water for a ritual cleansing. However, the servant who fetches the water also discovers the corpse of Hecuba �s son Polydorus, now washed up on the shore.

Hecuba immediately suspects that Polymestor has killed her son for the treasure and, pushed now to the edge of madness by her sufferings, begins to plot her revenge. She calls on the Greek leader Agamemnon for help, and he allows her to summon Polymestor to her. Hecuba sends Polymestor a message pretending that she wishes tell him about some treasure she had buried at Troy, and he duly arrives, accompanied by his two sons. They are led into Hecuba �s tent, where they are overpowered by the Trojan women hidden within. The two sons, unfortunate collateral victims of Hecuba �s larger plan, are summarily dispatched, and, after blood-curdling screams are heard from inside the tent, Hecuba emerges, triumphant. Polymestor crawls out from the tent, blinded and in agony, and reduced to the level of an animal. He curses Hecuba and the Trojan woman, threatening savage and bloody retribution. Agamemnon is summoned to judge Polymestor and Hecuba .

Polymestor feigns many excuses for the murder of Polydorus, but Hecuba convinces Agamemnon that he slew her son purely for the sake of the gold. Polymestor reveals a prophesy that Hecuba will die on the journey to Greece, and that her daughter Cassandra will die at the hands of Agamemnon �s wife, Clytemnestra . At the close of the play, Polymestor is banished by Agamemnon to live out his remaining years alone on a desert island. Analysis Back to Top of Page �Hecuba� is one of the few tragedies that evoke a sense of utter desolation and destruction in the audience, and there is almost no let up in the mood of suffering and anguish, and no sign of any silver lining. Few ancient tragedies culminate in such unmitigated hopelessness for all the principle characters concerned, and even fewer imply that their terrible fates were quite so richly deserved. However, the play is also remarkable for the grace and purity of its style, and it abounds in striking scenes and beautiful poetical passages (a particularly good example being the description of the capture of Troy).

The Trojan queen Hecuba in the aftermath of the Trojan War is one of the most tragic figures in classical literature.

Her husband, King Priam , died after the fall of Troy by the hand of Achilles ' son, Neoptolemus ; her son Hector , the Trojan hero, was killed in battle by the Greek hero, Achilles , as was another son, Troilus; her son, Paris , the main cause of the war, was killed by Philoctetes ; yet another son, Deiphobus, was slain during the sack of Troy, and his body mutilated; another son, the seer Helenus, was taken as a slave by Neoptolemus ; her youngest son, Polydorus, was ignominiously killed by Thracian King Polymestor for the sake of some gold and treasure; her daughter, Polyxena was sacrificed on the tomb of Achilles ; another daughter, the seeress Cassandra , was given as a concubine and whore to the Greek king Agamemnon after the war (later to be killed with him as described in Aeschylus � �Agamemnon� ); and she herself was given as a slave to the hated Odysseus (as described in Euripides � �The Trojan Women� ). Given all this, Hecuba can arguably be forgiven a little bitterness.

Already suffering from the multiple deaths of her husband and sons during the Trojan War, Hecuba is then confronted with two further excruciating losses, which are enough to finally tip her over into the role of vindictive aggressor, and the play concentrates to a large extent on the psychological process by which a victim turns into an avenger. It essentially falls into two parts: in the first part, which centres on the sacrificial death of Hecuba 's daughter Polyxena at the hands of the victorious Greeks, Hecuba is portrayed as a helpless victim of Greek machinations; in the second part, in which she responds to the murder of her son Polydorus at the hands of the Thracian king Polymestor , she has become an inexorable force of vengeance. Although Hecuba herself has far more excuse than the male characters for her atrocious behaviour, her psychological trauma turns her into as culpable a villain as any of them, extracting not one but two lives for the life of Polydorus in addition to blinding Polymestor . Just as the blinded Polymestor is reduced to the level of a animal, Hecuba herself comes to behave like a beast when her emotions get out of control.

At the risk of offending his Athenian audience, Euripides presents the Greeks in the play, almost to a man, as casually brutal and despicable. Odysseus (whose life Hecuba once saved) is portrayed as shamefully indifferent and ungracious; Agamemnon is a self-centred coward, apparently incapable of virtuous action; and the Thracian Polymestor is one of the most unmitigatedly unpleasant characters in all ancient drama, a cynical, lying, avaricious opportunist. Even that sacred cow, Greek justice, takes something of a beating in the play, with the revered Greek assembly revealed to be little more than an unthinking mob, and the hastily convened court towards the end of the play showing little connection with the administration of justice. Euripides � major theme in the play, other than the misery and desolation caused by war, is that we alone (not the gods or some abstraction called Fate) are responsible for our own sorrows, and that we alone have the means to redeem our lives. In �Hecuba�, there are no impersonal gods causing Hecuba �s madness; she is brought low by politics, expediency and greed.

Resources English translation by E. P. Coleridge (Internet Classics Archive): Greek version with word-by-word translation (Perseus Project):

Question: In Greek mythology who was the husband of Hecuba?
Answer: Priam