Tithonus
Trojan prince beloved by Eos who was granted immortality but not eternal youth, aging endlessly into a withered husk.
The Legend of Tithonus
He is the most horrifying cautionary tale in all of Greek myth — eternal life without eternal youth. Eos loved Tithonus and asked Zeus to make him immortal, but forgot to ask for eternal youth. He aged and shriveled until he could no longer move, endlessly babbling in a locked room. Some say Eos finally turned him into a cicada out of pity. His son Memnon would later die at Troy, killed by Achilles. The myth haunted every subsequent Greek story about divine gifts — Aphrodite herself cited Tithonus when refusing to make Anchises immortal.
Parents
Laomedon
Children
Memnon, Emathion
Symbols
Fun Fact
Tennyson's Tithonus (1860) is considered one of the finest dramatic monologues in English.
Explore Further
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🗡 herotragedy
Young Trojan prince killed by Achilles at the temple of Apollo, whose death was prophesied to seal Troy's doom.
Iphis of Argos
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Poor Argive youth who died of unrequited love for Anaxarete, who was then turned to stone.
Tydeus
🗡 heroThe ferocious warrior who forfeited immortality
A hero of savage courage who fought as one of the Seven Against Thebes but lost Athena's gift of immortality in his final moment.
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Hyacinthus was a Spartan prince of extraordinary beauty loved by both Apollo and Zephyrus — his accidental death gave birth to the hyacinth flower.
Anchises
🗡 heroLove, royalty, Troy
Trojan prince beloved by Aphrodite and father of Aeneas, the legendary founder of Rome
Ariadne
🗡 herolove
Cretan princess who saved Theseus with a ball of thread, was abandoned on Naxos, and became the immortal wife of Dionysus.
Busiris
🗡 heroNone recorded
Egyptian king who sacrificed strangers to Zeus until Heracles broke free and killed him
Glaucus
🗡 heroNone recorded
A young prince of Crete who drowned in a jar of honey and was restored to life by the seer Polyidus using a magical herb revealed by a serpent
Ganymede
🗡 heroCup-bearer of the gods
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Bellerophon
🗡 heroThe hero who tamed Pegasus
The Corinthian hero who tamed the winged horse Pegasus and slew the Chimera, but fell from heaven when he tried to reach Olympus.
Laodamia
🗡 herodevotion
Wife of Protesilaus who embraced a wax image of her dead husband so desperately the gods briefly returned him to life.
Patroclus
🗡 heroThe companion whose death transformed the Iliad
Achilles's closest companion whose death in borrowed armour broke the hero's withdrawal and sent him raging back to war.