Menelaus Paris at Sparta; his retrieval of Patroclus’s corpse; and his reunion with Helen. Menelaus appears as a character in a number of 5th-century Greek tragedies: Sophocles’ "Ajax", and Euripides’ "Andromache", "Helen", "Orestes", "Iphigenia at Aulis", and "The Trojan Women". Menelaus In Greek mythology, Menelaus (; , "Menelaos", from μένος "vigor, rage, power" and λαός "people," "wrath of the people") was a king of Mycenaean (pre-Dorian) Sparta, the husband of Helen of Troy, and the son of Atreus and Aerope. According to the "Iliad", Menelaus was a central figure in the Trojan War, leading the Spartan contingent of the Greek army,
History of Sparta to take advantage of the ensuing chaos, dispatched Philopoemen to Sparta with a large army. Once there, he compelled the Spartans to join the Achaean League ending their independence. Sparta played no active part in the Achaean War in 146 BC when the Achaean League was defeated by the Roman general Lucius Mummius. Subsequently, Sparta become a free city in the Roman sense, some of the institutions of Lycurgus were restored and the city became a tourist attraction for the Roman elite who came to observe exotic Spartan customs. The former Perioecic communities were not restored to Sparta and some