Parthenopaeus- Greek HeroHero"The Arcadian"

Son of Atalanta

Apollodorus records two fathers for Parthenopaeus: Melanion, who won Atalanta in a footrace, or Meleager, who lay with her during the Calydonian Boar Hunt. Either way, the boy grew up in Arcadia, an archer like his mother.

The Sphinx on the Shield

When Polynices sought to reclaim the Theban throne from his brother Eteocles, he and Adrastus assembled seven champions to march on the city. Parthenopaeus joined as Arcadia's champion. The seer Amphiaraus foresaw that all but Adrastus would die. They marched anyway.

In Aeschylus's telling, each champion attacks one of Thebes's seven gates. Parthenopaeus drew the Neistan Gate. He bore a shield emblazoned with the Sphinx, the monster that had terrorized Thebes a generation earlier. He swore by his spear, which he honored above any god, that he would sack the city regardless of Zeus's will.

The Neistan Gate

He did not. Periclymenus, defending the gate, killed him. He was the youngest of the Seven.

The victorious Thebans refused the fallen burial. In Euripides' Suppliants, the Argive mothers traveled to Athens and begged Theseus for help. He marched on Thebes and forced the surrender of the corpses. A generation later, Parthenopaeus's son Promachus joined the Epigoni and sacked the city his father had sworn to take.