Agamemnon

Also known as: King Agamemnon / son of Atreus · Family: Achaeans · Role: king · First appears: BOOK I

🌐 Also appears in: Greek Mythology — A Family Orrery (as Agamemnon) · The Odyssey (as Agamemnon) · The Metamorphoses of Ovid (as Agamemnon) · Greek Tragedy — The Same Myth, Three Voices (as Agamemnon)

In Book I, Agamemnon, son of Atreus and king of the Achaeans, refuses Chryses’s ransom and keeps Chryseis at Argos, then sends her back to Chryse under Ulysses’s command. His quarrel with Achilles begins when he orders Talthybius and Eurybates to seize Briseis; he says he will take her by force if needed. In Book II, after a lying dream from Jove, he orders the Achaeans into battle. In Book III, he proclaims Menelaus victorious in the duel with Paris and demands Helen’s return with compensation; Menelaus is his brother, and Helen his sister-in-law.

Across Books IV–VIII, Agamemnon encourages the Achaeans and fights at the front, killing Odius, Elatus, and Adrestus. He persuades Menelaus to reject Adrestus’s plea for mercy before striking him down. He also praises Idomeneus as a trusted comrade and promises Teucer honour, while Nestor counsels him not to take Briseis from Achilles. In Book IX, he sends Phoenix, Ajax son of Telamon, and Ulysses to seek Achilles’ return, offering gifts and one of his daughters in marriage; Achilles refuses both reconciliation and the marriage.

In Book X, Agamemnon rouses the leaders and sentinels against a possible night attack. In Book XI, he leads the advance, killing Bienor and Oileus, but later leaves the field; Hector then renews the Trojan assault. In Book XIV, Agamemnon proposes abandoning Troy, but Ulysses rejects the plan; Agamemnon also wounds Hyperenor fatally. By Book XIX, he and Achilles end their quarrel: Agamemnon swears he left Briseis untouched and restores her with the promised gifts. In Book XXIII, he accepts Achilles’s decision in the contest, giving the cauldron to Talthybius for him while Meriones receives the spear.