Philoctetes for ten years. Helenus, the prophetic son of King Priam of Troy, was forced to reveal, under torture, that one of the conditions of the Greeks' winning the war was that they needed the bow and arrows of Heracles. Upon hearing this, Odysseus and a group of men (usually including Diomedes) rushed back to Lemnos to recover Heracles' weapons. (As Sophocles writes it in his play named "Philoctetes", Odysseus is accompanied by Neoptolemus, Achilles' son, also known as Pyrrhus. Other versions of the myth don't include Neoptolemus.) Surprised to find the archer alive, the Greeks balked on what to do
Neoptolemus (general) himself; and the two leaders, who were bitter personal enemies, sought each other out during the battle and engaged in single combat, in which, after a desperate struggle, Neoptolemus was slain by Eumenes. Neoptolemus (general) Neoptolemus (in Greek Νεoπτόλεμος; died 321 BC) was a Macedonian officer who served under Alexander the Great. According to Arrian he belonged to the race of the Aeacidae, so he was probably related to the family of the kings of Epirus. Neoptolemus is mentioned as serving in the Macedonian royal guards (εταιρoι) and distinguished himself particularly at the siege of Gaza, 332 BC, of which