Idomeneus and the Vow (Human Sacrifice / Exile)

Catalogue ID: 04-trojan-cycle/096-idomeneus-vow-exile

Cycle: Trojan — Nostoi / Cretan return

Version line: Apollodorean / Servian–handbook nostos (vow; plague; exile)

Sources: Apollodorus, *Epitome* 6.10; Homer, *Iliad* 2.645–652, 4.251–271 (Idomeneus at Troy; no vow yet); Servius on *Aeneid* 3.121, 11.264 (full vow narrative in Latin scholia transmitting Greek nostos lore); Lycophron, *Alexandra* (Cretan nostos allusions)

Source file: /workspace/greek-myth-catalogue/04-trojan-cycle/096-idomeneus-vow-exile.md

Characters

Cretans — people who expel him after the plague
Deucalion — father of Idomeneus
Idamante — son; first living being met; sacrificial victim
Idomeneus — Cretan king; Trojan hero; maker of the vow; exile
Meriones — Iliadic companion (background at Troy)
Minos — grandfather; ancestral Cretan kingship
People of Crisa — recipient of the promised offering

Places

Daunia / Apulia — exile localization
Oenone — homeland; site of the meeting and sacrifice
The deep — place of the vow
Troy — war from which he sails

Themes

Narrative

Idomeneus, son of Deucalion and grandson of Minos, led the Cretan contingent at Troy and returned with a nostos the handbooks make tragic. Caught in a storm at sea, he vowed to sacrifice to Poseidon (or the gods) the first living thing that met him if he reached Crete safely. He landed, and the first to meet him was his own son—named Idamante (Idamantes) in later telling. Bound by the vow, Idomeneus killed the boy (or prepared the sacrifice); plague or divine anger then fell on Crete. The Cretans drove Idomeneus out. Apollodorus places his exile among the returns: he is expelled and ends in Italy (Salentine / Calabrian localization in antiquarian tradition) or wanders as a polluted king. Homer’s *Iliad* knows only the great Cretan warrior, still honored beside Meriones; the vow belongs to the cyclic and handbook nostos, akin to other rash wartime bargains (compare Jephthah-type patterns in comparative myth, but keep the Greek names). Catalogue the vow and exile apart from Idomeneus’s Iliadic aristeiai so the Cretan return stands as its own Nostoi unit.