in Ancient History, a son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. When his father was cruelly murdered by Clytemnestra and Ægisthus, young Orestes was saved from his mother's dagger by means of his sister Electra, called by Homer Laodicea, having been privately conveyed to the house of Strophius, who was king of Phocis, and who had married a sister of Agamemnon. He was tenderly treated by Strophius, who carefully educated him with his son Pylades. The two young princes soon became acquainted, and from their familiarity arose the most inviolable attachment and friendship. When Orestes came to years of discretion, he visited Mycenæ, and avenged his father's death by assassinating his mother Clytemnestra and her adulterer Ægisthus. Various accounts are given of the way in which these murders were committed. After their commission, however, he was acknowledged king of Mycenæ; but being tormented by the Furies, a punishment which the ancients always thought followed parricide, he exiled himself to Argos, where he was still pursued by the vengeful goddesses. Apollo, however, purified him, and he was acquitted by the unanimous opinion of the Areopagites, whom Minerva herself instituted on this occasion, according to the narration of the poet Æschylus, who flatters the Athenians in his tragical story, by representing them as passing judgment even upon the gods themselves. According to Pausanias, Orestes was purified of the murder, not at Delphi, but at Troezen, where still was seen a large stone at the entrance of Diana's temple, upon which the ceremonies of purification had been performed by nine of the principal citizens of the place. There was also at Megalopolis, in Arcadia, a temple dedicated to the Furies, near which Orestes cut off one of his fingers with his teeth in a fit of insanity. These different traditions are confused by Euripides, who says that Orestes, after the murder of his mother, consulted the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, where he was informed that nothing could deliver him from the persecutions of the Furies, if he did not bring into Greece Diana's statue, which was in the Taurica Chersonesus, and which, as it is reported by some, had fallen down from heaven. This was an arduous enterprise. The king of Chersonesus always sacrificed on the altars of the goddess all such as entered the borders of his country. Orestes and his friend were therefore both carried before Thoas the king of the place, and they were doomed to be sacrificed. Iphigenia, Orestes' sister, was then priestess of Diana's temple, and it was her office to immolate these strangers. The intelligence that they were Grecians delayed the preparations, and Iphigenia was anxious to learn something about a country which had given her birth. She even interested herself in their misfortunes, and offered to spare the life of one of them, provided he would convey letters to Greece from her hand. This was a difficult trial; never was friendship more truly displayed, according to the words of Ovid, ex Pont. 3. c. 2.

Ire jubet Pylades carum moriturum Orestem. Hic negat; inque vicem pugnat uterque mori.

At last, however, Pylades gave way to the pressing in treaties of his friend, and consented to carry the letters of Iphigenia to Greece. These were addressed to Orestes himself; and therefore these circumstances soon led to a discovery of the connections of the priestess with the man whom she was going to immolate. Iphigenia was convinced that he was her brother Orestes; and when the cause of their journey had been explained, she herself resolved with the two friends to fly from Chersonesus, and to carry away the statue of Diana. Their flight was discovered, and Thoas prepared to pursue them; but Minerva interfered, and told him that all had been done by the will and with the approbation of the gods. Some imagine that Orestes came to Cappadocia from Chersonesus, and that there he left the statue of Diana at Comana. Others contradict this tradition; and Pausanias thinks that the statue of Diana Orthia was the same as that which had been carried away from the Chersonesus. Some again suppose that Orestes brought it to Arcia in Italy, where Diana's worship was established. It was after this that Orestes ascended the throne of Argos, where he reigned in perfect security, married Hermione the daughter of Menelaus, and gave his sister to his friend Pylades. The marriage of Orestes with Hermione is also a matter of dispute among the ancients. All are agreed that she had been promised to the son of Agamemnon; but Menelaus had married her to Neoptolemus the son of Achilles, who had shown himself so truly interested in his cause during the Trojan war. The marriage of Hermione with Neoptolemus displeased Orestes; he remembered that she had been early promised to him; he was therefore determined to recover her by force or artifice. This he did by procuring the assassination of Neoptolemus. According to Ovid's epistle of Hermione to Orestes, Hermione had always been faithful to her first lover, and even it was by her persuasions that Orestes removed her from the house of Neoptolemus, for she was dissatisfied with the partiality of Neoptolemus for Andromache, and her attachment for Orestes was increased. There are, indeed, various opinions likewise about this: he, however, certainly managed to secure her affections, and retired to his kingdom of Argos. His old age was crowned with peace and security, and he died in the 96th year of his age, leaving his throne to his son Tisamenes by Hermione. Three years after, the Heraclidae recovered the Peloponnesus, and banished the descendants of Menelaus from the throne of Argos. Orestes died in Arcadia, as some say, by the bite of a serpent: and the Lacedemonians, who had become his subjects at the death of Menelaus, were directed by an oracle to bring his bones to Sparta. They were some time after discovered at Tegea, and his stature appeared to be seven cubits, according to the traditions mentioned by Herodotus and others. The friendship of Orestes and of Pylades became proverbial: and the two friends received divine honours among the Scythians, and were worshipped in temples.