Blown off course, the Achaeans landed in Mysia thinking it was Troy and ravaged Teuthrania. Telephus son of Heracles, king of the Mysians, wounded Achilles with his spear, cut down Thersander the Theban king, and drove the host back to their ships — until the same spear's rust healed him and he guided the fleet to the true Troad.1
Son of Heracles in Teuthrania
Telephus was born of Heracles and Auge, priestess of Athena at Tegea — exposed on Mount Parthenion and suckled by a doe, or cast abroad with his mother until she came to Teuthras, prince of Teuthrania in Mysia. Apollodorus makes Teuthras adopt the youth and give him the Mysian throne; Pausanias knows the country above the Caicus as Teuthrania of old, the land that would become Pergamon. When the Greek fleet first sailed for Troy, it was Telephus' kingdom they would mistake for Ilion — and the son of Heracles who would turn them back from the shore.2
The mistaken landing
The Achaeans, sailing from Aulis after the winds rose, landed in Mysia and pillaged the country, believing they had reached the Troad. Apollodorus sets the error in the Cypria's opening campaigns: the host that had sworn at Sparta and paid at Aulis now ravaged a friendly coast. Telephus, seeing his land plundered, armed the Mysians and chased the Greeks in a crowd to the ships, killing many before the princes understood their mistake. Homer remembers the Mysian detour when the wounded Menelaus tells how he stood against Eurypylus son of Telephus — proof that the first war was fought against the wrong king.3
Thersander falls
Among the slain was Thersander, son of Polynices and king of Thebes after the Epigonoi took the seven-gated city. He had made a stand against the Mysians — the Theban house that had sent its own expeditionary kings to Troy now lost its ruler before the true siege began. Pausanias ties Thersander to the Boeotian tradition; Apollodorus names him explicitly in the Mysian slaughter. Thebes would send another captain to Troy, but the man who ruled after the Epigonoi never saw the Scaean Gate.4
Achilles wounded
When Achilles rushed at Telephus, the Mysian king did not abide the onset and was pursued. In the pursuit he was entangled in a vine-branch and wounded in the thigh with Achilles' spear — the same Pelian ash that would slay Hector and Paris in seasons to come. The wound would not heal: Apollo told Telephus that he who wounded him must turn physician. The Cypria's first duel between the best of Achaea and the son of Heracles ended not in death but in a curse that would bring the Mysian king to Argos as a beggar before the fleet could sail true for Troy.5
Rust from the Pelian spear
Telephus came from Mysia to Argos clad in rags and begged Achilles' help, promising to show the course to Troy if he were healed. Achilles scraped rust from the spear that had wounded him and cured the thigh — the oracle fulfilled, ho trōsas iasetai, he who wounded shall heal. In return Telephus guided the Greek fleet to the true Troad. The episode filled lost tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides; the Pergamon altar would carve the Mysian battles and the healing across its frieze when Telephus became the mythical founder of the city that bore his name.6
Toward the true voyage
With Telephus' guidance the host corrected its course — the detour that had cost Thersander and bloodied Mysia now became the path to Ilion. Eurypylus son of Telephus would fight for Troy in the war's later years and fall to Neoptolemus, as Menelaus recalls in the Odyssey's catalogue of champions. The nested episode on Protesilaus at Troy tells who first leapt ashore when the corrected fleet reached the Troad — and Thetis' warning that the first to land would be the first to die.7
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How the centuries saw it
Telephus Seated on the Altar with Bandaged Thigh
Unknown (Attic red-figure vase-painter), c. 450 BC
Telephus on the altar with bandaged thigh — the Mysian king wounded by Achilles when the Achaeans mistook Mysia for Troy.
Telephus Threatening the Infant Orestes (Telephus Frieze, Panel 42)
Unknown (Pergamene sculptors), 2nd century BC
The Pergamon Telephus frieze: Telephus threatens infant Orestes — the hostage bargain that forces Achilles to heal the wound he made.
Achilles Healing Telephus with the Rust of His Spear
Unknown (Roman relief sculptor), 1st century BC
Achilles heals Telephus with spear-rust — the oracle that only the wounder can cure, unlocking the fleet's road to Troy.
Telephus Frieze: Telephus receives weapons from Auge (Pergamon Altar, panels 16–17)
Unknown, c. 160 BC
Telephus receives weapons from Auge on the Pergamon frieze — the Mysian hero armed before the Achaean clash.
In play
Telephus
The spear that wounds must heal — Achilles' Pelian shaft, Euripides' lost beggar-king tragedy, and the Mysian guide to Troy.
The Acharnians
Aristophanes
Aristophanes' comedy keeps parodying Euripides' Telephus — the rags, the hostage infant, and the wound that only the spear can cure.
Cypria
The cyclic prequel lands the Achaeans in Mysia by mistake — Telephus' wound opens the road to Ilium.