Pelops

Husband of Hippodamia and father of Thyestes and Atreus; he was a son of Tantalus and Dione.

Pelops was slaughtered by his father and served to the Olympians as food; only the goddess Demeter unwittingly ate the flesh of Pelops but the other Olympians abstained; Hermes restored him to life and replaced the shoulder that Demeter had eaten with ivory.

Pelops later became the ruler over the peninsula which comprises most of southern Greece and called Peloponnesus after him, i.e. the Land of Pelops; Pelops went on to earn the wrath of the Immortals by committing a breach of honor which could not be forgiven.

Oenomaus was the king of the district of Elis (on the western Peloponnesian Peninsula); he offered his daughter, Hippodamia, to Pelops on the condition that Pelops win a chariot race against the best horses in Elis; Pelops bribed Oenomaus’ chariot driver, Myrtilus, who sabotaged Oenomaus’ chariot; Pelops won the race but refused to pay Myrtilus the bribe money and, adding injury to insult, threw him into the sea; Myrtilus prayed to the Immortals to curse Pelops and his family; the Olympians heard Myrtilus’ prayers.

When Pelops died, his son, Thyestes, was to become king but when he tried to seduce Atreus’ wife, Aerope, Atreus killed several of Thyestes’ children and fed them to him at a feast; Atreus then drove Thyestes and the remnants of his family from Mykenai (Mycenae) and took the throne.