Unchanged by any teller — how the centuries since have seen Tyndareus.
The gallery
Dioskouroi with Tyndareus and Leda (Apulian red-figure hydria)
Dioskouroi Painter (attributed), c. 380–370 BC
On this Apulian red-figure hydria, the eponymous Dioskouroi Painter gathers the Spartan royal family around a quiet domestic scene. Tyndareus, king of Sparta, is rendered as the seated white-haired elder holding a sceptre, flanked by his wife Leda and framed on either side by their twin sons Castor and Polydeuces (the Dioskouroi) shown as young warriors with pilos caps and spears, while a woman pours from an oinochoe into a phiale. The 44.5 cm vessel, found at Pomarico and now in the British Museum (inv. 1856,1226.19), is one of the few ancient images to name and depict Tyndareus alongside his celebrated family rather than the more famous Leda-and-the-swan episode.
Odysseus Advises King Tyndareus Concerning Helen's Suitors
Howard Pyle, 1905
This pen-and-ink illustration by the American artist Howard Pyle, made for the 1905 edition of James Baldwin's The Story of the Golden Age, dramatizes one of Tyndareus' pivotal moments: the dilemma of the suitors of Helen. Fearing violence among the many kings competing for his stepdaughter's hand, the Spartan king Tyndareus turns to the cunning Odysseus, who counsels him to bind every suitor by oath to defend whichever man is chosen as Helen's husband. Pyle stages the counsel as an intimate exchange between the troubled aging king and the resourceful hero, capturing the political shrewdness that would later muster the Greek alliance against Troy. The image entered the public domain and is preserved via Project Gutenberg's digitization of the text.