In Greek mythology

Greek mythology

Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...

, Laomedon (Λαομέδων) was a Trojan

Troy

Troy was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida...

 king, son of Ilus

Ilus

Ilus is the name of several mythological persons associated directly or indirectly with Troy.-Ilus :Homer's Iliad mentions at several points the tomb of Ilus son of Dardanus in the middle of the Trojan plain...

, brother of Ganymede

Ganymede (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Ganymede is a divine hero whose homeland was Troy. Homer describes Ganymede as the most beautiful of mortals. In the best-known myth, he is abducted by Zeus, in the form of an eagle, to serve as cup-bearer in Olympus. Some interpretations of the myth treat it as an allegory of...

 and Assaracus

Assaracus

In Greek mythology, Assaracus was the second son of Tros, King of Dardania. He inherited the throne when his elder brother Ilus preferred to reign instead over his newly founded city of Ilium . He married Hieromneme, daughter of Simoeis; others say his wife was Clytodora, daughter of Laomedon....

, and father of Priam

Priam

Priam was the king of Troy during the Trojan War and youngest son of Laomedon. Modern scholars derive his name from the Luwian compound Priimuua, which means "exceptionally courageous".- Marriage and issue :...

, Astyoche

Astyoche

The name Astyoche or Astyocheia was attributed to the following individuals in Greek mythology.*Daughter of the river god Simoeis, mother of Tros by Erichthonius....

, Lampus

Lampus

In Greek mythology, Lampus was an elder of Troy, son of King Laomedon. Father of Dolops; he was killed by Heracles....

, Hicetaon

Hicetaon

In Greek mythology, Hicetaon was a son of King Laomedon of Troy. After Paris kidnapped Helen of Troy, Hicetaon suggested that she be returned to Menelaus to avoid war. His son was Melanippus, who died in the war Hicetaon had sought to avert....

, Clytius

Clytius

Clytius is the name of many people in Greek mythology:# A son of Laomedon, brother of Priam, and an elder of Troy.# A young soldier in the army of Turnus who is loved by Cydon in Virgil's Aeneid, and was killed by Aeneas...

, Cilla

Cilla (mythology)

Cilla in Greek mythology is a name that may refer to:*One of the two female characters associated with Troy:**Cilla, sister of Hecuba. She was married to Thymoetes, brother of Priam. On the same day that Hecuba bore Paris, Cilla bore Munippus, to Priam...

, Proclia

Proclia

In Greek mythology Proclia or Proclea is the daughter of Laomedon, king of Troy, or Clytius, son of Laomedon . She married Cycnus, king of Colonae, and bore him two children, Tenes and Hemithea....

, Aethilla

Aethilla

Aethilla or Aethylla was a daughter of Laomedon and sister of Priam, Astyoche, and Medesicaste. After the fall of Troy she became the prisoner of Protesilaus, who took her, together with other captives, with him on his voyage home. He landed in Thrace in order to take in fresh water...

, Medesicaste, Clytodora, and Hesione

Hesione

In Greek mythology and later art, the name Hesione refers to various mythological figures, of which the Trojan princess Hesione is known most.-Princess Hesione of Troy:...

. Tithonus

Tithonus

In Greek mythology, Tithonus or Tithonos was the lover of Eos, Titan of the dawn. He was a Trojan by birth, the son of King Laomedon of Troy by a water nymph named Strymo . The mythology reflected by the fifth-century vase-painters of Athens envisaged Tithonus as a rhapsode, as the lyre in his...

 is also described by most sources as Laomedon's eldest legitimate son; and most sources omit Ganymedes from the list of Laomedon's children, but indicate him as his uncle instead. Laomedon's possible wives are Placia, Strymo (or Rhoeo) and Leucippe

Leucippe

In Greek mythology, Leucippe is the name of the following individuals:*One of the Minyades, three sisters who were driven by Dionysus to kill Hippasus, the son of Leucippe...

; by the former he begot Tithonus

Tithonus

In Greek mythology, Tithonus or Tithonos was the lover of Eos, Titan of the dawn. He was a Trojan by birth, the son of King Laomedon of Troy by a water nymph named Strymo . The mythology reflected by the fifth-century vase-painters of Athens envisaged Tithonus as a rhapsode, as the lyre in his...

 and by the latter King Priam (see John Tzetzes

John Tzetzes

John Tzetzes was a Byzantine poet and grammarian, known to have lived at Constantinople during the 12th century.Tzetzes was Georgian on his mother's side...

' Scholia in Lycophronem 18 ). He also had a son named Bucolion

Bucolion

In Greek mythology, Bucolion was the eldest, but illegitimate, son of the Trojan king Laomedon and the nymph Calybe. His wife was the naiad Abarbarea, and they had at least two sons, Aesepus and Pedasus. Aesepus and Pedasus participated in the Trojan War, and the family is mentioned in the Iliad,...

 by the nymph Calybe

Calybe

In Greek mythology, Calybe was a nymph who was a wife of the Trojan king Laomedon and the mother of Bucolion....

, as recounted by Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

 in the Iliad

Iliad

The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...

 (6.22). Dictys Cretensis

Dictys Cretensis

Dictys Cretensis of Knossus was the legendary companion of Idomeneus during the Trojan War, and the purported author of a diary of its events, that deployed some of the same materials worked up by Homer for the Iliad...

 (4.22) added Thymoetes

Thymoetes

In Greek mythology, there were at least three different people named Thymoetes .*Thymoetes, one of the elders of Troy , son of Laomedon. A soothsayer had predicted, that on a certain day a boy should be born, by whom Troy should be destroyed. On that very day Paris was born to Priam, king of Troy,...

 to the list of Laomedon's children.

Laomedon owned several horses with divine parentage that Zeus has given him as compensation for the kidnapping of Ganymedes. Anchises

Anchises

In Greek mythology, Anchises was the son of Capys and Themiste . His major claim to fame in Greek mythology is that he was a mortal lover of the goddess Aphrodite . One version is that Aphrodite pretended to be a Phrygian princess and seduced him for nearly two weeks of lovemaking...

 secretly bred his own mares from these horses.

According to one story, Laomedon's son, Ganymedes, was kidnapped by Zeus

Zeus

In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...

, who had fallen in love with the beautiful boy. Laomedon grieved for his son. Sympathetic, Zeus sent Hermes

Hermes

Hermes is the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology and a guide to the Underworld. Hermes was born on Mount Kyllini in Arcadia. An Olympian god, he is also the patron of boundaries and of the travelers who cross them, of shepherds and cowherds, of the cunning of thieves, of orators and...

 with two horses so swift they could run over water. Hermes also assured Laomedon that Ganymedes was immortal and would be the cupbearer for the gods, a position of much distinction. However, Ganymedes is more usually described as a son of Tros

Tros

In Greek mythology, Tros was a ruler of Troy and the son of Erichthonius by Astyoche or of Ilus I, from whom he inherited the throne. Tros was the father of three sons: Ilus, Assaracus, and Ganymedes. He is the eponym of Troy, also named Ilion for his son Ilus...

, an earlier King of Troy and grandfather of Laomedon. Laomedon himself was son of Ilus

Ilus

Ilus is the name of several mythological persons associated directly or indirectly with Troy.-Ilus :Homer's Iliad mentions at several points the tomb of Ilus son of Dardanus in the middle of the Trojan plain...

, son of Tros.

Poseidon

Poseidon

Poseidon was the god of the sea, and, as "Earth-Shaker," of the earthquakes in Greek mythology. The name of the sea-god Nethuns in Etruscan was adopted in Latin for Neptune in Roman mythology: both were sea gods analogous to Poseidon...

 and Apollo, having offended Zeus, were sent to serve King Laomedon. He had them build huge walls around the city and promised to reward them well, a promise he then refused to fulfill. In vengeance, before the Trojan War

Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology and was narrated in many works of Greek literature, including the Iliad...

, Poseidon sent a sea monster to attack Troy and Apollo sent a pestilence.

Laomedon planned on sacrificing his daughter Hesione

Hesione

In Greek mythology and later art, the name Hesione refers to various mythological figures, of which the Trojan princess Hesione is known most.-Princess Hesione of Troy:...

 to Poseidon in the hope of appeasing him. Heracles

Heracles

Heracles ,born Alcaeus or Alcides , was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and Alcmene, foster son of Amphitryon and great-grandson of Perseus...

 (along with Oicles

Oicles

In Greek mythology, Oecles was an Argive king, father of Amphiaraus, son of Mantius or Antiphates and grandson of Melampus....

 and Telamon

Telamon

In Greek mythology, Telamon , son of the king Aeacus, of Aegina, and Endeis and brother of Peleus, accompanied Jason as one of his Argonauts, and was present at the hunt for the Calydonian Boar. In the Iliad he was the father of Greek heroes Ajax the Great and Teucer the Archer by different...

) rescued her at the last minute and killed the monster. Laomedon had promised them the magic horses as a reward for their deeds, but when he broke his word, Heracles and his allies took vengeance by putting Troy to siege, killing Laomedon and all his sons save Podarces, who saved his own life by giving Heracles a golden veil Hesione had made (and therefore was afterwards called Priam

Priam

Priam was the king of Troy during the Trojan War and youngest son of Laomedon. Modern scholars derive his name from the Luwian compound Priimuua, which means "exceptionally courageous".- Marriage and issue :...

, from priamai 'to buy'). Telamon took Hesione as a war prize and married her; they had a son called Teucer

Teucer

In Greek mythology Teucer, also Teucrus or Teucris , was the son of King Telamon of Salamis Island and his second wife Hesione, daughter of King Laomedon of Troy. He fought alongside his half-brother, Ajax, in the Trojan War and is the legendary founder of the city Salamis on Cyprus...

.