And having slain the Trojans, they set fire to the
city and divided the spoil among them. And having sacrificed to all the
gods, they threw Astyanax from the battlementsCompare Arctinus, Ilii Persis, summarized by
Proclus, in Epicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, ed. G. Kinkel, p.
50; Eur. Tro. 719-739, Eur. Tro. 1133-1135; Eur. And. 8-11; Paus. 10.26.9; Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica
xiii.251-257; Tryphiodorus, Excidium Ilii
644-646; Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 1263;
Scholiast on Eur. Andr. 10; Ov. Met. 13.415-417; Hyginus, Fab. 109;
Seneca, Troades 524ff., 1063ff. While ancient writers
generally agree that Astyanax was killed by being thrown from a tower at
or after the sack of Troy,
they differ as to the agent of his death. Arctinus, as reported by
Proclus, says merely that he was killed by Ulysses. Tryphiodorus reports
that he was hurled by Ulysses from a high tower. On the other hand,
Lesches in the Little Iliad said that it was Neoptolemus
who snatched Astyanax from his mother's lap and cast him down from the
battlements (Tzetzes and Paus. 10.26.9).
According to Euripides and Seneca, the murder of the child was not
perpetrated in hot blood during the sack of Troy but was deliberately executed after
the capture of the city in pursuance of a decree passed by the Greeks in
a regular assembly. This seems to have been the version followed by
Apollodorus, who apparently regarded the death of Astyanax as a
sacrifice, like the slaughter of Polyxena on the grave of Achilles. But
the killing of Astyanax was not thus viewed by our other ancient
authorities, unless we except Seneca, who describes how Astyanax leaped
voluntarily from the wall while Ulysses was reciting the words of the
soothsayer Calchas and invoking the cruel gods to attend the
rite. and slaughtered Polyxena on the grave of
Achilles.As to the
sacrifice of Polyxena on the grave of Achilles, see Arctinus, Ilii
Persis, summarized by Proclus, in Epicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, ed.
G. Kinkel, p. 50; Eur. Hec.
107ff.; Eur. Hec. 218ff.;
Eur. Hec. 391-393; Eur. Hec. 521-582; Quintus Smyrnaeus,
Posthomerica xiv.210-328; Tryphiodorus, Excidium Ilii
686ff.; Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron 323;
Hyginus, Fab. 110; Ov. Met.
13.439-480; Seneca, Troades 168ff., 938-944,
1118-1164; Dictys Cretensis v.13; Serv. Verg. A. 3.322. According to
Euripides and Seneca, the ghost of Achilles appeared above his grave and
demanded the sacrifice of the maiden. Others said that the spirit of the
dead showed himself in a dream to Neoptolemus (so Quintus Smyrnaeus) or
to Agamemnon (so Ovid). In Quintus Smyrnaeus the ghost threatens to keep
the Greeks wind-bound at Troy until they have complied with his demand, and
accordingly the offering of the sacrifice is followed by a great calm.
Euripides seems to have contemplated the sacrifice, in primitive
fashion, as a means of furnishing the ghost with the blood needed to
quench his thirst (Eur. Hec. 391-393;
Eur. Hec. 536ff.); but Seneca
represents the ghost as desiring to have Polyxena as his wife in the
Elysian Fields (Seneca, Troades 938-944). A more romantic
turn is given to the tradition by Philostratus, who says that after the
death of Achilles, and before the fall of Troy, the amorous Polyxena stole out from
the city and stabbed herself to death on the grave of Achilles, that she
might be his bride in the other world. See Philostratus, Her.
xx.18; Philostratus, Vit. Apollon. iv.16.4.
According to the usual tradition, it was Neoptolemus who slew the maiden
on his father's tomb. Pictures of the sacrifice were to be seen at Athens and Pergamus (Paus. 1.22.6; Paus.
10.25.10). Sophocles wrote a tragedy on the theme. See The Fragments of Sophocles, ed. A. C. Pearson, vol.
ii. pp. 161ff.
And as special awards Agamemnon got Cassandra, Neoptolemus got
Andromache, and Ulysses got Hecuba.Compare Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica
xiv.20-23, who agrees with Apollodorus as to the partition of
these captive women among the Greek leaders. But some say that
Helenus got her, and crossed over with her to the Chersonese
This is the version of
the story adopted by Dares Phrygius, who says that Helenus went to the
Chersonese along with
Hecuba, Andromache, and Cassandra (Dares Phrygius, De excidio
Trojae 43).; and that there she turned into a bitch,
and he buried her at the place now called the Bitch's Tomb.As to the transformation of
Hecuba into a bitch, compare Eur. Hec.
1259-1273; Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica
xiv.347-351; Dio Chrysostom xxxii. vol. ii. p. 20, ed.
L. Dindorf; Agatharchides, De Erythraeo Mari, in
Photius, Bibliotheca, p. 442a, ll. 23ff., ed. Bekker;
Julius Pollux, v.45; Tzetzes, Scholiast on
Lycophron 315, 1176; Excidium Ilii, Tusc. Disp.
iii.26.63; Ov. Met.
13.565-571; Hyginus, Fab. 111; Serv. Verg. A. 3.6; Scriptores rerum
mythicarum Latini, ed. G.H.Bode, i. p. 145 (Second Vatican
Mythographer 209). A rationalistic version of the story is
told by Dictys Cretensis v.16. We may conjecture that the
fable of the transformation originated in the resemblance of the name
Hecuba to the name Hecate; for Hecate was supposed to be attended by
dogs, and Hecuba is called an attendant of Hecate (Tzetzes,
Scholiast on Lycophron 1176). As for Laodice, the
fairest of the daughters of Priam, she was swallowed up by a chasm in the
earth in the sight of all.Compare Quintus Smyrnaeus, Posthomerica xiii.544-551;
Tryphiodorus, Excidium Ilii 660-663; Tzetzes,
Posthomerica 736; Tzetzes, Scholiast on Lycophron
314. When they had laid Troy waste and were about to sail
away, they were detained by Calchas, who said that Athena was angry with
them on account of the impiety of Ajax. And they would have killed Ajax, but
he fled to the altar and they let him alone.Compare Arctinus, Ilii Persis, summarized by
Proclus, in Epicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, ed. G. Kinkel, pp.
49ff. Ulysses advised the Greeks to stone Ajax to death for
his crime against Cassandra (Paus.
10.31.2).