#polymele

+ How I personally see them, since theres barely any info abt them, imma take some creative liberties :p and yes, all of them are the wives of Menoetius. Idk why there’s so many different versions of Patroclus mother but..whatever

Philomela (probably the most popular woman to be seen as Patroclus’ mother). I imagine her to be a strict, disciplined and sensible woman.

Polymele, Daughter of peleus & half sister of Achilles. I imagine her to be very bubbly, generous and gentle (and mostly taking her appearance after her father ofc, also I can imagine her being VERY pissed at Achilles if she finds out that her son died bc of him)

Periopis, princess of Pherae & daughter of King Pheres. I imagine her to be compassionate & very kind

Sthenele, princess of Iolcus. I imagine her to be a bit dull, worn out and isolated.

My my that brings me back to another ask I had answered to like oh my gosh all the way of last year's September! You can check it out here:

Gosh it was tough to find in my archives hahahaha but yeah we do have several myths in which we apparently see Odysseus appear willing or mostly willing although there are also some that seem rather obscure. I mean Telegony itself is not rescued today so we are not sure if Odysseus truly loved the Thesprotian queen Callydice or not and his case with her was yet another case of Circe or Calypso all over again (although most scholiasts or people mentioning it seem to mention that his marriage with her was willing). Hesiod for example mentions the relationship between Calypso and Odysseus being mostly willing. Others as well seem to adopt that line of thought.

So apart from these women we see on the list we also can add from the accounts of Parthenius, again, the story between Odysseus and Polymela, the daughter of Aeolus that seems to play some sort of mini-scandal. Since Odysseus seduced her and stayed with her during his monthly stay in Aeolus and he even gave her some of the Trojan spoils as a gift but then he set off and left with his men and left Polymela heartbroken. Aeolus was furious but apparently Polymela's brother Diores who was in love with his sister persuaded his father to let him marry her instead. Sounds like some sort of random excuse as to how the children of Aeolus would be married to each other but as per Homer that had already happened. So yeah here are a few

For anyone who doesn't know who Polymele is:

Polymele is one of the Aeolides, the children of Aeolus. According to the odyssey, she happily lived on the island of Aeolia, where Odysseus and his crew arrived during their journey home from Troy. She doesn't have an important role in this source.

However, in Parthenius of Nicaea’s version of her story, Polymele fell in love with Odysseus during his stay on Aeolia and became his lover in secret. When Odysseus departed, he left her with spoils from Troy, but her father, Aeolus, discovered her grief and was furious, and was about to put her to death, but her brother Diores, who was in love with her, intervened, and the two were allowed to marry.

Design notes for her.

When I have the time, I will draw her with color, overall, her main colors are white, blue, red and yellow.

I wanted to make her have a cloud-like body, ofc. I suppose she’s technically a demigoddess?

Alright I think I'm going to be straight forward to what I'm about to ask, and I'm sorry if I sound like a rude person. It's just the reaction I had when I learned about it. If you get startled by it, I understand:

Can you please explain to me who the hell is Polymele, Aeolus' daughter, who saw Odysseus, fell in love with him and he ALSO DID?! (what the hell?! he loves Penelope!).

This may sound childish, but I was actually kind of sad that I read that. Please tell if it's canon to The Odyssey.

Hahaha that reminds me of another ask that I had a while back you can see here:

Basically we talk about a bunch of post-homeric traditions that link Odysseus to some other areas or stories etc in one way serving the same purpose as other heroes before or after him that link him with offspring that became progenitors of an area. Also that being said some sources are also a bit more...questionable let's say and seem more like inspirations by one individual than actual mythical traditions although the limits are hard to find.

Anyways the specific tradition comes from a much later source than Homer and more specifically Parthenius who lived in 30s BC. He created a series of stories named "Love and Romances" (in which he claims to gather sources from other older than him sources) basically and some of them include some rather...juicy twist to the story