Telephus
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- This article is about Telephus the son of Heracles. The name also refers to the father of Cyparissus.
A Greek mythological figure, Telephus or Telephos (Greek: Τήλεφος) was one of the Heraclidae, the sons of Heracles, who were venerated as founders of cities. Telephos was by far the most famous, and the various sites at which libations were offered tp placate his spirit occasioned etiological myths of travels around the Greek mainland, in Magna Graecia and in Ionia.
Telephus was the son of Heracles and Auge, a priestess of Athena at Tegea; he was the spouse of Astyoche and the father of Eurypylus.
He was intended to be king of Tegea, but became the king of Mysia in Asia Minor. He was wounded by the Achaeans when they were coming to sack Troy and bring back Helen to Sparta.
Along with Hector, Helenus, Deiphobus, Aeneas, and Troilus he had accomponied Helen to Sparta and so was one of the first of all the Trojans and their allies to behold the beauty of Helen.
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[edit] Birth
Aleus, king in Tegea and father of Auge, had been told by an oracle that he would be overthrown by his grandson. So, according to varying myths, he forced Auge to become a priestess of Athena and leave the child, Telephos, on Mt. Parthenion. The child was suckled by a deer. Heracles had by that time become a god; he transformed himself into that deer and suckled Telephus. Alternatively Aleus put Auge and the baby in a crate that was set adrift on the sea.[1] They washed up in Asia Minor. Or Aleus exposed Telephus and sold Auge into slavery who was adopted by King Teuthras.
In any case Telephus was adopted, either by King Corycus or by King Creon.
[edit] Youthful travels
In his early manhood Telephos left home on a journey to Tegea, where his adopted father had found him. King Aleus and the men in his palace accepted the handsome youth, but they still inquired about his lineage. When he told them that he did not know it -- an ignorance stemming from their having abandoned him -- one of the men of the palace started to taunt the young prince. In anger the youth grabbed the man by his hair and tossed him out of the window of the palace. The man was Lycurgus the son of Aleus, and so the prophecy had come true.
[edit] Telephos and Auge
Parthenopaeus was destined to die at Thebes gates but Telephos was destined to rule foreign lands and fight his fellow Greeks before they reached Troy. The two companions went off to Asia Minor to look for land to make their kingdom. They eventually came to Mysia where they aided King Teuthras in a war and defeated the enemy. for this the King gave Telephus the hand of his beautiful adopted daughter Auge.
Auge wasn't happy about her father's decision and so she planned Telephos' death. When the two were going to bed together Auge grabbed a knife and tried to kill the man who was going to force her into a marriage she did not want for she was still in love with Hercules. Telephus grabbed the knife to kill her but Hercules separated the two with a flash of lightning and they both recognized each other as mother and son.
[edit] Telephus as king of Mysia and the Achaeans
Telephus later became King of the Mysians. When the Greeks left for the Trojan War, they accidentally found themselves in Mysia. Being that there King, Telephus was married to Laodice the daughter of King Priam and that Paris and Helen had stopped in Mysia on their way to Troy and had asked him to fight of the Achaeans if they came they attacked the Achaeans and vice versa. In the battle, Achilles wounded Telephus, who killed Thersander the King of Thebes. This explains why in the Illiad there is no Theban King.
[edit] Telephus' wound
The wound would not heal and Telephus asked the oracle of Delphi wich reponded in a mysterious way that "he that wounded shall heal".
Telephus' convinced Achilles to heal his wound in return for showing them the way to Troy.
According to others' reports about Euripides' lost play about Telephus, he went to Aulis pretending to be a beggar and asked Clytemnaestra the wife of Agamemnon the leader of the expedition to Troy what he should do to be healed. She had three reasons to help him: she was related to Heracles; Heracles fought a war that made her father King of Sparta and her a Princess of Sparta again; and she was angry at her husband and some say that he promised to marry her in return for her aid. Although he did not marry Clytaemnaestra.
In any case she helped him by telling her to kidnap her only son, Orestes and threaten to kill him if Achilles would not heal his wound. He grabbed the young child and said that he would kill him if Achilles would not heal his wound. Achilles refused, claiming to have no medical knowledge. Telephus was about to kill Orestes, but Odysseus reasoned that the spear had inflicted the wound and the spear must be able to heal it. Pieces of the spear were scraped off onto the wound, and Telephus healed. This is an example of sympathetic magic. Afterwards Telephus guided the Achaeans to Troy and they asked him if he would like to join them but he declined there offer claming that he was the step-son of King Priam through his wife (a)Laodice, b) Astoche) and in that way was related to Paris the man that started the Trojan war along with Helen being their step brother.
He was one of the men that competed in the games when Paris won and was also one of those that threatened to kill him.
[edit] Laodice's wrath
Laodice was beautiful and was extremely faithful to her husband Telephus. But Telephus had a child by her aunt Astyoche despite the fact that his bed companion was double his age. And with Argiope he had Roma who gave her name to Rome. He made both his concubine wich they had insisted on, but this didn't last long for she put her sister-in-law and her aunt to death for making love to her husband. It was even said that she was jealous of Helen for her beauty beat hers out and she lost much of the attentions of her husband much like it had happened with Helenus, and Deiphobus.
[edit] Eurypylus
Eurypylus was Telephus' son and he was supposed to become his successor to the throne but he died at Troy after his mother bribed him with the very same Golden Vine that Dyonysus tripped Telephus with that caused his wound. Telephus led his Mysian Forces towards Troy to help his grand father King Priam. Achilles' son Neoptolemus killed Telephus' son Eurypylus.
[edit] Laodice at Troy
Telephus assured the Trojans that the horse was not bad and convinced them to let the horse into Troy.
Laodice went with Eurypylus and Telephus to Troy although Telephus did not fight. Laodice snuck into Acamas' bed and she committed adultery. At the fall of Troy Laodice was sucked into a chasm in the Earth.
He met with Neoptolemus (or Calchas) who gave him a deadly blow in the very same place that Achilles had wich had never truly healed.
[edit] Telephus returns to Greece
Telephus fled back to Athens where the Heraclids were and became a General and Leader of the Heraclids a few years before the death of his Grandmother Alcmene he was the one who was there when she died.
When he heard that the Trojan princess that he had truly loved (Cassandra was left) he went crazy and made an attack on Arcadia and Ithica but he was defeated in a fight with Telemachus. During that time he killed many including the sons of Aleus and Aleus himself before they died he said: I am the son of Auge.
After that he traveled to Rhodes where he met with Polyxo and Helen. Helen told him of all that had happened after the fall of Troy. He impregnated Helen but she was soon after killed by Polyxo and so she died along with there unborn child.
He plucked out his eyes and fled Rhodes all the way to Gibraltar and climbed to the top of the Pillars of Hercules where he died of grief.
His last words were Father take my soul.
It was said by Pausanias that Heracles took his soul up to Olympos and he became his squire.
Or that he went to the Island of the Blest, Elysian Fields ect. after his death.
[edit] Telephus in the arts
Telephus features in Sophocles's The Assembly of the Achaeans and Euripides' Telephus.
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Karl Kerenyi, 1959. The Heroes of the Greeks (Thames and Hudson]], pp 337-41.
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