Helenus’s Family Tree

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Family

• Hecuba(parent),Priam(parent),Cassandra(sibling),Deiphobus(sibling),Hector(sibling),Paris(sibling)— Marriage

  Priam and Hecuba, king and queen of Troy, bore Hector, Paris, Cassandra, Deiphobus, and Helenus. Hecuba dreamed Paris would destroy Troy, but Priam welcomed him back.

• Andromache(spouse)— Marriage

  After Neoptolemus's death, Helenus married Andromache, the widow of his brother Hector. Together they ruled in Epirus, founding a small Troy in exile as described in Virgil's Aeneid.

Enemy of

• Deiphobus

  Deiphobus and Helenus both claimed Helen after Paris's death. Deiphobus prevailed, and Helenus, furious at being passed over, abandoned Troy and defected to the Greeks.

Associated with

• Aeneas

  In Virgil's Aeneid, Helenus hosted Aeneas and his Trojans in Epirus, where he had built a miniature Troy. As a seer, Helenus delivered crucial prophecies guiding Aeneas's voyage to Italy, warning him of Scylla, Charybdis, and the Sibyl.

• Apollo

  Apollo granted Helenus the gift of prophecy. Unlike his twin Cassandra, whose prophecies Apollo cursed to be disbelieved, Helenus retained the trust of those who heard his predictions.

• Helen of Troy

  Helenus and Deiphobus both sought Helen of Troy after Paris's death. Helen was given to Deiphobus, prompting Helenus's bitter defection to the Greek camp.

• Neoptolemus

  Helenus was awarded to Neoptolemus as a war prize after Troy's fall. He served as the young warrior's advisor and prophet, and after Neoptolemus's death inherited his kingdom in Epirus.

• Odysseus

  After defecting from Troy, Helenus revealed to Odysseus the conditions required for the city's fall, including the need to steal the Palladium and bring Neoptolemus and Philoctetes to the battlefield.

• Palladium

  Helenus revealed to the Greeks that Troy could not fall while the Palladium remained within its walls. Odysseus and Diomedes subsequently stole the sacred image, fulfilling one of the conditions for Troy's destruction.

• Philoctetes

  The captured Trojan seer Helenus prophesied that Troy could not fall without Philoctetes and the bow of Heracles. This prophecy forced the Greeks to retrieve the hero they had abandoned on Lemnos.

• Trojan War

  Helenus fought as a Trojan warrior and seer during the Trojan War. After Paris's death he defected to the Greeks, revealing the secret conditions needed for Troy's fall.