We will use your email address only for sending you newsletters. She is one of the eponymous women the tragedy Elements of her putative biography come from classical authors such as Aristophanes, Cicero, Euripides, and Homer (in both the Iliad and the Odyssey). All of her suitors were required to swear an oath (known as the Oath of Tyndareus) promising to provide military assistance to the winning suitor, if Helen were ever stolen from him. Her beauty inspired artists of all times to represent her, frequently as the personification of ideal human beauty. Cut! O'Brien, Steven. [91] The Irish poet William Butler Yeats compared Helen to his muse, Maude Gonne, in his 1916 poem "No Second Troy". “What moved me about her is that she feels like a woman who’s completely imprisoned in an abusive relationship, and has never had time in her life where she was not controlled by men constantly. In a famous representation by the Athenian vase painter Makron, Helen follows Paris like a bride following a bridegroom, her wrist grasped by Paris' hand. [49] Cypria narrate that in just three days Paris and Helen reached Troy. In Virgil's Aeneid, Deiphobus gives an account of Helen's treacherous stance: when the Trojan Horse was admitted into the city, she feigned Bacchic rites, leading a chorus of Trojan women, and, holding a torch among them, she signaled to the Greeks from the city's central tower. The English Pre-Raphaelite painter Evelyn de Morgan portrayed a sexually assertive Helen in her 1898 painting Helen of Troy. Was Helen of Troy a real person or not? In Greek mythology, Helen was the most beautiful woman from the age of the heroes. For Polyxo, they say, was an Argive by descent, and when she was already married to Tlepolemus, shared his flight to Rhodes. "Panorama with the Abduction of Helen Amidst the Wonders of the Ancient World", "Lights! In this version, Helen is depicted as unhappy in her marriage and willingly runs away with Paris, with whom she has fallen in love, but still returns to Menelaus after Paris dies and Troy falls. The earliest accounts of this war come from Homer, who lived around the eighth century B.C., several centuries after the events took place. 1.53%. In Euripides Iphigenia in Aulis, Clytemnestra, Iphigenia's mother and Helen's sister, begs her husband to reconsider his decision, calling Helen a "wicked woman". [74] Dares Phrygius describes Helen in his History of the Fall of Troy: "She was beautiful, ingenuous, and charming. [26] Fabius Planciades Fulgentius also states that Helen, Castor and Pollux are born from the same egg. Before this journey, Paris had been appointed by Zeus to judge the most beautiful goddess; Hera, Athena, or Aphrodite. See an analysis of the poem by Gumpert, Ancient writers do not agree on whether the embassy was dispatched before the gathering of the Greek army in Aulis or after it reached. The origins of Helen's myth date back to the Mycenaean age. Theseus and Pirithous then traveled to the underworld, the domain of Hades, to kidnap Persephone. Upon entering Troy, Helen begins to realize the fall-out of her actions will reach much further than simply destroying her family. The 1971 film The Trojan Women was an adaptation of the play by Euripides in which Irene Papas portrayed (a non-blonde) Helen of Troy. The Rape of Helen by Francesco Primaticcio (c. 1530–1539, Bowes Museum) is representative of this tradition. This resulted in the Trojan War when the Achaeans set out to reclaim her. Helen tries her best to keep Adonis from behaving stupidly, but mostly fails. [31] Later sources state either that it was brought to Leda by a shepherd who discovered it in a grove in Attica, or that it was dropped into her lap by Hermes. When she married Menelaus she was still very young; whether her subsequent departure with Paris was an abduction or an elopement is ambiguous (probably deliberately so). Real or not, Helen of Troy had a tremendous impact on the lives of people that knew of her. Helen's abduction caused an invasion of Athens by Castor and Pollux, who captured Aethra in revenge, and returned their sister to Sparta. John Erskine's 1925 bestselling novel The Private Life of Helen of Troy portrayed Helen as a "sensible, bourgeois heroine",[91] but the 1927 silent film of the same name, directed by Alexander Korda, transformed Helen into "a shopaholic fashion maven". [38] In Goethe's Faust, Centaur Chiron is said to have aided the Dioscuri brothers in returning Helen home. "[5], The usual tradition is that after the goddess Aphrodite promised her to Paris in the Judgement of Paris, she was seduced by him and carried off to Troy. Theocritus conjures the song epithalamium Spartan women sung at Platanistas commemorating the marriage of Helen and Menelaus:[81], We first a crown of low-growing lotus Zeus also transformed himself into a goose and raped Nemesis, who produced an egg from which Helen was born. [25] The First Vatican Mythographer introduces the notion that two eggs came from the union: one containing Castor and Pollux; one with Helen and Clytemnestra. [70], Pausanias also has another story (3.19.9–10): "The account of the Rhodians is different. Helen was portrayed by Diane Kruger in the 2004 film Troy. [91] She is one of the eponymous women the tragedy The Trojan Women produced in 415 BC by the Greek playwright Euripides. [91] In 1928, Richard Strauss wrote the German opera Die ägyptische Helena (The Egyptian Helena), which is the story of Helen and Menelaus's troubles when they are marooned on a mythical island. So she sent against her when she was bathing handmaidens dressed up as Furies, who seized Helen and hanged her on a tree, and for this reason the Rhodians have a sanctuary of Helen of the Tree."[71]. According to the ancient writers, it was the sight of Helen's face or breasts that made Menelaus drop his sword. Helen’s earliest mythological ancestry places her as the daughter of Zeus and the goddess Nemesis. Archaeologists have unsuccessfully looked for a Mycenaean palatial complex buried beneath present-day Sparta. Full easy it is to make this understood of one and all: for [99], In the 2018 TV miniseries Troy: Fall of a City, Helen was portrayed by Bella Dayne.[100]. Homer narrates that during a brief stop-over in the small island of Kranai, according to Iliad, the two lovers consummated their passion. This painting depicts Paris' judgement. Express. Eidolon is also present in Stesichorus' account, but not in Herodotus' rationalizing version of the myth. See, Euripides and the Gods, Mary R. Lefkowitz. [21] Recent archaeological excavations in Greece suggest that modern-day Laconia was a distinct territory in the Late Bronze Age, while the poets narrate that it was a rich kingdom. We are in the process of taking action by implementing several strategic and highly-visible diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives that we believe will result in true enduring improvement for all our stakeholders. The Berlin-born actress has also starred in TV shows Humans and The Man in the High Castle. Odysseus was one of the suitors, but had brought no gifts because he believed he had little chance to win the contest. [67] Electra wails:[68]. from Marlowe's Faustus, Isaac Asimov jocularly coined the unit "millihelen" to mean the amount of beauty that can launch one ship. In her youth, she was abducted by Theseus. [34], Pausanias states that in the middle of the 2nd century AD, the remains of an egg-shell, tied up in ribbons, were still suspended from the roof of a temple on the Spartan acropolis. Hera and Athena watch nearby. The fall of Troy came to represent a fall from an illustrious heroic age, remembered for centuries in oral tradition before being written down. Get HELE Alerts *Real-Time - data as of 3/20/2020 - Find a broker to begin trading HELE now Exchange:NASDAQ Industry: Consumer Durables. Artists of the 1460s and 1470s were influenced by Guido delle Colonne's Historia destructionis Troiae, where Helen's abduction was portrayed as a scene of seduction. Theseus took Helen and left her with his mother Aethra or his associate Aphidnus at Aphidnae or Athens. HELE . [44] Menelaus, her future husband, did not attend but sent his brother, Agamemnon, to represent him. She likes Hercules but as a friend. Helen on the Ramparts of Troy Moreau, Gustave Buy This Allposters.com. Lithographic illustration by Walter Crane, Before the opening of hostilities, the Greeks dispatched a delegation to the Trojans under Odysseus and Menelaus; they endeavored without success to persuade Priam to hand Helen back. During the fall of Troy, Helen's role is ambiguous. Although Helen is sometimes depicted as being raped by Paris, Ancient Greek sources are often elliptical and contradictory. On the other hand, Cypria note that this happened the night before they left Sparta.[50]. Helen is caring and enthusiastic. Dayne explains that Helen has often been portrayed as “a whore who cheated on her husband” but her approach is to emphasise how trapped she was and what caused her to elope. A curious fate is recounted by Pausanias the geographer (3.19.11–13), which has Helen share the afterlife with Achilles. In Greek mythology, Helen of Troy is known as the woman whose beauty sparked the Trojan War. but all men shudder at me. [39] On the other hand, Stesichorus said that Iphigenia was the daughter of Theseus and Helen, which obviously implies that Helen was of childbearing age. [28], On the other hand, in the Cypria, part of the Epic Cycle, Helen was the daughter of Zeus and the goddess Nemesis. “It is a story of empowerment for a woman,” she says. The Legends travel to the 1930s and try to get Helen back to the Bronze Age. 16. In the Cypria, Nemesis did not wish to mate with Zeus. [45] Helen and Menelaus became rulers of Sparta, after Tyndareus and Leda abdicated. People believed that this was "the famous egg that legend says Leda brought forth". As a young girl, she was carried off by Theseus, but she was rescued by her brothers. Updated May 15, 2019. In a similar fashion to Leighton, Gustave Moreau depicts an expressionless Helen; a blank or anguished face. Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). She is 'the face that launched a thousand ships'; the woman blamed for the Trojan War - a conflict that caused countless deaths - but who was the real Helen of Troy? [91] He dedicates his autobiography Diary of a Genius to "my genius Gala Gradiva, Helen of Troy, Saint Helen, Gala Galatea Placida."[91]. They say that when Menelaus was dead, and Orestes still a wanderer, Helen was driven out by Nicostratus and Megapenthes and came to Rhodes, where she had a friend in Polyxo, the wife of Tlepolemus. [89] The German poet and polymath Johann Wolfgang von Goethe re-envisioned the meeting of Faust and Helen. Artemis was enraged by a sacrilege, and only the sacrifice of Agamemnon's daughter, Iphigenia, could appease her. Another ancient tradition, told by Stesichorus, tells of how "not she, but her wraith only, had passed to Troy, while she was borne by the Gods to the land of Egypt, and there remained until the day when her lord [Menelaus], turning aside on the homeward voyage, should find her there."[7]. When she finally met her real husband, Menelaus, he wanted to kill her, but when she dropped her gown, he was blinded by her beauty and just forgave her. [...] or like Helen, on the sands of Eurotas, between Castor and Pollux, one to be victor in boxing, the other with horses: with naked breasts she carried weapons, they say, and did not blush with her divine brothers there. Can it be that her beauty has blunted their swords? [78], In Renaissance painting, Helen's departure from Sparta is usually depicted as a scene of forcible removal (rape) by Paris. Dio Chrysostom gives a completely different account of the story, questioning Homer's credibility: after Agamemnon had married Helen's sister, Clytemnestra, Tyndareus sought Helen's hand for Menelaus for political reasons. Theseus chose Helen, and Pirithous vowed to marry Persephone, the wife of Hades. However, Helen was sought by many suitors, who came from far and near, among them Paris who surpassed all the others and won the favor of Tyndareus and his sons. In Hellenistic times, she was associated with the moon due to the similarity of her name to the Greek word Σελήνη (Selēnē), meaning "Moon, goddess of the moon". As a sign of the importance of the pact, Tyndareus sacrificed a horse. Rozokoki, Alexandra. "Dioscuric Elements in Celtic and Germanic Mythology". In 1803, when French zoologist François Marie Daudin was to name a new species of beautifully colored snake, the trinket snake (Coelognathus helena), he chose the specific name helena in reference to Helen of Troy.[92]. 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