Astyanax

Infant son of Hector and Andromache — called Scamandrius by his father after the river of Troy, but by the city at large Astyanax, "lord of the city," because Hector alone was the bulwark of Ilios (*Iliad* 6.402-403). At the Scaean Gate, when Hector reached down to hold him, the child cried out in fear at the horsehair plume of the helmet, and Hector laughed and laid the helmet aside to embrace his son (*Iliad* 6.466-481). After the fall of Troy the Greeks, fearing the child would grow up to avenge his father, threw him from the walls of Ilios (Apollodorus *Epitome* 5.23).

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