Tyndareus

Tyndareus was a king of Sparta in Greek mythology, the husband of Leda and the father of Clytemnestra, and the mortal father of Castor. His wife Leda also bore Pollux and Helen to Zeus on the same night. Tyndareus is best known as the man who made Helen’s suitors swear to defend whoever she married, an oath that later drew the Greek leaders to Troy (Apollodorus, Library 3.10.7, 3.10.9).

Parents and Early Life

Pausanias makes Tyndareus the son of Oebalus and Gorgophone, daughter of Perseus (Pausanias 3.1.4). Apollodorus gives two other accounts: in one, Perieres and Gorgophone had Tyndareus, Icarius, Aphareus and Leucippus (Library 3.10.3); in the other, Oebalus and the nymph Batia were the parents of Tyndareus, Hippocoon and Icarius (Library 3.10.4). Hippocoon and Icarius, the father of Penelope, are named as his brothers.

Exile and Return

Hippocoon disputed the kingship with Tyndareus, claiming the throne as the eldest son, and with the help of his sons drove Tyndareus out of Lacedaemon. In Apollodorus, Hippocoon and his sons expelled both Icarius and Tyndareus, who fled to Thestius and fought on his side in a war with his neighbours (Library 3.10.5). Pausanias says the Spartans placed his exile at Pellana, while a Messenian tradition has him go to his half-brother Aphareus in Messenia and settle at Thalamae, where his children were born (Pausanias 3.1.4). Heracles later marched against Lacedaemon to punish the sons of Hippocoon, killed them, and brought Tyndareus back to recover his throne (Apollodorus, Library 2.7.3; Pausanias 3.1.5).

Leda and Their Children

Tyndareus married Leda, a daughter of Thestius, during his exile with her father (Apollodorus, Library 1.7.10, 3.10.5). Their daughters were Timandra, who married Echemus, Clytemnestra, who married Agamemnon, and Phylonoe, whom Artemis made immortal (Library 3.10.6). Apollodorus adds that Zeus came to Leda in the form of a swan and that on the same night Tyndareus lay with her, and so Pollux and Helen were the children of Zeus, and Castor and Clytemnestra of Tyndareus (Library 3.10.7). Euripides names three daughters of Leda: Phoebe, Clytemnestra and Helen (Iphigenia in Aulis 49–51).

A scholiast on Euripides reports Stesichorus’ story that Tyndareus forgot Aphrodite when he sacrificed to the gods, and quotes Hesiod’s Catalogue of Women: Aphrodite was jealous of Tyndareus’ daughters and gave them a bad name: Timandra left Echemus for Phyleus, Clytemnestra left Agamemnon for Aegisthus, and Helen dishonoured the bed of Menelaus (Hesiod, Catalogue fragment 67). The same poem makes Helen the child of Zeus and a daughter of Ocean rather than of Leda, and shows suitors such as Philoctetes and Podarces coming to the house of Tyndareus, son of Oebalus (fragment 68).

Who Was Castor’s Father?

The sources disagree. In the Odyssey, Leda bore to Tyndareus both Castor, the tamer of horses, and Polydeuces (Pollux), the boxer, and Zeus honours them under the earth so that they live and die on alternate days (Homer, Odyssey 11.298–304). In Pindar, Zeus tells Polydeuces, “Thou art my son,” but that his brother Castor was begotten by the mortal husband of their mother, and Polydeuces is offered a share of Castor’s fate (Pindar, Nemean 10.79–90). Apollodorus follows this account (Library 3.10.7).

The Oath of Tyndareus

When the suitors from all Greece gathered for Helen, Tyndareus feared that choosing one might make the others quarrel. Odysseus, who wished to win Penelope, promised him a way out if Tyndareus would help him. Tyndareus was to make all the suitors swear to defend the chosen husband against anyone who wronged him in his marriage. Tyndareus did so, and then chose Menelaus as Helen’s husband and asked Icarius to give Penelope to Odysseus (Apollodorus, Library 3.10.9). Pausanias says the suitors took the oath standing on the pieces of a sacrificed horse, which Tyndareus then buried at a place near Sparta called the Tomb of the Horse (Pausanias 3.20.9). Euripides describes the oath as a pledge to join in attacking any city of Greeks or foreigners whose man took Helen from her husband, and in his version Tyndareus then let Helen choose for herself, and she chose Menelaus (Iphigenia in Aulis 57–71). In the Hesiodic Catalogue Tyndareus sent none of the suitors away and accepted no one’s gifts, but asked them all for sure oaths sworn with libations (Catalogue fragment 68).

Agamemnon and Menelaus

Atreus’ sons Agamemnon and Menelaus were driven out of Mycenae by Thyestes and, in Apollodorus’ account, were brought back by Tyndareus, who helped them drive out Thyestes (Epitome 2.15). Agamemnon then reigned in Mycenae and married Clytemnestra, Tyndareus’ daughter (Epitome 2.16), and Menelaus married Helen (Library 3.10.9). Tyndareus returns in Euripides’ Orestes as the grandfather who confronts Orestes after the murder of Clytemnestra (Orestes 456–629), and one account of the trial of Orestes names Tyndareus as one who brought him before the Areopagus (Epitome 6.25). Pausanias saw the tomb of Tyndareus at Sparta, in front of the temple of Zeus Cosmetas (Pausanias 3.17.4).

Tyndareus Sources

Homer, Odyssey 11.298–304. Hesiod, Catalogue of Women fragments 67–68. Pindar, Nemean 10.79–90. Euripides, Iphigenia in Aulis 49–71; Orestes 456–629. Apollodorus, Library 1.7.10, 2.7.3, 3.10.3–10; Epitome 2.15–16, 6.25. Pausanias 3.1.4–5, 3.17.4, 3.20.9.

See Also: Leda, Castor, Clytemnestra, Pollux, Helen, Zeus, Agamemnon, Menelaus, Thyestes, Trojan War