House of Sparta

The large family tree above combines the Houses of Laconia and Messenia together. The links between the two kingdoms come from marriages.

The first link was when Polycaon, son of Lelex, migrated to Messenia and married the Argive princess, Messene.

The second link came from Gorgophone, daughter of Perseus and Andromeda. Gorgophone married Perieres, son of Aeolus and king of Messenia. Gorgophone then married Oebalus, son of Cynortas and king of Sparta. Aphareus, Gorgophone's son by her first marriage, married his half-sister Arene, Gorgophone's daughter by her second husband, which provided the third link between Laconia and Messenia.

See House of Sparta for tales about this family. Information about the House of Messenia (such as Perieres, Aphareus and Leucippus, can be found on the Aeolid page.

Note that the Greek geographer Pausanias gave two versions of the early genealogy of Lelex, which are different. In one passage, Myles was the father of Eurotas, not his brother (or half-brother?), which is different from what I have drawn above. So the early genealogy of Laconia could look like this –

Usually, Zeus seduced Leda, wife of Tyndareus, so that Zeus was the father of Polydeuces and Helen, while at the same time, Leda gave birth to Castor and Clytemnestra, whose father was Tyndareus. However, some authors said that Helen was not the daughter of Leda; they said that Helen's mother was really Nemesis, the goddess of retribution. There are a couple of different variations of how Nemesis was seduced by Zeus. Whichever version you might have read, Nemesis laid an egg, which Leda kept until the egg hatched, and Helen was born. (See Helen, Leda or Nemesis.)