Atreus: family tree --
Penelope: cousin of Helen and Clytemnestra.
At the end of the war: Agamemnon returns home with a mistress, Kassandra, who foretells the future. Klytemnestra kills both Agamemnon and his mistress, Kassandra.
Euripides: Clytemnestra is Agamemnon's second husband.
Genealogy:
Clytemnestra was the daughter of Tyndareus and Leda, the King and Queen of Sparta, making her a Spartan Princess.
Zeus appeared to Leda in the form of a swan, seducing and impregnating her. Leda produced four offspring from two eggs: Castor and Clytemnestra from one egg, and Helen and Polydeuces (Pollux) from the other.
Therefore, Castor and Clytemnestra were fathered by Tyndareus, whereas Helen and Polydeuces were fathered by Zeus. Her other sisters were Philonoe, Phoebe and Timandra.Penelope’s father was Icarius, brother of Tyndareus. Tyndareus was husband of Leda, Helen’s mother.
Klytemnestra and Helen were half-sisters (same mother, different fathers). Penelope was technically a cousin to only Klytemnestra (Tyndareus - Icarius were brothers) whereas technically no blood relationship between Helen and Penelope.
If Leda wants to keep a secret, and she better keep a secret, then she would disavow the relationship with a a swan/Zeus, and promote the family story that Helen and Klytemnestra were sisters, and Penelope was their cousin.
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The Curse Actually Extends Much Farther Back
Atreus and Thyestes were twin brothers.
Atreus was the father of Agamemnon and Menelaus.
Collectively, old man Atreus, sons Agamemnon and Menelaus and their descendants were collective referred to as Atreidai or Atreidae.
The twin brothers killed their half-brother Chrysippus. Their motive: the throne of Olympia, a small town in Elis on the Peloponnese peninsula, to the far, far west.
For that act, they were exiled by their father; they took refuge in Mycenae (near Argos). King Eurystheus was absent, fighting the Heracleidae. Eurystheus was killed and the brothers became co-rulers of Mycenae.
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Atreus and Thyestes: Twin Brothers
Parents: Pelops and Hippodamia.
Pelops co-conspired to kill his father-in-law, which resulted in another curse on the family.
After Atreus and Thyestes murdered their step-brother, they along with their mother Hippodamia, were exiled to Mycenae, where Hippodamia hung herself.
Long involved story of Atreu, his wife, Aerope, and the golden lamb to be sacrificed to Artemis.
Atreus ends up with the throne and banishes his brother Thyestes.
Atreus learns of Thyestes' adultery with Aerope. Atreus kills Thyestes' sons and tricked their father to eat their bodies.
Thyestes forced into exile for eating flesh of a human. Thyestes with daughter Pelopia had a son Aegisthus who was to kill Atreus but embarrassed by that incestuous act, Pelopia abandoned Aegisthus, found by a shepherd. The shepherd gives Aegisthus to Atreus,who raises him. Wow. Thyestes tells Aegisthus (when he is an adult) that Thyestes is both his father and grandfather.
Aegisthus then kills Atreus, although not before Atreus and Aerope had two sons, Agamemnon and Menelaus, and a daughter Anaxibia.
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Orestes and Elektra
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