Polydorus is the youngest son of Priam

Priam

Priam was the king of Troy during the Trojan War and youngest son of Laomedon. Modern scholars derive his name from the Luwian compound Priimuua, which means "exceptionally courageous".- Marriage and issue :...

 and Hecuba

Hecuba

Hecuba was a queen in Greek mythology, the wife of King Priam of Troy during the Trojan War, with whom she had 19 children. These children included several major characters of Homer's Iliad such as the warriors Hector and Paris, and the prophetess Cassandra...

 in the mythology of the Trojan War

Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology and was narrated in many works of Greek literature, including the Iliad...

. Polydorus is an example of the fluid nature of myth, as his role and story vary significantly in different traditions and sources.

In Hecuba and Metamorphoses

In Euripides

Euripides

Euripides was one of the three great tragedians of classical Athens, the other two being Aeschylus and Sophocles. Some ancient scholars attributed ninety-five plays to him but according to the Suda it was ninety-two at most...

' tragedy Hecuba

Hecuba (play)

Hecuba is a tragedy by Euripides written c. 424 BC. It takes place after the Trojan War, but before the Greeks have departed Troy . The central figure is Hecuba, wife of King Priam, formerly Queen of the now-fallen city...

, the ghost of Polydorus is a character, and his death is the cause of the main conflict of the play. Polydorus’ ghost presents the prologue of the play, explaining that he was sent to Thrace

Thrace

Thrace is a historical and geographic area in southeast Europe. As a geographical concept, Thrace designates a region bounded by the Balkan Mountains on the north, Rhodope Mountains and the Aegean Sea on the south, and by the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara on the east...

 under the protection of King Polymestor

Polymestor

In Greek mythology, Polymestor was a King of Thrace. His wife was Ilione, the eldest daughter of King Priam. Polymestor appears in Euripides' play, Hecuba and in the Ovidian myth "Hecuba, Polyxena and Polydorus"...

 in case Troy fell. With his son, Priam sent gold so that if Troy should fall his son could continue to support himself. Once Troy fell, however, Polymestor killed Polydorus by throwing him into the sea and stole the gold. Polydorus laments the fact that his body is adrift in the sea without the proper death rites.

Later in the play, a slave woman tells Hecuba that Polydorus’ body has been found washed up on shore. Hecuba explains that she saw the murderer of Polydorus in a dream and it is Polymestor. Aided by Agamemnon

Agamemnon

In Greek mythology, Agamemnon was the son of King Atreus and Queen Aerope of Mycenae, the brother of Menelaus, the husband of Clytemnestra, and the father of Electra and Orestes. Mythical legends make him the king of Mycenae or Argos, thought to be different names for the same area...

 and the other captive women, Hecuba proceeds to avenge her son’s murder by killing Polymestor’s sons and blinding him. This same story of Polydorus is summarized in essence in Ovid

Ovid

Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...

’s Metamorphoses.

In The Aeneid

In Vergil's Roman epic The Aeneid, Aeneas

Aeneas

Aeneas , in Greco-Roman mythology, was a Trojan hero, the son of the prince Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite. His father was the second cousin of King Priam of Troy, making Aeneas Priam's second cousin, once removed. The journey of Aeneas from Troy , which led to the founding a hamlet south of...

 lands in Thrace hoping to establish a colony for his people. The land is overgrown with various plants, and as Aeneas begins to uproot them, they began to spout blood. The plant begins to speak and explains that it is Polydorus - the spears that were used to kill him stuck into the ground and took root, transforming into plants. It is explained that Priam sent Polydorus to Thrace with payment to the Thracian king so that he would be protected if Troy fell. When Troy did fall, Polymestor broke his pact with the Trojans and killed Polydorus in order to ingratiate himself to Agamemnon and kept the payment. Aeneas goes on to give Polydorus a proper burial.

In Fabulae

According to the tradition of Hyginus

Hyginus

Hyginus can refer to:People:*Gaius Julius Hyginus , Roman poet, author of Fabulae, reputed author of Poeticon astronomicon*Hyginus Gromaticus, Roman surveyor*Pope Hyginus, also a saint, Bishop of Rome about 140...

’ Fabulae, Priam and Hecuba entrusted Polydorus’ upbringing to his sister, Iliona

Ilione

In Greek mythology, Ilione was the oldest daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her husband was the Thracian king Polymestor. She is briefly mentioned in Virgil's Aeneid: Aeneas gives her scepter to Dido....

, who was the wife of Polymestor. In order to ensure Polydorus’ safety, she raised him as her own son, while she raised her and Polymestor’s true son, Deipylus, as her brother. After the fall of Troy, the Achaeans offered Polymestor Agamemnon’s daughter Electra

Electra

In Greek mythology, Electra was an Argive princess and daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra. She and her brother Orestes plotted revenge against their mother Clytemnestra and stepfather Aegisthus for the murder of their father Agamemnon...

 to be his wife if he killed Polydorus. Polymestor agreed, but because of the switch that Iliona executed, he instead killed Deipylus.

As this occurred, Polydorus went to the oracle of Apollo in order to learn of his true parentage. Here he was told that his home city had been destroyed, his father killed, and his mother captured. Upon returning home, and still believing that he was the son of Polymestor and Iliona, he asked Iliona why the oracle had been wrong, at which point she tells him the truth of his ancestry. He proceeds to blind and kill Polymestor at his sister’s advice.

In the Iliad

In Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

's Greek epic the Iliad

Iliad

The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...

, Polydorus is depicted briefly as a foe to Achilles

Achilles

In Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greek hero of the Trojan War, the central character and the greatest warrior of Homer's Iliad.Plato named Achilles the handsomest of the heroes assembled against Troy....

. According to this source, Polydorus was the youngest son of Priam, and thus his father would not let him fight. Achilles, however, sees him on the battlefield showing off his great speed running through the lines and spears him, ending his life. Seeing his brother Polydorus’ death causes Hector to challenge Achilles.

Sources

• Apollodorus, R. Scott Smith, Stephen Trzaskoma, and C. Julius. Hyginus. Apollodorus' Library and Hyginus' Fabulae: Two Handbooks of Greek Mythology. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 2007. Print.
• Euripides, and Marilyn Nelson. Hecuba. U Penn Press, 1998. Print.
• Homer, and Stanley Lombardo. Iliad. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 1997. Print.
• Ovidius, Naso Publius, and Alan D. Melville. Metamorphoses. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986. Print.
• Virgil, and Robert Fitzgerald. The Aeneid. New York: Knopf, 1992. Print