Memnon

During the Trojan War, he brought an army to Troy's defense and killed Antilochus, Nestor's son, during a fierce battle.

The death of Memnon echoes that of Hector, another defender of Troy whom Achilles also killed out of revenge for a fallen comrade, Patroclus.

Memnon's death is related at length in the lost epic Aethiopis,[2] likely composed after The Iliad, circa the 7th century BC.

Dictys Cretensis, author of a pseudo-chronicle of the Trojan War, writes that "Memnon, the son of Tithonus and Aurora, arrived with a large army of Indians and Aethiopians, a truly remarkable army which consisted of thousands and thousands of men with various kinds of arms, and surpassed the hopes and prayers even of Priam.

Before the next day's battle, so great is the divine love towards Memnon that Zeus makes all the other Olympians promise not to interfere in the fighting.

When Memnon reaches the Greek ships, Nestor begs Achilles to fight him and avenge Antilochos, leading to the two men clashing while both wearing divine armor made by Hephaestus, making another parallel between the two warriors.

Venus implores Vulcan for Aeneas: "Therefore I come at last with lowly suit before a godhead I adore, and pray for gift of arms,—a mother for her son.

[8] Between Achilles and Memnon, Zeus favors both of them and makes each man tireless and huge so that the whole battlefield can watch them clash as demigods.

In honour of Memnon, the gods collect all the drops of blood that fall from him and use them to form a huge river that on every anniversary of his death will bear the stench of human flesh.

[11] Eos, the goddess of the dawn, begs Zeus to return her son; the king of the gods doesn't bring Memnon back to life, but he grants his mother a grace, that she will be able to see him alive and to caress him with his rosy fingers every day, when she opens the doors of heaven so as her brother Helios can begin his journey.

According to ancient Greek poets, Memnon's father Tithonus was snatched away from Troy by the goddess of dawn Eos and was taken to the ends of the earth on the coast of Oceanus.

Considered both "Asian and African" for Greek and Roman writers because of his parentage and because of the geographical indeterminacy of Aithiopia and of India.

[23] Memnon Pieta When Memnon died, Eos mourned greatly over the death of her son,[24] and made the light of her brother, Helios (Sun), to fade, and begged Nyx (Night), to come out earlier, so she could be able to freely steal her son's body undetected by the armies of the Greeks and the Trojans.

[27] The Colossi of Memnon are two massive stone 3,400 year old twin statues of the Pharaoh Amenhotep III, located in Luxor, Egypt.

This identification was based, argued by R. Drew Griffith on the fact that the statue faces sunrise on the winter solstice and so was linked to the dawn.

Like Memnon, Amenhotep formed military pacts with eastern kings, was son of a solar deity, and was exceptionally handsome.

the northernmost of the colossi collapsed, and, at sunrise, began to produce an eerie musical sound that early Greek travelers interpreted as the mythical half-mortal Memnon calling out to his mother Eos, goddess of the dawn.

Visitors came from far and wide to hear the song, including the Roman Emperor Hadrian and the Empress Sabine, who had to wait several days before the statue called out to them in a.d.