The Greek Gods

In Greek mythology, Paris (also known as Alenander or Alexandros) was the son of Priam. Priam was the king of Troy, and Hecuba. Paris appears in several Greek legends and is known by his elopement with Helen, who was the queen of Sparta. This was one of the main causes for the Trojan war. Paris later kills Achilles, in the Trojan war, when he hit him in the heel with an arrow.

Before Paris was born his mother had a dream of giving birth to a flaming torch. She sought the opinion of the seer, Aesacus, as to what the dream meant and was told that it was a foretelling of the downfall of Troy and that the child would be the ruin of his homeland. Aesacus announced that a child, born on the day that Paris was born, would have to be killed in order to save the kingdom.Even though Paris was born on that day before midnight, Priam nor Hecuba could kill him. Paris’ father asked the herdsman, Agelus to take the child away and kill him. The herdsman took him to Mount Ida but could not kill him either so he left the baby exposed there on the mountain. Instead of perishing there, the baby was nurses by a female bear. Agelaus returned after nine days and discovered the baby still alive so he took him home in a backpack and raised him as his own. He took a dog’s tongue back to Priam to show them that he had indeed killed the baby.

When Paris was still young he fought a gang of cattle thieves and took the cows back to the herd where they had came from. This is when he received the surname of Alexander., which meant ‘protector of men’. Oeneus became Paris’ first lover. She was skilled in arts of prophesy and medicine. Later Paris left her and went to Helen and Oeneus told him that if he was ever injured that he should come to her and she could heal him, no matter how serious the injury.

Paris liked to fight his bulls one against another and he had one which could not be beat so he began fighting the bull against other herdsmen’s bulls. He won them all. Paris offered to give a golden crown to any bull which could beat his. Ares decided to change into a bull and fight the bull. He won the fight and Paris gave him the golden crown. The gods of Olympus admired Paris for his honesty in giving away the crown so they made him the judge as to who was the most beautiful of Aphrodite, Athena, and Hera. For more information on Paris, search the internet. There are many stories about the Greek Gods available.