Pylaeus

In Greek mythology, Pylaeus (Ancient Greek: Πύλαιος), son of Lethus, son of Teutamides, descendant of Pelasgus.[1] He was one of the allies to King Priam in the Trojan War; he commanded the Pelasgian contingent together with his brother Hippothous.[2][3] Pylaeus is hardly ever mentioned separately from his brother; they are said to have fallen in battle together by Dictys Cretensis[4] and to have been buried "in a garden" according to the late Latin poet Ausonius.[5]

Strabo, in his comment on the Homeric passage referenced above, mentions that according to a local tradition of Lesbos, Pylaeus also commanded the Lesbian army and had a mountain on the island named Pylaeus after him.[6]

Pylaeus is also an epithet of Hermes.[7]

  1. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities 1.28.3 (citing Hellanicus, Phoronis) = Hellanicus fr. 4 Fowler, pp. 156–176.
  2. ^ Homer, Iliad 2.840–843
  3. ^ Dictys Cretensis, 2.35
  4. ^ Dictys Cretensis, 3.14
  5. ^ Ausonius, Epitaph of Heroes Who Participated in The Trojan War 21
  6. ^ Strabo, 13.3.3
  7. ^ Scholia on Homer, Iliad 2.842; Eustathius on Iliad 358.19; Diogenes Laërtius, 8.1.31: Pylaios was one of the three epithets that Hermes bore as the conveyor of the souls of the dead to the Underworld.