First king

The first Laconian king was Lelex ₂, a "son of the soil" (see AUTOCHTHONOUS) or, as others say, a son of Poseidon and Libya, that is a descendant of Io, since Libya is daughter of Epaphus ₁, king of Egypt and son of Zeus and Io. Lelex ₂ himself is said to have arrived to Laconia from Egypt.

Inventor of the mill

Lelex ₂ was succeeded on the throne by his son Myles, the inventor of the mill. His mother was the naiad Cleocharia. Another son, Polycaon ₁, emigrated and became the first king of Messenia.

Public works

Yet another son of Lelex ₂, Eurotas, who is also called son of Myles, became king after the latter. Eurotas had a daughter Sparta, who married Lacedaemon, son of Zeus and the Pleiad Taygete, after whom the Lacedaemonians are called. It is told that Eurotas led down to the sea the stagnant water on the plain, and when it flowed away, a river-stream was formed which he named Eurotas after himself.

Lacedaemon

After Eurotas, Lacedaemon became king and had by Sparta a son Amyclas ₁, and a daughter Eurydice ₂. According to some, this daughter married King Acrisius of Argos, and gave birth to Danae, mother of Perseus ₁, the founder of Mycenae. Lacedaemon called the inhabitants Lacedaemonians after himself, and having founded a city, he called it Sparta after his wife.

Memorials and name of flower

This curious and original custom of leaving memorials behind was also followed by King Lacedaemon's son and successor, King Amyclas ₁, who having founded a city near Sparta, called it Amyclae. Amyclas ₁ married Diomede ₂, and among their children is Hyacinthus ₁, a handsome young man whom Apollo loved, and accidentally killed with the cast of a quoit. His blood, which had stained the grass, transformed into a flower.

Two successors

Argalus, son of Amyclas ₁ and Diomede ₂, became king after his father, and on his own death was succeeded by his brother Cynortes.

Oebalus ₁

After Cynortes, one of his sons, Oebalus ₁, became king. Some say that Oebalus ₁ married the naiad Batia ₂, while others say that his wife was Gorgophone ₂, daughter of Perseus ₁. It is said that Gorgophone ₂ was the first woman to marry a second time, and that her husbands were brothers.

Dispute concerning the kingdom

Among the children of Oebalus ₁ are Tyndareus (father of Helen), Icarius ₁ (father of Penelope, Odysseus' wife), and Hippocoon ₂. These sons disputed for the kingdom, and Hippocoon ₂ expelled both Icarius ₁ and Tyndareus from Lacedaemon, and became king of the Lacedaemonians.

Occasion for war

At this time, Heracles ₁ was campaigning in the Peloponessus; he had already captured Elis, and after attacking Pylos, he killed Neleus and his sons except Nestor. When Pylos was taken, Heracles ₁ marched against Lacedaemon, because the Lacedaemonians had supported the Pylians in their war against Heracles ₁, and also because he wished to punish the sons of Hippocoon ₂ for the death of Oeonus. This Oeonus, son of Licymnius, had once visited Sparta with Heracles ₁, and was killed by the sons of Hippocoon ₂, for having himself killed their dog that had attacked him.

Invasion of Lacedaemon

In order to invade Lacedaemon, Heracles ₁ requested and obtained military assistance from King Cepheus ₂ of Tegea (in Arcadia), who at the beginning was reluctant to go to war, as he feared the Argives could march against his city. However, he was finally persuaded when Heracles ₁ provided a lock of the hair of Medusa ₁ that he received from Athena. This lock, he explained, used in a certain way, would protect Tegea from any attack. During the invasion of Lacedaemon, however, Cepheus ₂ and his sons perished in battle. Som say that Iphicles, son of Amphitryon and Alcmena and brother of Heracles ₁, was also killed in this battle; however, others affirm that Iphicles was wounded in the first battle fought by Heracles ₁ against King Augeas of Elis, and died later of his wound.

King Tyndareus

But as Hippocoon ₂ and his sons were defeated and dead, and Sparta subjugated, Heracles ₁ restored Tyndareus, entrusting the kingdom to him. Tyndareus married Leda and had children by her: the DIOSCURI, Clytaemnestra, Helen, Timandra ₁, Phylonoe, and Phoebe ₆. During his rule, Helen was abducted by Theseus, and later (when Helen had been brought back) many kings and princes of Hellas came to Sparta as SUITORS OF HELEN. On this occasion, The Oath of Tyndareus was exacted from the SUITORS. Tyndareus gave Penelope to Odysseus, and Helen to Menelaus. Clytaemnestra married first Tantalus ₃, and after him King Agamemnon of Mycenae, brother of Menelaus. Timandra ₁ married Echemus, king of the Arcadians, and Phylonoe was made immortal by Artemis. Some day or other, Tyndareus died, having bequeathed the kingdom of Sparta to his son-in-law Menelaus. Tyndareus is said to have been raised from the dead by Asclepius.

King Menelaus

Menelaus and Helen reigned as king and queen of Sparta when the Trojan Paris came for a visit, and violating all rules of hospitality, abducted his host's wife and took her to Troy. This outrage was regarded by Menelaus and the kings of Hellas who were bound by The Oath of Tyndareus, as a reason for waging war against Troy.

After the war, Menelaus and Helen returned to Sparta, having wandered in the Mediterranean for seven years. Menelaus and Helen never died because they were made immortal by Hera, and sent to the Elysian Fields, but on earth Menelaus was succeeded on the throne by his nephew Orestes ₂, son of Agamemnon.

Dispute between the sons of Agamemnon and Achilles echoes previous conflict

Hermione, daughter of Menelaus and Helen, was nine years old when she was abandoned by her mother. She married Orestes ₂, but when he went mad after killing his mother Clytaemnestra, Neoptolemus, son of Achilles, carried her off, because she had previously been promised to him at Troy by her father. However, when Orestes ₂ recovered his mind, he and his troops looked for Neoptolemus, and finding him at Delphi, they murdered him and took Hermione back.

Extension of the kingdom of Orestes ₂

King Orestes ₂ ruled over a vaster territory than his father. For when Cylarabes died childless, leaving vacant the throne of Argos, Orestes ₂ succeeded him, thus adding this kingdom to his own. Orestes ₂ also succeeded to the throne of Sparta, for the Lacedaemonians considered his claim to the throne prior to that of Nicostratus and Megapenthes ₁, these being sons of Menelaus by one or perhaps two slave women, whereas Orestes ₂ was the son of one of the daughters of King Tyndareus. Besides Sparta and Argos, Orestes ₂ also extended his rule over the greater part of Arcadia, and obeying the oracle of Delphi, he moved his capital from Mycenae to Arcadia. Messenia was held in ancient times by the line of Neleus and Nestor until some time after the Trojan War; then Orestes ₂ annexed the region to his kingdom, and Messenia was ruled by him and his descendants down to the return of the HERACLIDES.

The sons of Orestes ₂

Location of Sparta in Laconia

When Orestes ₂ died, killed by the bite of a snake at Oresteum in Arcadia, his son by Hermione, Tisamenus ₂, came to the throne, while his bastard son by Erigone ₁ (daughter of Aegisthus and Clytaemnestra), Penthilus ₁, led the Aeolian colonisation, which preceded the Ionian by four generations. He advanced as far as Thrace sixty years after the Trojan War, about the time of the return of the HERACLIDES to the Peloponnesus.

Tisamenus ₂ lost both life and kingdom when the HERACLIDES Temenus ₂ and Cresphontes invaded the country. With him disappeared the dynasty of the Pelopides, and the HERACLIDES, descendants of Perseus ₁, took over.

Two Royal Houses

Casting lots after victory, the HERACLIDES Cresphontes and the twin brothers Procles ₂ and Eurysthenes ₁ divided the territory they had conquered, Messenia being assigned to Cresphontes, and Sparta to the twins.

The twins Procles ₂ and Eurysthenes ₁ were bitter enemies, but as they had won by lot the kingdom of Lacedaemon, they decided to rule with two royal houses, and this is why there were two kings in Sparta also in historical times.

Throne Succession Laconia / Sparta

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