Application
So let us take our cue from Menelaus,
and not leave hold of these gentlemen
till they give us a sight of their own serious business.
.the mundane;
» Name: Teresa
» Journal: caeliat
» Contact: AIM: teresavneves; MSN/GTalk: teresavneves@gmail.com; Email: teresavneves@gmail.com
» How did you find us?: Fishie and Frankie made me do it
.the myth;
» God(dess): Menelaus of Sparta
» Reference: Wikipedia, Greek Mythology Link, Timeless Myths
» Family: {mother & father} Aerope and Atreus; {spouse} Helen
» Played By: Eric Bana
» Human Alias: Miles Grey
» Human Age: 40
» God of...: N/A [Human]
» Flair: N/A [Human]
» Flair Type: N/A
» Fitting in: Banker
» Weakness:
Menelaus's pride and possessiveness have always been his breaking points. As the younger brother, he has always played second fiddle to Agamemnon excepted in one point - he was the one who got Helen as a wife, and makes that a source of pride. As such, he is very conscious of what is his, and will ferociously defend it, be it a person or an object. That leads to recklessness, for he was always better at acting than fencing with words - that is what one has advisers for, anyway. Though some of that recklessness abated as he grew up, he is still easily inflamed when it concerns what is close to him, Helen and Hermione in particular.
One could say that Helen herself is the centerpiece of Menelaus's weakness. He is at his most vulnerable in situations involving her, for though their bond is undeniable, there is the evident fact that she spent a good part of her life with other men, and Menelaus is nothing if not jealous. She brings out the best and worst in him, and he is hardly one to walk over broken glass carefully.
» History:
Menelaus's story starts with the feud between his father Atreus, King of Mycenae, and his uncle Thyestes. Seeking to end the quarrels between them, Atreus sent his two sons, Agamemnon and Menelaus, to arrest Thyestes. However, Atreus was meanwhile killed by his nephew Aegisthus, who gave the throne to his father and caused the two young Atreides to be sent into exile. They were fostered first by King Polyphides of Sicyon, and later by King Oeneus of Calydon. Several years passed before they made alliance with Tyndareus, King of Sparta, to drive off Thyestes, exiling him in Cythera. As the older brother, Agamemnon took the throne for himself. While Agamemnon married Clytemnestra, daughter of Tyndareus, Menelaus became part of the group that would be known as the Suitors of Helen, courting the other Spartan princess.
Seeking the protection of his famously beautiful daughter, Tyndareus followed Odysseus's advice and exacted an oath from the many suitors: they were to protect and defend the one chosen as Helen's husband if any wrong was done him regarding his marriage. The oath granted, Tyndareus selected Menelaus as Helen's husband, and the younger Atreides became the ruler of Sparta when the Dioscuri (his brothers-in-law) ascended to Olympus. His promised hecatomb to Aphrodite, however, Menelaus forgot, setting the fickle goddess of love against him.
His marriage to the most beautiful woman on Earth was not without incident. At first, Menelaus saw Helen as little more than a prize, no matter her charms. She had secured him a place of power among the great houses, was the one thing in which he had gotten off better than Agamemnon, and had birthed their daughter, Hermione; she was valuable for that and little more. His feelings for his wife grew throughout the years, but it was only when he lost Helen that Menelaus really realized how he felt about her. If anything, he doted his love on little Hermione; she might not be the son he hoped for, but was the light of her father's eyes.
During their tenth year of marriage, there was a visit to his household from the princes of Troy. When Menelaus had to leave a few days after their arrival, to attend his mother's father funeral in Crete, he did not give a second thought to leaving the Trojans with his wife - the rules of hospitality were sacred, or so he thought, while he took some time from the mourning of his late grandfather to chase after a nymph named Cnossia in the city of Cnossus.
Upon his return to Sparta, however, Menelaus found that his hospitality had been betrayed. Unbeknownst to him, Paris and Helen had become lovers during his absence, and eloped to Troy before he returned home, taking with them most of the Spartan valuables.
Menelaus's rage was fearsome to behold. It hit him, then, how much he truly cared for Helen, how much more she truly was than a prize for the others to admire him. She was his, yes - Menelaus never shared well - but she was his wife and he loved her deeply.
For that alone he would go to Troy to reclaim her, but only a fool would think there was nothing else involved. To have honored guests steal his lady wife from his own house was a wound on Menelaus's pride, as well on Sparta itself - and, by extension to his family, a matter of Greek honor. With Agamemnon's aid, he invoked the Oath of Tyndareus, binding all the former Suitors to him and the rescue of Helen from her Trojan abductors. The fleet gathered in Aulis, but Artemis sent unfavourable winds against them, demanding the sacrifice of young Iphigenia, Agamemnon and Clytemnestra's daughter. It was the life of one woman to restore another's, and Menelaus urged his brother to proceed with the offering to Artemis, going so far as to intercept Agamemnon's tentative of undoing the deed, his ruthless, wounded pride and honor driving him on.
With Artemis appeased, the fleet sailed on to Troy. There, Odysseus and Menelaus were sent as envoys, demanding the restoration of Helen and the stolen Spartan properties. The Trojans would have none of it, threatening even to kill the two Greeks, were it not the intervention of Antenor, an Elder of Troy who pleaded for peace.
Returning to the Achaeans without Helen, war was inevitable. It lasted ten long, draining years, with staggering loses on either side. During the tenth year of the war, Menelaus wished to settle it in single combat with Paris. The Trojan prince was reluctant to fight at first, but was incited by his brother Hector. With that, a truce was set in place, the two combatants fighting their own war for Helen's heart without the loss of further lives. Paris almost lost his life to Menelaus, but Aphrodite spirited him away from the fight when the Spartan king was about to kill his opponent. Soon after, Athena, seeking to disrupt the truce, aimed Pandarus's spear toward Menelaus. The same goddess protected Menelaus himself, and the wound was shallow and healed by Machaon, son of Asclepius, but the aggression was enough to start the battling anew.
While Menelaus was himself a warrior, he was not, by any accounts, among the great in the field of battle. He had moments of valiant bravery, though, like his defence of Patroclus's corpse after he was felled by Hector. With the help of Meriones, Ajax the Greater and Ajax the Lesser, he retrieved the body from the field, returning it to his comrades.
He was among the Greeks hidden in the Wooden Horse, opening the city from the inside. During the sacking of Troy, Menelaus slew Deiphobus, who had taken Helen as a wife when Paris died. Upon finding Helen, he at first wanted to kill her - she who had been the cause of so much death and sorrow - but her beauty and his love for his stayed his hand. As the city fell, Menelaus took Helen back to the Achaean fleet.
The journey home was not uneventful. The ship in which the reunited couple traveled was blown off course and arrived in Egypt. There they lived for a few years, finally reconciliating after so much time apart. At last they sailed back to Sparta, where they reunited with the rest of the family.
While Helen's reunion with Hermione was cold, Menelaus was delighted to see his little daughter a grown woman. During the time at Troy, he had promised her hand in marriage to Neoptolemus, Achilles's son, but came home to find that Tyndareus was offering her to Orestes, Agamemnon's son. This raised yet another question in the family, for during their time at Egypt, Agamemnon had been killed by Clytemnestra and her lover, Aegisthus, the same cousin who had killed Atreus. To further complicate things, Orestes had plotted with his sister Electra and their friend Pylades to murder Clytemnestra and Aegisthus. They had succeeded, but Orestes had been driven mad by the Erinyes. Stuck between two sides of the family, Menelaus overruled Tyndareus's choice and married Hermione to Neoptolemus.
Neoptolemus was not worthy of his precious daughter, though, was the conclusion that Menelaus arrived to after a while. He had taken Andromache as a concubine during the sacking of Troy, and kept her with him, honoring her even after he had married Hermione. While his daughter remained childless, Andromache grew great with child, and the suspicion rose on Hermione and Menelaus that the Trojan woman had bewitched Hermione to remain barren. Finding the situation unacceptable, Menelaus seized Andromache and her young son, threatening to kill them both. Peleus, Neoptolemus's grandfather, intervened before blood could be drawn. As he stated later, however, it was never Menelaus's intention to hurt neither woman nor child, just that they be put in their place as a concubine and her bastard son, below his royal-blooded daughter.
The Moirae were not yet done with Atreus's kin, however. The rivalry between Neoptolemus and Orestes grew hotter as the time went by, and the later ended up killing the former and marrying Menelaus's daughter in his turn. Still on the throes of madness, hounded by those who sought to avenge Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, Orestes, Electra and Pylades went to Menelaus for protection.
His marriage to Helen made him Clytemnestra's kin, complicating his judgement of her actions in killing his own brother. Furthermore, the same familial bond tarnished his view on Orestes's murder of his own mother, effectively tying his hands when Orestes and Electra called for his help. While he felt avenged for Agamemnon's murder and the death of his criminal cousin Aegisthus, he could not accept the death of his wife's sister. With no viable choice, Menelaus justified his inaction on the un-lawship of Orestes's actions, trying to protected his own family in the process.
However, that inflamed Orestes's crazed spirit. Feeling wronged, he seized Hermione and Helen, attempting to force Menelaus into succoring his nephew and niece. Obviously, the Spartan king was not best pleased, and the situation would have ended in bloodshed if Apollo had not intervened. The Singer bid them make peace, instructing Menelaus to find a new wife since Helen's tasks on the mortal plane were completed. Menelaus watched his wife ascend to immortality, with no chance of getting her back that time.
Fortunately, he did not have to look for a new spouse, for Cronus snatched him from the world before that time came to pass.
» Personality:
Menelaus is a simple individual at heart, but the demands of his life have carved what was a direct, straightforward personality into a character somewhat more complex. He is usually blunt and honest, tolerating no nonsense.
He is ruthless, impatient and stubborn like a bull; even though he has none o the loquacious nature of his elder brother, Menelaus's force of will itself can move mountains. He is not one to be bullied into anything, nor to give up when set on a goal, momentous as it may be. Everything is a means to his ends, even if terrible acts must be taken (as the sacrifice of his niece to retrieve his wife).
While a proud man, Menelaus is not against admitting his own faults, even if that admission will precede a nasty punch. He does not take well to having his own failings pointed out to him; he is aware of them himself, and needs no others to remark on what is not their business.
Menelaus's appreciation for anything (most remarkably for Helen) is slow to bloom and slower to acknowledge. Still, when he does admit to himself that he does enjoy something, he will fight for it within an inch of his life.
Only his closest kin get to see his gentle side, and that only occasionally. If Helen is the love of his life, Hermione is his pride and joy. For them and them only, Menelaus would single-handedly face any opponent (for most others, he will hardly lift a finger in aid). Even though their are women, they are the women of his household, to be cherished, protected and loved as such. They need but ask to see him give over in things he would never allow anyone else.
» Sample Journal:
"Find another wife", he says. Who does he think I am? Respect to the gods is fine and good, but there are limits. I think they had proof enough already of what I would do to have her. There shall be none of this another wife nonsense. I have one wife already, and they do not get to take her from me, gods or mortals. One is all I need.
They want this city down as well? Alright. Let's start from the beginning.
» Sample Roleplay:
This city could gobble Troy whole and show no sign it was bothered by it, he mused as he watched the activity outside. In half an hour watching the street, he had seen more people than he ever would in the cities of old. And the diversity of them! All together, like there was no difference between their cultures, like their lands were not at war every other year. It was dizzying and astounding at the same time - and also somewhat depressing. With such a mass of mixed people, would someonse still remember the songs and the glory? How hard would it be for one person alone to emerge from that sea, to carve their name in the halls of history as they had done. Achaeans and Trojans alike, their stars had shone bright and furious in their time, leaving behind a blazing trail that time could not abate for centuries. Now? They were regarded as mere tales, the ghosts of the past.
They who had consorted with the gods. These people on the street below were not just like ants, they were ants, scurrying about their petty days with no idea of what it was to launch a fleet across the sea for one purpose only. These days, everything was big, made of steel and mortar; people had no notion of the effort that went into building a ship, into filling it with a crew of fighters, into raising an army and supporting it while the war lasted.
Everything was so petty.
They could learn again. All it took was a spattering of like minds to whip a mindless mass of people into working together, as the heroes of the Trojan War had proved. And in this time without gods, there was no one to interfere in their plans and tell them what they could not do. Freedom was there to be molded as desired. Into a single purpose.
Slowly, a smile took over Menelaus's face. Maybe this city was not so bad after all.
and not leave hold of these gentlemen
till they give us a sight of their own serious business.
.the mundane;
» Name: Teresa
» Journal: caeliat
» Contact: AIM: teresavneves; MSN/GTalk: teresavneves@gmail.com; Email: teresavneves@gmail.com
» How did you find us?: Fishie and Frankie made me do it
.the myth;
» God(dess): Menelaus of Sparta
» Reference: Wikipedia, Greek Mythology Link, Timeless Myths
» Family: {mother & father} Aerope and Atreus; {spouse} Helen
» Played By: Eric Bana
» Human Alias: Miles Grey
» Human Age: 40
» God of...: N/A [Human]
» Flair: N/A [Human]
» Flair Type: N/A
» Fitting in: Banker
» Weakness:
Menelaus's pride and possessiveness have always been his breaking points. As the younger brother, he has always played second fiddle to Agamemnon excepted in one point - he was the one who got Helen as a wife, and makes that a source of pride. As such, he is very conscious of what is his, and will ferociously defend it, be it a person or an object. That leads to recklessness, for he was always better at acting than fencing with words - that is what one has advisers for, anyway. Though some of that recklessness abated as he grew up, he is still easily inflamed when it concerns what is close to him, Helen and Hermione in particular.
One could say that Helen herself is the centerpiece of Menelaus's weakness. He is at his most vulnerable in situations involving her, for though their bond is undeniable, there is the evident fact that she spent a good part of her life with other men, and Menelaus is nothing if not jealous. She brings out the best and worst in him, and he is hardly one to walk over broken glass carefully.
» History:
Menelaus's story starts with the feud between his father Atreus, King of Mycenae, and his uncle Thyestes. Seeking to end the quarrels between them, Atreus sent his two sons, Agamemnon and Menelaus, to arrest Thyestes. However, Atreus was meanwhile killed by his nephew Aegisthus, who gave the throne to his father and caused the two young Atreides to be sent into exile. They were fostered first by King Polyphides of Sicyon, and later by King Oeneus of Calydon. Several years passed before they made alliance with Tyndareus, King of Sparta, to drive off Thyestes, exiling him in Cythera. As the older brother, Agamemnon took the throne for himself. While Agamemnon married Clytemnestra, daughter of Tyndareus, Menelaus became part of the group that would be known as the Suitors of Helen, courting the other Spartan princess.
Seeking the protection of his famously beautiful daughter, Tyndareus followed Odysseus's advice and exacted an oath from the many suitors: they were to protect and defend the one chosen as Helen's husband if any wrong was done him regarding his marriage. The oath granted, Tyndareus selected Menelaus as Helen's husband, and the younger Atreides became the ruler of Sparta when the Dioscuri (his brothers-in-law) ascended to Olympus. His promised hecatomb to Aphrodite, however, Menelaus forgot, setting the fickle goddess of love against him.
His marriage to the most beautiful woman on Earth was not without incident. At first, Menelaus saw Helen as little more than a prize, no matter her charms. She had secured him a place of power among the great houses, was the one thing in which he had gotten off better than Agamemnon, and had birthed their daughter, Hermione; she was valuable for that and little more. His feelings for his wife grew throughout the years, but it was only when he lost Helen that Menelaus really realized how he felt about her. If anything, he doted his love on little Hermione; she might not be the son he hoped for, but was the light of her father's eyes.
During their tenth year of marriage, there was a visit to his household from the princes of Troy. When Menelaus had to leave a few days after their arrival, to attend his mother's father funeral in Crete, he did not give a second thought to leaving the Trojans with his wife - the rules of hospitality were sacred, or so he thought, while he took some time from the mourning of his late grandfather to chase after a nymph named Cnossia in the city of Cnossus.
Upon his return to Sparta, however, Menelaus found that his hospitality had been betrayed. Unbeknownst to him, Paris and Helen had become lovers during his absence, and eloped to Troy before he returned home, taking with them most of the Spartan valuables.
Menelaus's rage was fearsome to behold. It hit him, then, how much he truly cared for Helen, how much more she truly was than a prize for the others to admire him. She was his, yes - Menelaus never shared well - but she was his wife and he loved her deeply.
For that alone he would go to Troy to reclaim her, but only a fool would think there was nothing else involved. To have honored guests steal his lady wife from his own house was a wound on Menelaus's pride, as well on Sparta itself - and, by extension to his family, a matter of Greek honor. With Agamemnon's aid, he invoked the Oath of Tyndareus, binding all the former Suitors to him and the rescue of Helen from her Trojan abductors. The fleet gathered in Aulis, but Artemis sent unfavourable winds against them, demanding the sacrifice of young Iphigenia, Agamemnon and Clytemnestra's daughter. It was the life of one woman to restore another's, and Menelaus urged his brother to proceed with the offering to Artemis, going so far as to intercept Agamemnon's tentative of undoing the deed, his ruthless, wounded pride and honor driving him on.
With Artemis appeased, the fleet sailed on to Troy. There, Odysseus and Menelaus were sent as envoys, demanding the restoration of Helen and the stolen Spartan properties. The Trojans would have none of it, threatening even to kill the two Greeks, were it not the intervention of Antenor, an Elder of Troy who pleaded for peace.
Returning to the Achaeans without Helen, war was inevitable. It lasted ten long, draining years, with staggering loses on either side. During the tenth year of the war, Menelaus wished to settle it in single combat with Paris. The Trojan prince was reluctant to fight at first, but was incited by his brother Hector. With that, a truce was set in place, the two combatants fighting their own war for Helen's heart without the loss of further lives. Paris almost lost his life to Menelaus, but Aphrodite spirited him away from the fight when the Spartan king was about to kill his opponent. Soon after, Athena, seeking to disrupt the truce, aimed Pandarus's spear toward Menelaus. The same goddess protected Menelaus himself, and the wound was shallow and healed by Machaon, son of Asclepius, but the aggression was enough to start the battling anew.
While Menelaus was himself a warrior, he was not, by any accounts, among the great in the field of battle. He had moments of valiant bravery, though, like his defence of Patroclus's corpse after he was felled by Hector. With the help of Meriones, Ajax the Greater and Ajax the Lesser, he retrieved the body from the field, returning it to his comrades.
He was among the Greeks hidden in the Wooden Horse, opening the city from the inside. During the sacking of Troy, Menelaus slew Deiphobus, who had taken Helen as a wife when Paris died. Upon finding Helen, he at first wanted to kill her - she who had been the cause of so much death and sorrow - but her beauty and his love for his stayed his hand. As the city fell, Menelaus took Helen back to the Achaean fleet.
The journey home was not uneventful. The ship in which the reunited couple traveled was blown off course and arrived in Egypt. There they lived for a few years, finally reconciliating after so much time apart. At last they sailed back to Sparta, where they reunited with the rest of the family.
While Helen's reunion with Hermione was cold, Menelaus was delighted to see his little daughter a grown woman. During the time at Troy, he had promised her hand in marriage to Neoptolemus, Achilles's son, but came home to find that Tyndareus was offering her to Orestes, Agamemnon's son. This raised yet another question in the family, for during their time at Egypt, Agamemnon had been killed by Clytemnestra and her lover, Aegisthus, the same cousin who had killed Atreus. To further complicate things, Orestes had plotted with his sister Electra and their friend Pylades to murder Clytemnestra and Aegisthus. They had succeeded, but Orestes had been driven mad by the Erinyes. Stuck between two sides of the family, Menelaus overruled Tyndareus's choice and married Hermione to Neoptolemus.
Neoptolemus was not worthy of his precious daughter, though, was the conclusion that Menelaus arrived to after a while. He had taken Andromache as a concubine during the sacking of Troy, and kept her with him, honoring her even after he had married Hermione. While his daughter remained childless, Andromache grew great with child, and the suspicion rose on Hermione and Menelaus that the Trojan woman had bewitched Hermione to remain barren. Finding the situation unacceptable, Menelaus seized Andromache and her young son, threatening to kill them both. Peleus, Neoptolemus's grandfather, intervened before blood could be drawn. As he stated later, however, it was never Menelaus's intention to hurt neither woman nor child, just that they be put in their place as a concubine and her bastard son, below his royal-blooded daughter.
The Moirae were not yet done with Atreus's kin, however. The rivalry between Neoptolemus and Orestes grew hotter as the time went by, and the later ended up killing the former and marrying Menelaus's daughter in his turn. Still on the throes of madness, hounded by those who sought to avenge Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, Orestes, Electra and Pylades went to Menelaus for protection.
His marriage to Helen made him Clytemnestra's kin, complicating his judgement of her actions in killing his own brother. Furthermore, the same familial bond tarnished his view on Orestes's murder of his own mother, effectively tying his hands when Orestes and Electra called for his help. While he felt avenged for Agamemnon's murder and the death of his criminal cousin Aegisthus, he could not accept the death of his wife's sister. With no viable choice, Menelaus justified his inaction on the un-lawship of Orestes's actions, trying to protected his own family in the process.
However, that inflamed Orestes's crazed spirit. Feeling wronged, he seized Hermione and Helen, attempting to force Menelaus into succoring his nephew and niece. Obviously, the Spartan king was not best pleased, and the situation would have ended in bloodshed if Apollo had not intervened. The Singer bid them make peace, instructing Menelaus to find a new wife since Helen's tasks on the mortal plane were completed. Menelaus watched his wife ascend to immortality, with no chance of getting her back that time.
Fortunately, he did not have to look for a new spouse, for Cronus snatched him from the world before that time came to pass.
» Personality:
Menelaus is a simple individual at heart, but the demands of his life have carved what was a direct, straightforward personality into a character somewhat more complex. He is usually blunt and honest, tolerating no nonsense.
He is ruthless, impatient and stubborn like a bull; even though he has none o the loquacious nature of his elder brother, Menelaus's force of will itself can move mountains. He is not one to be bullied into anything, nor to give up when set on a goal, momentous as it may be. Everything is a means to his ends, even if terrible acts must be taken (as the sacrifice of his niece to retrieve his wife).
While a proud man, Menelaus is not against admitting his own faults, even if that admission will precede a nasty punch. He does not take well to having his own failings pointed out to him; he is aware of them himself, and needs no others to remark on what is not their business.
Menelaus's appreciation for anything (most remarkably for Helen) is slow to bloom and slower to acknowledge. Still, when he does admit to himself that he does enjoy something, he will fight for it within an inch of his life.
Only his closest kin get to see his gentle side, and that only occasionally. If Helen is the love of his life, Hermione is his pride and joy. For them and them only, Menelaus would single-handedly face any opponent (for most others, he will hardly lift a finger in aid). Even though their are women, they are the women of his household, to be cherished, protected and loved as such. They need but ask to see him give over in things he would never allow anyone else.
» Sample Journal:
"Find another wife", he says. Who does he think I am? Respect to the gods is fine and good, but there are limits. I think they had proof enough already of what I would do to have her. There shall be none of this another wife nonsense. I have one wife already, and they do not get to take her from me, gods or mortals. One is all I need.
They want this city down as well? Alright. Let's start from the beginning.
» Sample Roleplay:
This city could gobble Troy whole and show no sign it was bothered by it, he mused as he watched the activity outside. In half an hour watching the street, he had seen more people than he ever would in the cities of old. And the diversity of them! All together, like there was no difference between their cultures, like their lands were not at war every other year. It was dizzying and astounding at the same time - and also somewhat depressing. With such a mass of mixed people, would someonse still remember the songs and the glory? How hard would it be for one person alone to emerge from that sea, to carve their name in the halls of history as they had done. Achaeans and Trojans alike, their stars had shone bright and furious in their time, leaving behind a blazing trail that time could not abate for centuries. Now? They were regarded as mere tales, the ghosts of the past.
They who had consorted with the gods. These people on the street below were not just like ants, they were ants, scurrying about their petty days with no idea of what it was to launch a fleet across the sea for one purpose only. These days, everything was big, made of steel and mortar; people had no notion of the effort that went into building a ship, into filling it with a crew of fighters, into raising an army and supporting it while the war lasted.
Everything was so petty.
They could learn again. All it took was a spattering of like minds to whip a mindless mass of people into working together, as the heroes of the Trojan War had proved. And in this time without gods, there was no one to interfere in their plans and tell them what they could not do. Freedom was there to be molded as desired. Into a single purpose.
Slowly, a smile took over Menelaus's face. Maybe this city was not so bad after all.