HELEN OF TROY

Helen  of Troy

In Greek mythology, Helen of Sparta was perhaps the most inspired character in all literature, ancient or modern. A whole war, one which lasted for ten years, was fought over her. Not only that, nearly all the myths of the heroic age were threaded together in such a way that this most idealized of all wars was the culmination of various exploits, including the Argonaut, the Theban wars, and the Calydonian boar hunt. It is as though this event was in the destiny of every dynasty formed from the beginning of things.

Helen, the face that launched a thousand ships, was a tantalizing enigma from the very first. She was flesh and blood certainly, but she was also immortal, since her father was none other than Zeus. Her mother was the beautiful Leda, queen of Sparta, and was a sister of Clytemnestra, Castor and Pollux. In Greek myths, she was considered the most beautiful woman in the world. By marriage she was Queen of Laconia, a province within Homeric Greece, the wife of King Menelaus. Her elopement with Prince Paris of Troy brought about the Trojan War. She was described by Dares Phrygius as "She was beautiful, ingenuous, and charming. Her legs were the best; her mouth the cutest. There was a beauty-mark between her eyebrows".
Elements of her putative biography come from classical authors such as Aristophanes, Cicero, Euripides and Homer (in both the Iliad and the Odyssey). Her story appears in Book II of Virgil's Aeneid.

In her youth, she was abducted by Theseus. A competition between her suitors for her hand in marriage sees Menelaus emerge victorious. An oath sworn beforehand by all the suitors (known as the Oath of Tyndareus) requires them to provide military assistance in the case of her abduction; this oath culminates in the Trojan War. When she marries Menelaus she is still very young; whether her subsequent involvement with Paris is an abduction or a seduction is ambiguous.

The legends recounting Helen's fate in Troy are contradictory. Homer depicts her as a wistful figure, even a sorrowful one, who comes to regret her choice and wishes to be reunited with Menelaus. Other accounts have a treacherous Helen who simulates Bacchic rites and rejoices in the carnage. Ultimately, Paris was killed in action, and in Homer's account Helen was reunited with Menelaus, though other versions of the legend recount her ascending to Olympus instead. A cult associated with her developed in Hellenistic Laconia, both at Sparta and elsewhere; at Therapne she shared a shrine with Menelaus. She was also worshipped in Attica and on Rhodes.

" However, in the play this meeting and the ensuing temptation are not unambiguously positive, closely preceding death and descent to Hell. Images of her start appearing in the 7th century BC. In classical Greece, her abduction by Paris—or elopement with him—was a popular motif. In medieval illustrations, this event was frequently portrayed as a seduction, whereas in Renaissance painting it is usually depicted as a rape by Paris. The fact that the terms rape and elopement were often used interchangeably lends ambiguity to the legend.

#There are also different stories about her fate. After she returned to Sparta, Menelaus tried to kill her for her treachery, however she disrobed and her beauty weakened Menelaus and made him drop his sword. In another version, she was thought to have gone to Mount Olympus, while yet a different account says she eventually went to the Underworld to spend eternity with Achilles.