Introduction
Laertes was the king of Ithaca and father of Odysseus. By the time of the events of the Odyssey, he had retired from active kingship to a rural farm, grieving what he believed was the loss of his son.
Family
- Children: Odysseus
A Father's Long Wait
Laertes appears mainly at the close of Odysseus's story, living in self-imposed rustic isolation during his son's long absence and the chaos of the suitors occupying his household. His reunion with Odysseus, after the suitors are finally defeated, is one of the Odyssey's final emotional scenes, and Laertes fights alongside his son and grandson Telemachus against the suitors' vengeful kinsmen.
As with all figures of Greek heroic legend, sources diverge on many particulars; the account above follows the most widely transmitted classical tradition.