Short answer: the house of Atreus destroys itself across five generations because every crime demands a revenge and every revenge is a fresh crime. It starts with a monstrous banquet between Atreus and Thyestes, runs through Agamemnon sacrificing his daughter, and ends with Orestes killing his mother Clytemnestra to avenge his father.
If the house of Thebes falls by trying to dodge a prophecy, this one falls for a different reason: by being right. Everyone who kills here has a just motive.
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Atreus and Thyestes are brothers fighting over the throne of Mycenae. Thyestes seduces Aerope, Atreus' wife, and with her help takes the throne.
Atreus wins it back and pretends to make peace. He invites his brother to a banquet of reconciliation and serves him a stew. When Thyestes has finished eating, Atreus shows him the heads and the hands: they were his sons.
That is the crime that sets everything in motion. Everything after it is the bill.
Agamemnon, Atreus' son, gathers the Greek fleet to sail for Troy. And the fleet cannot leave, because there is no wind.
The seer names the price: sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia. Agamemnon summons her with the excuse of a wedding to Achilles, and kills her at the altar.
That is the second crime, and with it Agamemnon stops being a victim of the curse and starts feeding it. Ten years later he comes home from Troy victorious, with Cassandra as spoil.
This is where the myth usually gets told badly. Clytemnestra is reduced to the woman who cheats on her husband with Aegisthus and murders him on his return.
But Clytemnestra is the mother of the girl Agamemnon cut down for a favourable wind. She has been waiting ten years. And Aegisthus is not just any lover: he is the surviving son of Thyestes, the one missing from that stew.
They both hold the same account against the same family.
When Agamemnon arrives she receives him with carpets and a hot bath, and kills him in the tub, tangled in a net.
Orestes, the son, kills Clytemnestra and Aegisthus to avenge his father. And with that the system breaks: he has just committed matricide, the crime hunted by the Furies.
The chain can only continue or stop. And here the myth does something it has never done before: Athena convenes a court, twelve citizens hear both sides and vote. Orestes is acquitted.
Five generations of blood end in a ballot. It is the idea that closes Greek tragedy: revenge does not stop with more revenge, it stops with a trial.
| Character | Whose what | What they do |
|---|---|---|
| Tantalus | The great-grandfather | Serves his own son to the gods |
| Atreus | Son of Pelops | Serves Thyestes his sons in a stew |
| Thyestes | Atreus' brother | Seduces Aerope and eats his sons |
| Aerope | Atreus' wife | Helps Thyestes steal the throne |
| Agamemnon | Atreus' son | Sacrifices Iphigenia for wind |
| Iphigenia | Agamemnon's daughter | Dies at the altar thinking she is to marry |
| Clytemnestra | Agamemnon's wife | Kills him in the bath |
| Aegisthus | Thyestes' son | Clytemnestra's lover and accomplice |
| Orestes | Son of both | Kills his mother and is put on trial |
| Electra | Orestes' sister | Pushes him to do it |
Aegisthus is the son of Thyestes, the brother Atreus served his own children at a banquet. He is the survivor of that slaughter, so killing Agamemnon, son of Atreus, is not merely a lover's crime: it is a family debt two generations old being collected.
Because Agamemnon sacrificed their daughter Iphigenia so the fleet would get its wind and reach Troy. The "unfaithful wife" version skips the entire motive. Clytemnestra has spent ten years waiting for that man to come home.
With a trial, not another death. When Orestes kills his mother, the Furies hunt him for matricide, and Athena convenes a court in Athens that acquits him. It is the moment revenge gives way to justice.
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