Menelaus

Family: Greek · Role: son of Plisthenes · First appears: Apollodorus, Library 3.2

🌐 Also appears in: The Iliad (as Menelaus) · The Odyssey (as Menelaus) · Greek Tragedy — The Same Myth, Three Voices (as Menelaus)

Menelaus was a Greek, identified as the son of Plisthenes, and also as the son of Atreus and Aerope, with Agamemnon as his brother. In his early life, a nurse took him and Agamemnon to Polyphides, who sent them on to Oeneus. Tyndareus chose Menelaus as Helen’s bridegroom, and after the Dioscuri became gods, transferred the kingdom of Sparta to him. Menelaus married Helen; they had Hermione and, according to some, Nicostratus, while he also had Megapenthes by Pieris or Tereis, and Xenodamus by Cnossia.

After Alexander was entertained by him for nine days, Menelaus left on a journey to Crete to perform the obsequies of his mother’s father, Catreus. When he learned that Helen had been taken and the Trojans refused to restore her, he went to Agamemnon at Mycenae and persuaded him to muster the Greek army against Troy. He went with Odysseus and Talthybius to Cinyras in Cyprus, and at Troy fought Paris in single combat until Aphrodite carried Paris away. Pandarus then broke the truce by shooting Menelaus; later, Menelaus and Odysseus recognized and rescued Glaucus, son of Antenor, and Menelaus slew Deiphobus before leading Helen to the ships.

Menelaus and Agamemnon later quarrelled, while Menelaus also acted alongside Diomedes and Nestor. After wandering for eight years, he returned to Sparta and regained his kingdom. Hera made him immortal, and he went with Helen to the Elysian Fields.