Teucer (Ancient Greek: Τεῦκρος, Teûkros) is the Salaminian archer of the Trojan War, son of King Telamon of Salamis by his second wife Hesione, daughter of Laomedon of Troy, and half-brother of Ajax the Great. He fought from behind Ajax's shield, entered the Trojan Horse, and after Ajax's suicide was driven from his father's island; he founded Salamis on Cyprus. The atlas keeps him distinct from King Teucer of the Troad (teucer-troas), the Scamander-born first king of Teucria.
Adapted from Wikipedia, "Teucer" · CC BY-SA 4.0
I.Family
Teucer is the son of Telamon, king of Salamis Island, and Hesione, daughter of King Laomedon of Troy — Telamon's prize from Heracles' earlier sack of the city. Through Hesione he is nephew of Priam and cousin of Hector and Paris, the Trojans he fought at the second siege. His elder half-brother by Telamon's first wife is Ajax the Great (Telamonian Ajax).
This node is the Salaminian hero teucer — not King Teucer (teucer-troas), son of the river-god Scamander and the nymph Idaea, first king of the land later called the Troad.
II.Trojan War
In the Iliad Teucer is chiefly a great archer who looses shafts from behind the giant shield of Ajax. When Hector drove the Achaeans toward their ships, Teucer killed many charging Trojans, including Hector's charioteer Archeptolemus; Apollo foiled every arrow aimed at Hector himself. Hector later stunned Teucer with a rock, forcing him from the fight for a time. After Zeus snapped his bowstring, Teucer took up a spear, challenged Hector again, and narrowly avoided Hector's javelin.
He was one of the Danaans who entered the Trojan Horse. Hyginus credits him with thirty Trojan dead; Homer names among them Aretaon, Orsilochus, Ormenus, Ophelestes, Daetor, Chromius, Lycophontes, Amopaon, Melanippus, Prothoon, Periphetes, and Archeptolemus. He also wounded Glaucus son of Hippolochus.
III.Exile and Cyprus
After Ajax's suicide Teucer guarded the body until burial, insulting Menelaus and Agamemnon when they tried to prevent it; Odysseus finally persuaded Agamemnon to allow the rites. Before Telamon he stood trial for negligence in failing to bring home Ajax's corpse or arms; he was disowned and forbidden to return to Salamis. Horace's Odes 1.7 gives him a farewell speech to his companions — "nil desperandum" ("do not despair") and "cras ingens iterabimus aequor" ("tomorrow we shall set out upon the vast ocean").
Tradition has him join King Belus of Tyre in a campaign against Cyprus; Belus then granted him the island. Teucer founded Salamis on Cyprus, named after his home, married Eune (daughter of Cinyras), and by her had a daughter Asteria. Later Cypriot figures such as Anaxarete were placed in his line. Local Galician legend also ties the foundation of Pontevedra to Teucer — a poetic reception rather than a classical Greek source.