Greek Mythology

The Classical Gods of Ancient Greece

PELOPS

Greek legendary mortal

Adventurous hero who got into a stew

Son of Tantalus, King of Phrygia, and Dione, the daughter of Atlas.

He suffered appalling abuse as a baby when his dad invited the Gods to a dinner party and put Pelops on the menu as a stew. The Gods were far from amused. Zeus hurled Tantalus down to the Underworld and the Gods rallied round to remedy the situation.

Hermes spooned out the meaty bits and re-boiled them in the cauldron of re-birth, Clotho kneaded the bits together and Hephaestus carved out a shoulder from ivory to replace a bit eaten by Demeter before she realized what was going down. Rhea did some kiss of life and Poseidon contributed a special team of lightweight winged horses for the re-constituted infant to play with when he was taken off to be fostered in Olympus.

When he was of age he decided to leave his heavenly home and travel to Earth where he fancied his chance to win the hand of Hippodamia, daughter of Oenomaus, in a chariot race. He had of course brought his winged horses with him.

Not one to take chances as he faced death if he lost, he bribed the charioteer of Oenomaus to cause a wheel failure and crash which would and did cause the death of Oenomaus.

The charioteer Myrtilus, after throwing himself clear, had been promised a trip on the honeymoon chariot with a chance to sleep with the new bride. No chance — Pelops managed to tip him out over the sea where he drowned.

This was very naughty, and repentant Pelops cried on the shoulder of Hephaestus, who had earlier made him such a nice shoulder and was always his favorite. He prayed and prayed to be forgiven saying he would never ever do it again cross his heart and hope to die. Remembering the poor lad in the stew, what was a good God to do?

So after being warned a third strike and you are out, he was forgiven and went on to rule happily and have lots of children who were never forced to eat anything they didn’t like.

Pelops Facts and Figures

Name: Pelops
Pronunciation: Coming soon
Alternative names:

Gender: Male
Type: legendary mortal
Celebration or Feast Day: Unknown at present

Role: Unknown at present

Good/Evil Rating: Unknown at present
Popularity index: 2604

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Article last revised on September 06, 2018 by Rowan Allen.
Editors: Peter J. Allen, Chas Saunders

References: Coming soon.

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