Aegisthus

Also known as: AEG / AEGISTHUS / ÆGISTHOS / Ægis / Ægis. / Ægisthos / Ægisthus · Family: House of Atreus · Role: paramour of Clytemnestra · First appears: Aeschylus, Agamemnon — Scene 1

Aegisthus was the son of Thyestes and the thirteenth child of Atreus’s brother. As an infant, he was banished with Thyestes by Atreus; grown, he returned in pursuit of vengeance and planned against Agamemnon, whose father had wronged his own. In Argos, he became Clytemnestra’s paramour and secretly plotted with her against her husband: “she plotted with Ægisthos against her husband's life.”

After Agamemnon returned from Troy, Aegisthus and Clytemnestra killed him, then assumed rule in Argos and over the house. Clytemnestra called him her husband and “no slight shield of stoutest confidence,” while Aegisthus was also a friend of Phanoteus. He ordered that Electra marry him, sought to prevent vengeance from Orestes, and left Agamemnon’s grave without honor while mocking the dead king.

When a report claimed that Orestes was dead, Aegisthus was summoned without armed guards to hear it. The report was a deception: Orestes revealed himself, and Aegisthus recognized his voice. Orestes then killed him where Agamemnon had been slain, bringing retribution for the murder; Pylades was said to have helped contrive Aegisthus’s destruction.