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32-451: Legends claim that Orestias was founded by Orestes , the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra . Orestias or Orestia is thought to have been the same town as Uscudama (other variants: Uskudama, Uskadama, Uskodama) or Odrysa (other variants: Odrysia, Odrysos, Odrysus) which was the first Odrysian capital. Orestias took its name by the Greeks, at least from the time Philip II of Macedon took over

64-462: A dramatic prototype for all persons whose crime is mitigated by extenuating circumstances. These legends belong to an age when higher ideas of law and of social duty were being established; the implacable blood-feud of primitive society gives place to a fair trial, and in Athens, when the votes of the judges are evenly divided, mercy prevails. In one version of the story of Telephus , the infant Orestes

96-462: A letter from her to Greece; he refused to go, but he implored Pylades to deliver the letter while he stayed to be slain. After a conflict of mutual affection, Pylades at last yielded, but the brother and sister finally recognized each other due to the letter, and all three escaped together, carrying with them the image of Artemis. After his return to Greece, Orestes took possession of his father's kingdom of Mycenae (killing his half-brother Alete , who

128-420: A man in the crew of Menelaus during his return from Troy . Notes [ edit ] ^ Pausanias , 2.29.4 ; Scholia on Euripides , Orestes 765 & 1233 ^ Hyginus , Fabulae 117 ^ Scholia on Euripides, Orestes 33 ^ Aeschylus , Agamemnon 877 - 885; Pindar , Pythian Ode 11.35; Apollodorus , Epitome 6.24 ^ Pausanias, 2.16.7 with

160-707: A reference to Hellanicus ^ Homer , Iliad 5.49 ^ Nonnus , 30.108 ^ Pausanias, 10.25.3 References [ edit ] Aeschylus , translated in two volumes. 2. Agamemnon by Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph.D. Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press. 1926. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. Greek text available from the same website . Apollodorus , The Library with an English Translation by Sir James George Frazer, F.B.A., F.R.S. in 2 Volumes, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921. ISBN   0-674-99135-4 . Online version at

192-551: A temple and took off with Hermione. He seized Argos and Arcadia after their thrones had become vacant, becoming ruler of all the Peloponnesus . His son by Hermione, Tisamenus , became ruler after him but was eventually killed by the Heracleidae . There is extant a Latin epic poem , consisting of about 1000 hexameters , called Orestes Tragoedia , which has been ascribed to Dracontius of Carthage. Orestes appears also to be

224-405: Is a French-language opera in three parts by Darius Milhaud based on The Oresteia triptych by Aeschylus in a French translation by his collaborator Paul Claudel . Pausanias writes that at the road from Megalopolis to Messene there was a sanctuary of goddesses Maniae (meaning madness). Citizens said that it was there that madness overtook Orestes. Strophius From Misplaced Pages,

256-572: Is pursued by the Erinyes (Furies) , whose duty it is to punish any violation of the ties of family piety. He takes refuge in the temple at Delphi ; but, even though Apollo had ordered him to kill his mother, the god is powerless to protect Orestes from the consequences. At last Athena receives him on the Acropolis of Athens and arranges a formal trial of the case before twelve judges, including herself. The Erinyes demand their victim; Orestes asserts that it

288-538: The Odyssey , Orestes is held up as a favorable example to Telemachus , whose mother Penelope is plagued by suitors . In Pindar 's version, the young Orestes was saved by his nurse Arsinoe ( Laodamia ) or his sister Electra, who conveyed him out of the country when Clytemnestra wished to kill him. In the familiar theme of the hero's early eclipse and exile, he escaped to Phanote on Mount Parnassus , where King Strophius took charge of him. In his twentieth year, he

320-617: The Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on the Capitolium . The relationship between Orestes and Pylades has been presented by some authors of the Roman era (not by classic Greek tragedians) as romantic or homoerotic . A dialogue entitled Erotes ("Affairs of the Heart") and attributed to Lucian compares the merits and advantages of heterosexuality and homoeroticism, and Orestes and Pylades are presented as

352-508: The Eumenides, who now offer him wisdom and counsel. They are then propitiated by the establishment of a new ritual, in which they are worshipped as "Semnai Theai", "Venerable Goddesses", and Orestes dedicates an altar to Athena Areia . As Aeschylus tells it, Orestes' punishment for matricide ended after a trial, but according to Euripides, in order to escape the persecutions of the Erinyes, Orestes

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384-420: The Greeks took over most of Eastern Thrace including Edirne, they restored the city's Roman name (Adrianoupolis) and not its old Greek name (Orestias), which was given to its suburb Karaağaç , in remembrance of the ancient Thracian town. Orestiada (or Nea Orestias or New Orestias) is a modern Greek town founded in 1923 on a site 17 km to the south of Orestias, to house Greek refugees who had to abandon

416-492: The Perseus Digital Library . Pausanias , Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918. ISBN   0-674-99328-4 . Online version at the Perseus Digital Library Pausanias, Graeciae Descriptio. 3 vols . Leipzig, Teubner. 1903. Greek text available at

448-547: The Perseus Digital Library . Pindar , Odes translated by Diane Arnson Svarlien. 1990. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library. Pindar, The Odes of Pindar including the Principal Fragments with an Introduction and an English Translation by Sir John Sandys, Litt.D., FBA. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1937. Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library . [REDACTED] [REDACTED] This article includes

480-714: The Perseus Digital Library. Homer, Homeri Opera in five volumes. Oxford, Oxford University Press. 1920. ISBN   978-0198145318 . Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library . Nonnus of Panopolis , Dionysiaca translated by William Henry Denham Rouse (1863-1950), from the Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1940. Online version at the Topos Text Project. Nonnus of Panopolis, Dionysiaca. 3 Vols. W.H.D. Rouse. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1940–1942. Greek text available at

512-561: The Perseus Digital Library. Greek text available from the same website . Gaius Julius Hyginus , Fabulae from The Myths of Hyginus translated and edited by Mary Grant. University of Kansas Publications in Humanistic Studies. Online version at the Topos Text Project. Homer , The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, MA., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1924. ISBN   978-0674995796 . Online version at

544-569: The ashes of Orestes ( Cineres Orestis ) as one of the seven pignora imperii of the Roman empire in his In Vergilii Aeneidem commentarii (‘Commentary on Virgil’s Aeneid’). Alongside the ashes, Servius lists the other six pignora: the stone of the Mother of the Gods, the terracotta chariot of the Veientines, the ancile , the sceptre of Priam , the veil of Iliona, and the palladium . The ashes were kept at

576-498: The body, which measured 7 cubits long (311.5 cm if 1 cubit is 44.5 cm ). Thus Orestes would have been a Giant . These remains could have belonged to a huge animal from the Pleistocene epoch. Huge bones found in caves in nearby areas of Greece have been attributed to horses ( Equus abeli ), mammoths , elephants , deers , bovids and cetaceans . Maurus Servius Honoratus , an early 4th century grammarian, regards

608-566: The brother of Electra . He is the subject of several Ancient Greek plays and of various myths connected with his madness, revenge, and purification, which retain obscure threads of much older works. In particular Orestes plays a main role in Aeschylus ' Oresteia . The Greek name Ὀρέστης, having become "Orestēs" in Latin and its descendants, is derived from Greek ὄρος (óros, "mountain") and ἵστημι (hístēmi, "to stand"), and so can be thought to have

640-474: The 💕 For the spider genus, see Strophius (spider) . In Greek mythology , Strophius ( / ˈ s t r oʊ f i ə s / ; Ancient Greek : Στρόφιος means "slippery fellow, twister") was the name of the following personages: Strophius, son of Crisus , was a King of Phocis , husband of the sister of Agamemnon (whose name was either Anaxibia , Astyocheia or Cydragora ) and, by her, father of Pylades and Astydameia . When Orestes

672-531: The latter border town, which was given to Turkey (along with two villages) by the Treaty of Lausanne . This article relating to archaeology in Greece is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Orestes (mythology) In Greek mythology , Orestes or Orestis ( / ɒ ˈ r ɛ s t iː z / ; Ancient Greek : Ὀρέστης [oréstɛːs] ) was the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra , and

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704-716: The meaning "stands on a mountain". In the Homeric telling of the story, Orestes is a member of the doomed house of Atreus , which is descended from Tantalus and Niobe . He is absent from Mycenae when his father, Agamemnon , returns from the Trojan War with the Trojan princess Cassandra as his concubine, and thus not present for Agamemnon's murder by Aegisthus , the lover of his wife, Clytemnestra . Seven years later, Orestes returns from Athens and avenges his father's death by slaying both Aegisthus and his own mother Clytemnestra. In

736-400: The one was struck to the ground by his usual madness and lay there, but Pylades "did wipe away the foam and tend his frame and shelter him with a fine well-woven robe," thus showing the feelings not merely of a lover, but also of a father. But when it had been decided that, while one remained to be killed, the other should depart for Mycenae to bear a letter, each wished to remain for the sake of

768-481: The other, considering that he himself lived in the survival of his friend. But Orestes refused to take the letter, claiming Pylades was the fitter person to do so, and thus showed himself almost to be the lover rather than the beloved. In 1734, George Frederic Handel 's opera Oreste (based on Giangualberto Barlocci's Roman libretto of 1723), was premiered in London's Covent Garden . L'Orestie d'Eschyle (1913–1923)

800-517: The principal representatives of homoerotic friendship: Taking the love god as the mediator of their emotions for each other, they sailed together as it were on the same vessel of life...nor did they restrict their affectionate friendship to the limits of Hellas....as soon as they set foot on the land of the Tauride, the Fury of matricides was there to welcome the strangers, and, when the natives stood around them,

832-573: The town. The Roman emperor Hadrian expanded the town into a city , gave it a strong fortification and renamed it to Hadrianopolis ( Greek : Αδριανούπολις). However the name Orestias for the city of Hadrian, was still used by many writers at the Byzantine era, along with Adrianoupolis . During the Ottoman period the name of Adrianou(polis) was paraphrased by the Turks and eventually became Edirne. In 1920 when

864-541: Was hiding from his murderous mother, Clytemnestra , Strophius hid him. During this time, Orestes and Pylades became great friends. Strophius, one of Pylades' sons with Electra , Orestes' sister. Pylades and Electra's other son was Medon . Strophius, father of the Trojan Scamandrius , who was killed by Menelaus . Strophius, father of Phlogius , a companion of Dionysus in the Indian campaign. Strophius,

896-400: Was indeed he who killed his mother, though he was acting on the orders of Apollo. At the close of the trial, Athena votes on the verdict last, announcing that she is for acquittal; the votes are counted and the result is a tie, forcing an acquittal in accordance with the rules previously stipulated by Athena. The Erinyes, who insisted on Orestes' responsibility in the murder, are converted into

928-649: Was kidnapped by King Telephus, who used him as leverage in his demand that Achilles heal him. According to some sources, Orestes fathered Penthilus by his half-sister, Erigone . For modern treatments see the Oresteia in the arts and popular culture . In The History by Herodotus , the Oracle of Delphi foretold that the Spartans could not defeat the Tegeans until they moved the bones of Orestes to Sparta. Lichas discovered

960-462: Was ordered by Apollo to go to Tauris , carry off the statue of Artemis that had fallen from the heavens, and bring it to Athens. Orestes traveled to Tauris with Pylades , where the pair were at once imprisoned by the people, among whom the custom was to sacrifice all Greek strangers in honor of Artemis. The priestess of Artemis, whose duty it was to perform the sacrifice, was Orestes' sister Iphigenia . She offered to release him if he would carry home

992-766: Was the son of Clytemestra and Aegisthus), to which were added Argos and Laconia . Orestes was said to have died of a snakebite in Arcadia . His body was conveyed to Sparta for burial (where he was the object of a cult ) or, according to a Roman legend, to Aricia, when it was removed to Rome ( Servius on Aeneid , ii. 116). Before the Trojan War , Orestes was to marry his first cousin Hermione , daughter of Menelaus and Helen . Things soon changed after Orestes committed matricide : Menelaus then gave his daughter to Neoptolemus , son of Achilles and Deidamia . According to Euripides' play Andromache, Orestes slew Neoptolemus just outside

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1024-822: Was urged by Electra to return home and avenge his father's death. He returned home, along with his first cousin Pylades , son of Anaxibia (sister to Agamemnon) and Strophius. The story of Orestes was the subject of the Oresteia of Aeschylus ( Agamemnon , Choephori , Eumenides ), of the Electra of Sophocles , and of the Electra , Iphigeneia in Tauris , Iphigenia at Aulis and Orestes , all of Euripides . He also appears in Euripides’ Andromache . In Aeschylus's Eumenides , Orestes goes mad after killing his mother and

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