The Trojan War: A New History

A mythological hero, Aeneas is son of the goddess Aphrodite and Priam’s kinsman, Anchises. Aeneas is the central character in the Roman epic The Aeneid, which derives from the Homeric epics. Aeneas both fights in the Trojan War and rules the city after the war.

Mythical king of Mycenae, Agamemnon is the warlord responsible for leading the Greek offensive against Troy. He and his brother, Menelaus, seek revenge and conquest after Paris abducts Menelaus’s wealthy and beautiful bride, Helen. After returning from the great war triumphant, Agamemnon is murdered by his wife, Clytemnestra, and her lover, Aegisthus.

The son of Oileus, Ajax of Locris is a mythological Greek warrior who is known as the “Lesser Ajax” and distinguished by his unchivalrous treatment of the Trojans. He rapes Cassandra in the Epic Cycle.

A strong though slow-moving warrior within the Greek ranks, the cousin of Achilles is sometimes referred to as the “Greater Ajax.” He duels with Hector and fails to win Achilles’s armor after his cousin’s death, which is instead bequeathed to Odysseus.

The wise wife of Hector has become a symbol for wives left to grieve for the losses of war. She helps her husband strategize from Troy’s ramparts and predicts the death of Hector, begging him to retire from the field. She is taken as a war prize by the Greeks.

As his name suggests, this mythological figure is a rare pro-Greek member in the Trojan camp, and embodies the swelling civil unrest in the besieged city. He may have aided Odysseus and other Greeks in surreptitiously gaining entry into the city. Archeological evidence suggests that Troy did trade with the Greeks, so Greek sympathizers may have existed at the historical Troy.

A mythical princess of Lyrnesus, Briseis is taken as a prize by Achilles, who is offended when she is taken by Agamemnon in compensation for Chryseis.

The mythical prophet at Aulis and Troy, Calchas divines that Apollo has sent a plague to the Greek camp as punishment for the capture of Chryseis, who is the daughter of a priest of Apollo. The restitution of Chryseis is one of the events that turns the tide in favor of the Greeks.

Another mythological seer, Cassandra’s visions are famously (and disastrously) ignored by the Trojan warlords in Virgil’s Aeneid. The daughter of Priam plays a far larger role in the later epic, in which she predicts the fall of Troy.

The mythological maiden whose part the god Apollo seemingly takes in blighting the Greek forces with a plague after her capture by the Greeks. She is the daughter of the priest Chryses, to whom Agamemnon ultimately restores her.

An important Trojan ally, Cycnus is king of Colonae on the western coast of Troad. In Greek myth, he is killed by Achilles, despite his superhuman powers.

The Trojan prince who marries Helen following the death of his brother, Paris.

The mythical king of Argos is one of the youngest and gutsiest Greek warriors. According to Homer, he has to be quelled by the god Zeus after wounding the gods Ares and Aphrodite on the Trojan field. He undertakes an important scouting mission with Odysseus and is also sent to fetch the abandoned Philoctetes, without whom, it is believed, the Greeks cannot prevail.

An incompetent and presumptuous Trojan spy, Dolon is tortured by the Greeks and killed by Diomedes. He gives the Greeks critical information about the Trojans’ plans that helps them attain the upper hand in the conflict.

The father of Andromache is also the mythical king of Thebes-under-Plakos. Achilles respectfully buries him and sells his wife back to the Trojans, though she later dies and the sacking of the city dampens the Trojans’ morale.

The son of Telephus, Eurypylus leads a late contingent of Trojan allies from Mysia.

The foremost Trojan warrior and strategist, Hector is the dutiful and noble brother of Paris. Son of Priam and Hecuba, Troy’s crown prince succeeds in keeping the assailants at bay for ten years according to Homer. Ultimately, his conservatism and nobility lead him to fall prey to the Greek hero Achilles, who drags Hector’s naked body around the city behind his chariot, before finally returning the body to a suppliant Priam.

The wife of Priam and the Trojan queen. Together with Andromache, she is a figure for the innocent and grieving victims of war.

The queen “whose face launched a thousand ships,” according to Homer, Helen is the mythological wife of Menelaus of Lacedaemon. Supposedly the most beautiful woman in the world, Helen’s abduction by Paris instigates the Trojan War. Helen’s character remains sketchy in the epics, and she appears variously as deceitful, ambitious and opportunistic. Helen is a symbol of the wealth, honor and political tensions that motivated the historical conflict.

Another Trojan sibling of Hector, Helenus has the ability to divine the will of the gods. Having been ambushed by the Greeks, he prophesizes that they will not prevail without the presence of Philoctetes, whom they abandoned on the island of Lemnos.

The mythical daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra is notoriously sacrificed by her father at Aulis. Her life is exchanged for a more favorable outlook on the excursion before the black ships set sail. In some accounts of the myth, she is replaced by a bird or deer at the last moment by the goddess Artemis.

A Trojan priest, Laocoon is killed, along with his sons, by a sea monster in Virgil’s version of the myth.

A mythological Trojan ally and prince of Aethiopia who brings support for Troy late in the Trojan War.

The mythological husband of Helen, Menelaus’s cuckolding is the ignition of the conflict. Menelaus fights Paris on the plains of Troy before ultimately killing Helen’s new husband, Deiphobus, in revenge. Menelaus loses most of his ships on his return to Sparta (also known as Lacedaemon), which he rules with Helen as before the epic war.

Mythical son of Achilles, Neoptolemus conquers Troy and subsequently marries the daughter of Helen and Menelaus.

The elderly king of Pylos is the most astute counselor in the Trojan court.

Hero of Homer’s The Odyssey, Odysseus has a smaller part in The Iliad. His name has become synonymous with difficult journeys, as his return home lasted ten years in the Homeric epic. The Greek leader’s epithet is normally “wily,” and his stratagems enable the attackers to triumph over the great city. He is credited with devising the Trojan Horse, the ploy or trick that allows the warriors to finally gain entrance into Troy.

Charming and attractive, the Trojan prince seduces Helen while enjoying the hospitality of her husband, Menelaus, and enrages the Spartan king by absconding with Helen to Troy. Portrayed as somewhat juvenile in contrast with his noble brother, Hector, Paris repeatedly refuses to return Helen to her husband, subjecting all around him to war. Paris fights Menelaus on the Trojan field, and kills Achilles in revenge for his brother Hector’s death, using a poison-tipped arrow. As Helenus predicted, Philoctetes in turn kills Paris using the bow of Heracles.

Achilles’s second-in-command is a superb warrior and in some versions of the tale the two were also lovers. Achilles is enraged at the death of Patroclus and returns to the battlefield just as the Greeks appear on the brink of defeat. Patroclus comforts Breseis after she is captured, and impulsively disobeys Achilles’s orders, embarking on a killing spree that ultimately results in his death at the hands of Hector.

An archer from Thessaly, Philoctetes is bitten by a snake and thus abandoned on the island of Lemnos before the war begins. When Helenus predicts the fall of Troy is contingent on his involvement in the war, Diomedes returns to fetch him. He is healed by the physician Machaon and kills Paris using the bow of Heracles.

Brother of Hector, Polites is a swift runner who is nearly captured by Achilles while on a scouting mission.

Another Trojan seer, Polydamas is an astute tactician whose advice Hector twice disregards. While attacking Achilles, Hector is knocked unconscious by Ajax. After Patroclus’s death, Hector again fails to heed Polydamas, opting to camp on the fields of Troy rather than retreating back behind the gates of Troy. This decision leads to Hector’s death.

Mythological king of Troy, the stately Priam is able to summon aid from numerous allies and rely on great reserves of wealth. Yet the Achilles heel for Priam’s kingdom is its maturity, symbolized by this elderly king. The Trojans fail to go on the offensive and weaken their enemy through the looting, pillaging and stratagems that serve the Greeks. Priam is killed by Achilles’s son, Neoptolemus.

The first soldier killed at Troy is the Greek king of Phylace. He is slain by Hector as he leaps down from the black ships.

The Lycian king is the son of Zeus in myth, and leader of an impactful contingent of Trojan allies. He is slain by Patroclus.

Emblematic of the Greeks’ deceptive character in contrast with the stalwart Trojans, Sinon tricks them into bringing the Trojan Horse within Troy’s walls.

A descendant of Heracles, Telephus is the king of Mysia. His son, Eurypylus, is killed by Achilles’ son, Neoptolemus.

The brother of the Greater Ajax, Teucer is a great Greek archer.

A physically deformed and verbose Greek, Thersites harangues the Greek warlords and stirs malcontent within the Greek camp. He is emblematic of the discontent felt by the Greek army as morale begins to dwindle.