In the Iliad, Aeneas is a leader of the Dardanians, a group descended from Dardanus, the original founder of Troy. (Dardanus’ son, Ilus, and a grandson, Tros, gave Troy its common names: Ilium and Troy). Homer givesAeneas little more notice, but legends say that at the time of Troy’s fall, he escaped the city carrying his father, and also rescued his son and certain Trojan relics including the Athenian Palladium. The Palladium was a statuette representing Athena’s dear childhood friend Pallas, an object extremely holy to Athena. In the epic poem, The Aeneid, the Roman poet Virgil tells how Aeneas returned from Troy to found Rome, which he calls the “new Troy.”

Andromache was the perfect wife to her husband, Hector – a real contrast to that home-wrecker, Helen, who became her sister-in-law. Andromache was wildly worried about her husband and her baby son, Astyanax. In the middle of the war, she tried to keep Hector from attacking the Greeks, urging him instead to stay close to the city and defend the walls. She pointed out a weak spot in the western wall where, she said, the two Ajaxes had already tried to enter. Sadly, though, Andromache was fated to lose both her husband and son in the war. She herself was taken captive.

The infant son of Hector and Andromache, Astyanax represented Troy’s hope for the future. Had he lived, he would have been king one day. The Greeks made sure he would not survive, once they had taken Troy. Some say it was Odysseus who threw the baby boy from the battlements of Troy to his death.

A princess of Troy and sister to Hector and Paris, Cassandra had the ability to foresee the future – though the god Apollo made sure nobody believed her. She predicted the defeat of Troy, and warned her townspeople that the great wooden horse left behind at the end of the war was full of Greeks. They didn’t believer her, of course, and took the horse into the city. The sack of Troy followed, and Cassandra, seeking refuge in Athena’s temple, was dragged away first by Little Ajax and then by the Greek leader Agamemnon. On arriving at Mycenae, Agamemnon’s home, Cassandra foresaw the murder of Agamemnon and ongoing deaths in his family. Again, no one believed her, and she, like Agamemnon, was killed by his wife, Clytemnestra.

Hector was King Priam’s “good son.” He was a nearly unbeatable fighter and leader, a good father to his son Astyanax and ideal husband to his wife Andromache. He did not go off to a foreign city and bring away a beautiful married woman like his brother Paris. Instead he defended his people against the Greeks, nearly crushing them while Achilles sat in his tent sulking. But when Hector killed Achilles’ friend Patroclus, he brought the wrath of Achilles down on himself. Achilles chased Hector across the Trojan countryside for miles, then killed him and humiliated him even in death by dragging Hector’s body three times around the city walls behind his chariot.

The Pinarbasi springs at the edge of the Trojan plain remain a landmark where, according to Homer, Achilles chased Hector before killing him.

Hecuba was queen of Troy, and bore her husband King Priam many children, though Hector was her favorite. When the war was not going well, Hector hurried home to ask his mother to make offerings to Athena. She organized the older noble women and brought out the finest robe in her treasury to give Athena. But she lost all her family to the Greeks in the end.

Prince Paris of Troy had a reputation as a ladies’ man, rather than a fighting hero. “Our prince of beauty,” his brother Hector calls him, with disgust, in Homer’s Iliad. He was so good looking that the goddesses Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite asked him to judge which of them was most beautiful. Paris chose Aphrodite, because she promised him the lovely Helen as a bride. When Paris stole Helen away from her Greek husband, Menelaus, he sparked the Greek revenge that destroyed Troy. Yet Paris’ heroic moment came after the Greek Achilles killed Hector. Paris shot an arrow into Achilles’ heel. The Greeks decided they needed extra help to get rid of Paris, and finally he was shot to death by a Greek using the magical bow and arrows of Heracles.

Priam, the king of Troy, had fifty sons and a dozen daughters, all of whom lived in his grand palace complex with him in the city’s citadel. Hector, Priam’s first son by his wife Hecabe (also called Hecuba) was his favorite. Paris, a later son, caused the Greeks to destroy Troy. . After the Greek Achilles killed Hector, Priam went to Achilles’ tent to ask for the body of his son for proper burial. Homer says he begged Achilles, saying, “I have endured what no one on earth has ever done before -- / I put to my lips the hands of the man who killed my son.” Old Priam did get Hector’s body back, but when the Greeks sacked Troy, he was slaughtered at his palace steps.

Priam’s trip to speak with Achilles in the Greek camp includes fording the “fair-flowing river,” the Scamander. That detail helped archaeologists determine that the Greeks might have camped at Besika Bay, south of the city.

The son of the water nymph, Thetis, and a mortal father, Achilles was famous as the greatest warrior among the Greeks. He agreed to join Agamemnon’s war of revenge against Troy, but when Agamemnon forced him to give up the slave woman he had won as a war prize, Achilles became so angry he refused to fight for months. Homer says Achilles knew he had a choice: he could leave for home and have a long but quiet life; or he could fight again and gain great fame – but the price of that fame would be death. When Hector kills Achilles’ best friend Patroclus, the decision is made and Achilles roars back to the battle. Achilles kills Hector, with the aid of the goddess Athena. But Paris, guided by Apollo, shoots the hero in the one place where he can be mortally wounded: the ankle.

A mound on the Trojan plain was long regarded as the ancient tomb of Achilles.

Powerful, selfish Agamemnon, king of Mycenae, agreed to head the attack on Troy when Helen was stolen away from his brother Menelaus. When the assembled Greeks could not sail for Troy for lack of a good wind, Agamemnon did not hesitate to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia to bring one. He led the fight against Troy for ten years, but endangered his own cause when he stole away Achilles’ woman war prize, Briseis. The same self-regard led him to take the Trojan princess Cassandra away from Ajax of Locris. In the end, Agamemnon led the Greeks to victory over Troy. But when he returned home, he got his come-uppance. His wife Clytemnestra, furious over Agamemnon’s killing of her daughter and his desire for Cassandra, murdered him.

Great Ajax was second as a fighter only to his cousin Achilles, and very confident. Once when Athena urged him on in battle, he shouted, “Be off, Goddess, and encourage my fellow-Greeks; for where I am, no enemy will ever break through!” At Ajax’s birth, Heracles gave him a lion pelt to wear, which made him nearly invulnerable. In the Trojan War, Ajax was always in the thick of it: dueling with Hector, joining the group that begged Achilles to return to the fight, protecting the body of Patroclus. He was the one to bring the body of Achilles himself back from the front; but Agamemnon awarded Achilles’ armor to Odysseus, instead of to him. Enraged, Ajax would have attacked his fellow Greeks; but Athena made him crazy so that he slaughtered animals instead. Finally, in despair, Ajax fixed his sword in the ground and fell on it, killing himself.

Ajax of Locris was called “Little Ajax” because he was a smaller man than his fellow Greek, Great Ajax. He was known for his huge pet snake, which followed him everywhere. Little Ajax was also famous as a very fast runner – second only to Achilles. When the Greeks finally invaded Troy at the end of the Trojan War, Little Ajax found the Trojan princess Cassandra in Athena’s temple, and tried to drag her away. Agamemnon interfered, though, and took Cassandra as his own prize. Little Ajax died on the way home from Troy. But the people of Ajax’s home town, Locris, felt that the goddess Athena was still angry. To calm her, they promised to send two girls per year for a thousand years to serve in Athena’s temple at Troy. The girls were safe on temple grounds, but they had to enter the city through a secret tunnel to avoid being killed by angry Trojans.

An underground passage to the temple grounds in Troy IX may memorialize the legend about the girls from Locris.

She is called “Helen of Troy,” but before Paris stole her away, she lived with her husband Menelaus in Sparta. Helen’s beauty was famous, but the tales disagree about her feelings. Was she a victim of Paris, or of the goddess Aphrodite who offered her to him? Or did she captivate Paris, careless of the horror she would bring on Troy? Homer presents her as loving Paris, but also missing her first husband and child. She spends most of the war on the high walls of Troy, worrying first about Paris and then about Greeks she knows among the fighters. In the end, she is recaptured and returned to Menelaus.

Menelaus, king of the Greek land of Sparta, was lucky to get the lovely Helen for his wife. She was sought after by all the neighboring lords, and to avoid a war over her, they had agreed to join together for defense if any one of them was attacked. That agreement came in handy when Paris stole Helen away from Sparta. Menelaus turned to his powerful brother Agamemnon to gather the leaders together in a force to attack Troy. Menelaus was an older man, but he too fought at Troy and finally brought Helen back. Some say he meant to kill her for her treachery, but when he saw her great beauty again, the knife fell from his hand.

One of the most fascinating of the Greek leaders, Odysseus was famous for his wisdom and wiliness. He became chief advisor to Agamemnon, forming part of the group that tried to get Achilles to return to the battle. At night, with Diomedes, he was inspired to capture a set of fabulous white horses which might have ensured Troy’s victory. On Achilles’ death, Odysseus managed to get his armor; and some say the Trojan horse was Odysseus’ idea. After the war, though, it took many years and trials before Odysseus made it home to Ithaca – a story Homer tells in The Odyssey.

Achilles’ closest friend was an older cousin he grew up with, Patroclus. Naturally Patroclus came to Troy to fight with Achilles and his troops, the Myrmidons, and naturally he withdrew from the battle when the angry Achilles did. However, when the battle turned sharply against the Greeks, Patroclus felt he had to act. With Achilles’ permission, he dons his cousin’s armor to frighten the Trojans, and not only drives them away from the Greek ships, but chases them to the walls of Troy. There, Hector kills him with Apollo’s help. Miserable and angry, Achilles takes revenge and then orders a hero’s funeral for Patroclus. Wood for the funeral pyre is gathered from the foothills of Mt. Ida, source of Troy’s thriving lumbering trade.

Aphrodite, the goddess of love, emerged from the ocean’s foam and traveled on a seashell to the islands of the Aegean. Aphrodite married the god of the forge, Hephaestus – but that did not keep her from many extramarital affairs and intrigues. Among her offspring was the Trojan hero Aeneas, born of his mother’s night on Mount Ida with a mortal man. Aphrodite helped cause the Trojan War when she offered the lovely Helen to Prince Paris of Troy, if Paris would award her the golden apple as the most beautiful goddess. Aphrodite managed to enrage not only Helen’s husband Menelaus and his fellow Greek kings, but also her beauty-contest rivals, the goddesses Hera and Athena.

Apollo pulls the sun across the sky with his horses, and is also god of healing and of music, carrying his lyre everywhere. Apollo was the special protector of Troy. Homer tells how Agamemnon must return a priestess he stole away from Apollo’s shrine, and he decides to take Achilles’ favorite captive woman as a substitute. This act enrages Achilles, who drops out of fighting and nearly causes the Greeks to lose.. In battle, Apollo watches over Paris , snatching him from the field when Menelaus threatens to kill him. Later, Apollo guides Paris’ deadly arrow to the heel of Achilles. Yet Apollo’s powers are not enough to save his beloved Troy, in the end.

A shrine to Apollo, called the Smintheum, has been restored at Chrysa, just south of Troy along the coast.

Athena, the great goddess of wisdom, sprang directly out of the head of her father, Zeus. She was fully armed, a sign of her strength in war. But she also had a domestic side, as goddess of crafts such as pottery and weaving. In Homer’s Iliad, Trojans consider Athena their protector, and they pray to her, “Queen Athena – Shield of our city – glory of goddesses!” They lay their most finely made robe across the knees of her statue as a gift. But Athena does not protect Troy from the Greeks because she is angry with Trojan prince Paris. He had awarded a golden apple for the greatest beauty not to her but to the goddess of love, Aphrodite. Athena gains revenge by helping Achilles kill the Trojan hero, Hector.

In later times when Troy was a Greek town, a new temple to Athena atop the citadel was a major feature of the city.

Hephaestus was the smith god, master forger of metal weapons and tools. The smith was a vital personage in ancient times, considered something of a sorcerer for the magical strength and beauty he could give to metal objects. Hephaestus was lame and ugly, but married to the most beautiful of the goddesses, Aphrodite. She gave him many headaches by fooling with mortal men and other gods. In the Trojan war, Thetis convinces Hephaestus to forge armor for her son Achilles, and Homer gives over many verses to describing its beauties. Hephaestus also helps Achilles when the river Scamander almost drowns him, by fighting the river with fire.

Wife of Zeus, and his sister too, Hera was one of the most powerful immortals. In the Trojan War, Hera backs the Greeks – because Paris, prince of Troy, did not choose her as fairest of the goddesses. Hera is always looking for ways to undermine her husband, who backs the Trojans for a time. She manages with the help of Sleep to distract Zeus from the action in the middle of the war, while Poseidon encourages the Greek attack. But Zeus wakes up, crying, “What a disaster you create!” He reminds her of the time when he hung her up on Olympus, her feet tied to anvils. She, as usual, denies she beguiled him and swears to follow him in future.

Poseidon, the god of the sea, is nearly as powerful as his brother Zeus, the sky god who rules on Olympus. However when he and other gods tried to rebel against Zeus, Poseidon was punished by being forced to build the city of Troy (or, some say, just the walls) for King Lamedon, father of Priam. However, the king failed to pay wages to Poseidon for his year of work. This is one reason why Poseidon backs the cause of the Greeks, leaping into the fray for example when Hera is distracting Zeus, crying, “I, I will lead the way!” Horses are sacred to Poseidon, and he also controls earthquakes. Some scholars have guessed that the Trojan horse may represent the earthquake that destroyed Troy VI -- since both horses and earthquake represent Poseidon’s power.

Thetis, an immortal called a Nereid who lives in the sea, married the mortal man Peleus. It was at their wedding that the dispute among goddesses occurred which led to the abduction of Helen. When Achilles was born to Peleus and Thetis, his mother ensured his might from the beginning by dipping him in the river Styx. This made him invulnerable, except for his ankle, where she was holding him. During the Trojan War, Achilles prayed for help to his mother when Agamemnon stole away Briseis, his war prize, and he wanted to get back at the Greeks. Thetis convinced Zeus to allow the Trojans to nearly defeat the Greeks.

King of the gods, Zeus is powerful but unpredictable. He reigns over an unruly crowd of gods alongside his wife Hera. Among his many offspring by mortal women is Helen, cause of the Trojan War. One myth says that Zeus encouraged the Trojan War in order to reduce the excess population. He influences the events of the war as he swoops from his home on Mount Olympus to Mount Ida, in the Troad (Trojan region). Calling on Zeus can be dangerous: Homer tells how Zeus grants Achilles’ angry wish, expressed by his immortal mother Thetis, to set back the Greek cause temporarily. Yet Achilles doesn’t know that the cost of Zeus’ aid will be the death of his best friend, Patroclus. Despite his power, Zeus is constantly opposed by other gods, from Hera to Poseidon, and he himself seems to submit to “fate,” as when Hector must die and with him, the hopes of Troy.