（Διομήδης).
1. A son of Tydeus and Deipyle, the husband of Aegialeia,
and the successor of Adrastus in the kingdom of Argos,
though he was descended from an Aetolian family. (Apollod.
1.8.5, &c.) The Homeric tradition about him is as follows :-
-His father Tydeus fell in the expedition against Thebes,
while Diomedes was yet a boy (II. 6.222); but he himself
afterwards was one of the Epigoni who took Thebes. (II.
4.405; comp. Paus. 2.20.4.) Diomedes went to Troy with
Sthenelus and Euryalus, carrying with him in eighty ships
warriors from Argos, Tiryns, Hermione, Asine, Troezene,
Eionae, Epidaurus, Aegina, and Mases. (2.559, &c.) In the
army of the Greeks before Troy, Diomedes was, next to
Achilles, the bravest among the heroes ; and, like Achilles
and Odysseus, he enjoyed the special protection of Athena,
who assisted him in all dangerous moments. (5.826, 6.98,
10.240, 11.312; comp. Verg. A. 1.96.) He fought with the
most distinguished among the Trojans, such as Hector and
Aeneias (8.110, &c., 5.310, &c.), and even with the gods who
espoused the cause of the Trojans. He thus wounded
Aphrodite, and drove her from the field of battle (5.335,
440), and Ares himself was likewise wounded by him. (5.837.)
Diomedes was wounded by Pandareus, whom, however, he
afterwards slew with many other Trojans. (5.97, &c.) In the
attack of the Trojans on the Greek camp. he and Odysseus
offered a brave resistance, but Diomedes was wounded and
returned to the ships. (11.320, &c.) He wore a cuirass made
by Hephaestus, but sometimes also a lion's skin. (8.195,
10.177 At the funeral games of Patroclus he conquered in the
chariot-race, and received a woman and a tripod as his
prize. (23.373, &c.) He also conquered the Telamonian Ajax
in single combat, and won the sword which Achilles had
offered as the prize. (23.811, &c.) He is described in the
Iliad in general as brave in war and wise in council (9.53),
in battle furious like a mountain torrent, and the terror of
the Trojans, whom he chases before him, as a lion chases
goats. (5.87, 11.382.) He is strong like a god (5.884), and
the Trojan women during their sacrifice to Athena pray to
her to break his spear and to make him fall. (6.306.) He
himself knows no fear, and refuses his consent when
Agamemnon proposes to take to flight, and he declares that,
if all flee, he and his friend Sthenelus will stay and fight
till Troy shall fill. (9.32, &c., comp. 7.398, 8.151 :
Philostr. Her. 4.)
The story of Diomedes, like those of other heroes of the
Trojan time, has received various additions and
embellishments from the hands of later writers, of which we
shall notice the principal ones. After the expedition of the
Epigoni he is mentioned among the suitors of Helen (Hyg.
Fab. 81; Apollod. 3.10.8), and his love of Helen induced him
to join the Greeks in their expedition against Troy with 30
ships. (Hyg. Fab. 97.) Being a relative of Thersites, who
was slain by Achilles, he did not permit the body of the
Amazon Penthesileia to be honourably buried, but dragged her
by the feet into the river Scamander. (Tzetz. ad Lycoph. 993
; Dict. Cret. 4.3.) Philoctetes was persuaded by Diomedes
and Odysseus to join the Greeks against Troy. (Soph.
Philoct. 570, &c.; Hyg. Fab. 102.) Diomedes conspired with
Odysseus against Palamedes, and under the pretence of having
discovered a hidden treasure, they let him down into a well
and there stoned him to death. (Dict. Cret. 2.15 ; comp.
Paus. 10.31.1.) After the death of Paris, Diomedes and
Odysseus were sent into the city of Troy to negotiate for
peace (Dict. Cret. 5.4), but he was afterwards one of the
Greeks concealed in the wooden horse. (Hyg. Fab. 108.) When
he and Odysseus had arrived in the arx of Troy by a
subterraneous passage, they slew the guards and carried away
the palladium (Verg. A. 2.163), as it was believed that
Ilium could not be taken so long as the palladium was within
its walls. When, during the night, the two heroes were
returning to the camp with their precious booty, and
Odysseus was walking behind him, Diomedes saw by the shadow
of his companion that he was drawing his sword in order to
kill him, and thus to secure to himself alone the honour of
having taken the palladium. Diomedes, however, turned round,
seized the sword of Odysseus, tied his hands, and thus drove
him along before him to the camp. (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 822.)
Diomedes, according to some, carried the palladium with him
to Argos, where it remained until Ergiaeus, one of his
descendants, took it away with the assistance of the
Laconian Leagrus, who conveyed it to Sparta. (Plut. Quaest.
Graec. 48.) According to others, Diomedes was robbed of the
palladium by Demophon in Attica, where he landed one night
on his return from Troy, without knowing where he was.
(Paus. 2.28.9.) A third tradition stated, that Diomedes
restored the palladium and the remains of Anchises to
Aeneias, because he was informed by an oracle, that he
should be exposed to unceasing sufferings unless lie
restored the sacred image to the Trojans. (Serv. ad Aen.
2.166, 3.407, iv, 427, 5.81.)
On his return from Troy, he had like other heroes to suffer
much from the enmity of Aphrodite, but Athena still
continued to protect him. He was first thrown by a storm on
the coast of Lycia, where he was to be sacrificed to Ares by
king Lycus; but Callirrhoe, the king's daughter, took pity
upon him, and assisted him in escaping. (Plut. Parall. Gr.
et Rom. 23.) On his arrival in Argos he met with an evil
reception which had been prepared for him either by
Aphrodite or Nauplius, for his wife Aegialeia was living in
adultery with Hippolytus, or according to others, with
Cometes or Cyllabarus. (Dict. Cret. 6.2; Tzetz. ad Lycoph.
609; Serv. ad Aen. 8.9.) He therefore quitted Argos either
of his own accord, or he was expelled by the adulterers
(Tzetz. ad Lyc. 602), and went to Aetolia. His going to
Aetolia and the subsequent recovery of Argos are placed in
some traditions immediately after the war of the Epigoni,
and Diomedes is said to have gone with Alcmaeon to assist
his grandfather Oeneus in Aetolia against his enemies.
During the absence of Diomedes, Agamemnon took possession of
Argos ; but when the expedition against Troy was resolved
upon, Agamemnon from fear invited Diomedes and Alcmaeon back
to Argos, and asked them to take part in the projected
expedition. Diomedes alone accepted the proposal, and thus
recovered Argos. (Strab. vii. p.325, x. p. 462; comp. Hyg.
Fab. 175; Apollod. 1.8.6; Paus. 2.25.2.) According to
another set of traditions, Diomedes did not go to Aetolia
till after his return from Troy, when he was expelled from
Argos, and it is said that he went first to Corinth; but
being informed there of the distress of Oeneus, he hastened
to Aetolia to assist him. Diomedes conquered and slew the
enemies of his grandfather, and then took up his residence
in Aetolia. (Dict. Cret. 6.2.) Other writers make him
attempt to return to Argos, but on his way home a storm
threw him on the coast of Daunia in Italy. Daunus, the king
of the country, received him kindly, and solicited his
assistance in a war against the Messapians. He promised in
return to give him a tract of land and the hand of his
daughter Euippe. Diomedes defeated the Messapians, and
distributed their territory among the Dorians who had
accompanied him In Italy Diomedes gave up his hostility
against the Trojans, and even assisted them against Turnus.
(Paus. 1.11; Serv. ad Aen. 8.9.) He died in Daunia at an
advanced age, and was buried in one of the islands off cape
Garganus, which were called after him the Diomedean islands.
Subsequently, when Daunus too had died, the Dorians were
conquered by the Illyrians, but were metamorphosed by Zeus
into birds. (Ant. Lib. 37; comp. Tzetz. ad Lyc. 602, 618.)
According to Tzetzes, Diomedes was murdered by Daunus,
whereas according to others he returned to Argos, or
disappeared in one of the Diomedean islands, or in the
country of the Heneti. (Strab. vi. p.284.) A number of towns
in the eastern part of Italy, such as Beneventum,
Aequumtuticum, Argos Hippion (afterwards Argyripa or Arpi),
Venusia or Aphrodisia, Canusium, Venafrum, Salapia, Spina,
Sipus, Garganum, and Brundusium, were believed to have been
founded by Diomedes. (Serv. ad Aen 8.9, 11.246; Strab. vi.
pp. 283, 284; Plin-H. N. 3.20; Justin, 12.2.) The worship
and service of gods and heroes was spread by Diomedes far
and wide : in and near Argos he caused temples of Athena to
be built (Plut. de Flum. 18; Paus. 2.24.2); his armour was
preserved in a temple of Athena at Luceria in Apulia, and a
gold chain of his was shewn in a temple of Artemis in
Peucetia. At Troezene he had founded a temple of Apollo
Epibaterius, and instituted the Pythian games there. He
himself was subsequently worshipped as a divine being,
especially in Italy, where statues of him existed at
Argyripa, Mctapontum, Thurii, and other places. (Schol. ad
Pind. Nem. 10.12 ; Scylax, Peripl. p. 6; comp. Strab. v.
p.214, &c.)
There are traces in Greece also of the worship of Diomedes,
for it is said that he was placed among the gods together
with the Dioscuri, and that Athena conferred upon him the
immortality which had been intended for his father Tydeus.
It has been conjectured that Diomedes is an ancient
Pelasgian name of some divinity, who was afterwards
confounded with the hero Diomedes, so that the worship of
the god was transferred to the hero. (Böckh, Explicat. ad
Pind. Nem. x. p. 463.) Diomedes was represented in a
painting on the acropolis of Athens in the act of carrying
away the Palladium from Troy (Paus. 1.22.6), and Polygnotus
had painted him in the Lesche at Delphi. (10.25.2, 10.2.)
Comp. Brandstäter, Die Gesch. des Aetol. Land p. 76, &c. - A
Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology,
William Smith, Ed.
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