This is Part II on
my research into situations where the gods seem to confuse an ancient Greek
hero with his lineage and vice versa. Part
I was TFBT
Looking at His Lineage Rather than the Man
Homer tells us that; "Tros, who was lord of the Trojans, and to
Tros in turn there were born godlike Ganymedes who was the loveliest born of
the race of mortals, and therefore the gods caught him away to themselves, to
be Zeus' wine-pourer, for the sake of his beauty, so he might be among the
immortals” [i] This is the first instant of the Olympians’ love of Trojan princes, apparently due to their
beauty. Ganymede consequently became
immortal and unaging. He never had any
children. However his brother unfaulted
Ilus fathered Capys and his other brother Assaracus fathered the universally
hated Laomedon.
Laomedon in turn
sired Priam and Tithonus. Of Tithonus we
hear that golden-throned Eos (Dawn) snatched
up Tithonus presumeable because he was as beautiful as the deathless gods and
brought him to Ethiopia, and there consorting with him she bore two sons,
Emathion and Memnon.[ii]
At some point the rosy fingered goddess went to ask the dark-clouded Son of Cronos
that he should be deathless and live eternally; and Zeus bowed his head to her
prayer and fulfilled her desire.”[iii]
When Memnon died as men do, the gods
so loved him that once again the granted immortality to a descendant of Tros.[iv] Memnon’s
cousin Hector too is “dear to the gods.”
[v]
Meanwhile the
descendants of Capys though not made immortal seemed to be dear to the gods
also because of their great beauty.
Hence we hear;
"Anchises, (son of Capys) most glorious
of mortal men, take courage and be not too fearful in your heart. You need fear
no harm from me nor from the other blessed ones, for you are dear to the gods:
and you shall have a dear son who shall reign among the Trojans, and children's
children after him, springing up continually. His name shall be Aeneas, because
I felt awful grief in that I laid me in the bed of mortal man: yet are those of
your race always the most like to gods of all mortal men in beauty and in
stature.” (Homeric
Hymn to Aphrodite 191)
Of Aeneas’ son Ascanius supposedly Virgil says in the Aeneid
“Blessings
on your fresh courage, boy, scion of gods and ancestor of gods yet to be, so it
is man rises to the stars."
Ascanius was
ancestor of the Emperor August of Rome.
He as also the ancestor of Queen Victoria who ruled a quarter of the
planet and upon whose empire the sun never set.
These two other descendants of Tros seem pretty favored by the gods too!
